Thou Shalt not take False Idols

Not being remotely religious, one of the ten commandments may seem like a strange place to extract dating advice, however, the issue of idolatry has to be one of the most plaguing factors in our dating dilemmas. Some worship idols, some find themselves being worshipped, and there are some who simple can’t cope without their pedestal.

Charlie had a pattern that was driving her crazy.  Throughout her life, she had poured blood, sweat, tears and toil into the pursuit of unattainable men.  Whether they be attached men, ambiguous men, addicts, tortured souls unable to sustain a relationship if their lives depended on it, or even celebrities, these were the guys that drove her to distraction.  The men she fruitlessly pursued, though flattered at her idolatry, and pleased to have been put on a pedestal, at the end of the day, couldn’t see her unless they looked down.  She desperately wanted to meet the guy that would sweep her off her feet, yet she would nonchalantly stroll on past the line of interested men at her doorstep, in favour of chasing rainbows. A self defeating prophecy by any standards, and one that was driving her self confidence to the ground she was failing to kept her feet on.

It took Charlie a string of heartbreaks (along with a teenage realisation that it wasn’t going to happen with Johnny Depp) to face the fact that she had developed a mentality that dictated, if you have to bust a gut to attain it, it must be highly valuable.  You got the impression that if any of these men actually became available to her, these idols would soon lose their glittering gold shimmer (OK, maybe not Johnny Depp) and look like base metal. Her epiphany relationship came when she met Josh.  Clearly interested in her, but not forthright enough to have her clasping for her running shoes, and highly forgiving of her initial signs of disinterest, slowly but surely, with him, Charlie decided to face what actually turned out be her fear, her fear of actual real intimacy with an available guy. And this was the turning point that led to Charlie’s relocation to reality.

When we adopt the Indiana Jones dating strategy of making an adventure out of pursuing hard won goals, do we choose the chase over the relationship?  Are we in essence choosing to run towards something, because it hides the fact that we are running away from something else?  That something else being a real, mutually fulfilling, risk taking, vulnerability exposing relationship.