When is it a good time to sleep with someone?
When do you take the relationship to the next level? Is it true you should wait at least 3 dates before you sleep with him, or is this a modern dating myth? So is it the three date rule or is it when it becomes official? If you're thinking about when you should first have sex with a guy, I’m not going to give you rules by which you should live by instead I want to help you by giving you encouragement to make the best decisions for yourself.
Each to their own
I don’t believe that any of us have the power or the need to tell other people how they should live their lives. For some people, physical intimacy is something that is a part of a committed relationship. Others might value spontaneity and living in the moment.
If you've heard a lot of dating advice around stringing it out with a guy, I want to unpick that and get you to a place where you feel like you can make a really good judgement about moving the relationship forwards.
Let's look at the logic behind waiting before you sleep with someone. The main logic is that by elongating the dating process, and keeping him investing in you for a longer period of time, he's gonna have time to establish an emotional connection to you and not `use’ you for the sexual opportunity. Now, to state the obvious, this paints a pretty grim picture of men, and their motivations. This is not how 50% of the world's population thinks about sex and relationships. But, there is a very different reason why it may be powerful for you to hang on, until you're comfortable.
One night stands
There are some people in the world who are very comfortable having physical intimacy early on in the relationship. They can have a night of passion, put their high heels on the next day, shut the door, and not care. If that's you, and you're happy with it, that's awesome. If, however, you would shut the door and then be overtaken with anxiety, or start to expect a little bit more from him, or feel much more emotionally exposed, then that could be a telling sign you are rushing the process.
Whilst we might all want to be the female version of James Bond, with the devil may care attitude, it's important to recognise how you feel about that particular topic. If your emotions are really closely related to physical intimacy, respect your own timeline for how you want to move things forward.
It's not so much that we meet a guy, have sex with him, and then suddenly, he changes his opinion of you, because you'd cross that physical line. It's all about what it means to us to take that next step forward.
If you take that next step forwards, and you know that that means you're going to expect to see him again, to be on a track towards a relationship, be cautious. Expectations too early on in dating can set us up for disappointments.
Creating expectations too early on
Let's imagine a scenario: you had the most awesome first date with the first guy in ages. You feel excited about him! Then you kind of get carried away in the moment, one thing leads to another... Next thing you know, you are shutting the front door, carrying your high heels in your hand. Now, if that happens, and you pursued the adventure that far, because you really liked him you might expect this to blossom into something. When it doesn't, you can easily rationalise that you've made a `mistake’ by having sex too quickly.
Instead, what probably happened is that you formed expectations about what was going to happen very early on, and they just didn't match up with the reality of what this man was able to offer. The key here is to really slow the dating process down until you've had clear communication about what you both want. Wait until you've built more trust, and you get to know him a bit better to be able to make real judgement calls.
Choosing the right time to sleep with someone isn't about getting one guy's approval or worrying what one person happens to think about us. Ultimately, it's about us retaining our motivation to keep the process of dating going until we meet someone super amazing and special.
Do not build your expectations too quickly, as they might get crushed. That is a pretty good way to destroy your motivation levels. Instead, look to preserve your own values around dating and intimacy and your own motivation to keep the search going to meet one of the many amazing people there are out there for you. If that means slowing things down a bit, then your best and only good rationale is to wait.
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If you've found my advice on when to sleep with a guy useful, I’ve got an amazing free mini training course for you. I'm all about teaching women how they can learn to love dating, and make decisions that are right for you and that aren't really about getting any man.
