I’m not generally a very anxious person, but when it comes to dating, I’ve had more than my fair share of anxiety. In fact it got so bad in grad school that when a guy I had crush on was coming over, I had to have my housemate sit on me for 20 minutes because I was shaking so hard that I couldn’t calm down.
So I get it If you’ve been dating and feeling anxiety come as you navigate your experiences. Especially right now when our whole world has been thrown into major changes from the Corona Virus, it’s likely a lot of human beings are experiencing anxiety from the uncertainty of their financial security, relationships and health.
If you’re someone who’s been feeling quite anxious to the point of overwhelm, especially when related to dating, I’m going to share a few reasons why this happens and how shifting into your feminine energy can help.
If you get anxious in dating you may recognize that certain situations trigger you. This can happen:
When a person pulls away, doesn’t text or call you back - Maybe the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd dates went really well and you started to think, maybe this could be your guy, but then it drops off suddenly and you don’t hear from him at all. You text him to check in, but he doesn’t respond for 2 days. The anxiety kicks in.
When you’re not getting what you need- When you know that you want a person who talks respectfully about his mom or who pays attention to details to make sure you feel good on a date or calls you consistently throughout the week, but you’re not getting that. You come up with reasons why he’s that way and ignore honoring what would feel good for you. The anxiety kicks in.
When you’re not being yourself- Your date takes you to a restaurant with bacon in every dish, but you’re vegan, you don’t speak up and instead try to make it work for you. You laugh at his jokes that are partially offensive. You cancel your favorite gym class to spend time with him. These can be the start of compromising in small ways who you really are. You put in a lot of effort to be someone you think your date would like. The anxiety kicks in.
When they don’t seem as into you are you are into them- Are you waiting by your phone to see his text pop up? Did he tell you he wasn’t sure about when he’d be free this week? Does he not seem sure about the kind of relationship he wants or his contact has been “on” one week and “off” the next 2 weeks? If you’ve got strong feelings for a guy that isn’t making you a priority with his communication nor taking action to be with you. The anxiety kicks in.
When you are fantasizing about who a guy really is- You’ve gone on 2 dates with this guy and you are imaging how great he’d be playing with the daughter that you’ve always wanted. So you stop entertaining all other date options and start to focus only on him. But you don’t really even know who he is yet. The anxiety kicks in.
In each of these scenarios a woman gives her value over to another person for them to define her. She is usually making meaning of a man’s behavior and letting it dictate whether she is worthy, lovable or attractive enough to get the love that she desires.
When we are giving another person the power to define our worth, we stop drawing our innate value from who we are—the amazing, uniquely beautiful, talented, sensual, funny, light-hearted, compassionate, resourceful, creative woman that we are. When we don’t stand in our innate value, we tend to go more into our masculine energy, which is about making things happen and fixing things. We start to feel anxious in order to not feel the emotions that are coming up, which is suppressing our feminine nature that naturally feels emotions easily. This causes problems in our experiences with men, because they can sense that action oriented energy is covering up for our lack of belief in our own value.
On the other hand, when we stand in the truth of our worth as women, we shift into the power of our feminine energy.
A woman in her feminine energy knows that her essential being is valuable, powerful and desirable. There is nothing that she has to do to earn or gain the affection of a man or anyone else in her life. While the masculine energy takes action and makes things happen to attract a partner, the feminine rests in her value, which looks like honoring her feelings, speaking up about her desires, honoring her body and the intuitive information that it gives her. The feminine takes time to go inward to see what she is feeling. Instead of keeping herself busy and doing activities to numb their feelings, she tunes in to give herself time to feel and then acts on what feels good or creates boundaries around what feels bad.
So shifting into this feminine energy can help us to overcome anxiety in many ways, here are 3 specific ideas:
Resting in Your Value - Whether that means telling yourself the truth about your value daily or reminding yourself in the face of a financial crisis that you are worthy to receive the things that you need. Start to see yourself as the prize that a man gets to have when he treats you in the way that feels good, nourishing and creates security for you. Then qualify the man—is he good enough for you? Do you want him as he is?
Get Curious - what am I feeling about this experience?—write down all the feelings. Where is this feeling coming from? Instead of reaching for your phone to call a guy in attempts to relieve yourself from the unbearable anxiety that he’s not texting you, how can you sit with yourself and get curious about your feelings?
Notice Your Body’s Intuition - Notice when you start to feel tension around your heart or start to clench in your pelvis or when your gut feels like it’s tied in knots. Then close your eyes and ask yourself - what is my body telling me right now. So often our bodies have wisdom for us about a dating situation before we realize that wisdom on a conscious level.
Once we gain awareness of the experiences that cause the anxiety to kick in for us, it can be helpful to start to take steps to both increase our own sense of self-worth as well as taking time to check in with what’s coming up for us in our feeling space.
When anxiety comes on, it can be a way to numb our emotions. When this happens we sometimes want to make the uncomfortable feeling of anxiety go away by going into our masculine energy. For instance we think by taking action to get a man’s response we’ll feel better. However, it’s rare that we ever feel better when we grasp at getting a man’s attention, instead of resting in the knowledge that we deserve what we actually want—for the guy to freely choose to reach out to us because he wants to. He is free to choose and we are assured of our value no matter what happens.
If you're experiencing anxiety and having trouble getting to the root of it on your own, it can be helpful to get support explore ways to shift into your feminine energy. Schedule a coaching session below to feel calmer and confident in your relationships.