It’s Values First in Dating

At this stage of the dance, for the two of you, dating is about two primary things.

1. Determining if this is the right person for you, and
2. Preparing each other for your future spouse (whether it’s you or not).

Since the mate question is always front and center at this stage of your lives, you need to make sure you’re clear about what kind of person you’d want to spend the rest of your life with.

Though neither of you are list people, I’m guessing that you have some general ideas in your heads of the kind of person you’d like to marry someday (good looking/attractive, funny/sense of humor, likeable/easy to get along with, good conversationalist, intelligent/smart, will listen to everything your father has to say and think it’s brilliant, etc. :-).

But my counsel would be to make values congruence the primary thing you’re looking for. Why? Because values reveal the deepest part of someone. And if the two of you have different core values—or different hierarchies of core values, you’ll have massive conflicts that will ultimately separate you.

For example, if you value frugality and your spouse values consumption, you’ll have battles about money every week … for the rest of your lives. Or if you value responsibility and your spouse values self-preservation/ego, you’ll be constantly arguing about their excuse-making as to why things never get done. Or if you value excellence and they value relaxation/time off you’ll have conflicts all the time about why things aren’t done well.

But the conflicts aren’t always caused by having different values, sometimes it may be that you have the same or similar values, but the conflict is caused because your core values aren’t on the same priority scale. For example, we have a family friend who had been dating a guy on and off for a number of years, but kept putting off getting engaged. When I talked with this person, I asked her a number of questions which led us to the conclusion that the major reason why she didn’t want to marry him was because her highest value was learning/education. It wasn’t that he didn’t value learning, it was just way down the scale for him (like maybe 10 or 15).

So my counsel to her was, “Never compromise on your top couple of core values.” Learning/education was her highest value. It’s what drove her. And it’s what drove her crazy in her relationship with this guy. Shortly after that conversation she ended their several year old relationship—and not long after that, she met a guy who had a similar top core value of learning/education—and as of this writing, she and her husband have been happily married for over a decade and have three wonderful kids.

So, even though the two of you aren’t big on lists, I’d encourage both of you to do some soul searching and wrestle with the question, “What are my core values?” And then, once you make a list, I’d encourage you to wrestle with, and then whittle that list down to your top five. Once you’re clear on that, then when you meet someone you feel attracted to, you’ll have a better idea of what you’re looking for, “Do we have similar values?”

Most of the things on most people’s lists of what they’re looking for are obvious (like good looking. Duh! If you weren’t attracted to them in the first place, you wouldn’t even be asking the question, “Is this the right person for me?”). If you want to be wise, you want to have a better list and ask better questions. In this case, you want to ask the values congruence question—and, if you do, you’ll be well ahead of the rest of the class—and on your way to finding someone with whom you can build a marriage with that will not only last, but be a joy!

One last note: In case you’re curious, your core values don’t have to be in the same order, they just need to be in the same general vicinity.

To get you started, here’s a sample list of core values you can use to stimulate your thinking (and begin the debating :-).

Authenticity, Affordability, Change, Cleanliness, Collaboration, Commitment, Competency, Consistency, Continuous Improvement, Creativity, Curiosity, Dependability, Diversity, Education, Efficiency, Excellence, Fairness, Frugality, Fun, Generosity, Growth, Hard Work, Health, Honesty, Humility, Imagination, Influence, Initiative, Integrity, Intelligence, Justice, Knowledge, Laughter, Lifelong Learning, Loyalty, Objectivity, Openness, Optimism/Positive Thinking, Passion, Perseverance, Play, Productivity, Professionalism, Promptness, Quality, Reliability, Respect, Responsibility, Responsiveness, Results, Safety, Security, Service, Simplicity, Speed, Teachability, Teamwork, Trust/trustworthiness, Value, Wisdom