Dating vs. Hanging Out

This week in my Family Relations class we have been talking about dating and relationships. In today's class we talked a lot about dating vs. hanging out. As we talked about what dating really is, we talked about the 3 P's of dating, which are: (1) Planned; (2) Paired Off; and (3) Paid For. I thought that this was really interesting because I had never heard of the 3 P's of dating before. I knew that there was a difference between going on dates and just hanging out, but I didn't really know what exactly counted as a date. So talking about this was very helpful to me as I learned what counts as a date.
Another thing that I found interesting in our discussion today was some of the reasons that people choose not to date. One reason that I found really intriguing was that many people have extremely high expectations that make it very hard for them to find people who they will even consider going on dates with. They have this vision of the perfect person to go on dates with, and anyone that falls short of their expectations is not worthy to be asked on a date by that individual. Another reason was that there are some individuals who are in the "race to commitment". This means that these individuals who are in this race to commitment are viewing dating only as a way of finding a mate. This can cause difficulties when the two individuals going on the date together have different expectations; one may be looking for someone to commit to while the other individual is simply going on dates to have fun and explore their options. The individual wanting to commit to someone then may decide that they don't want to date others because they think that other individuals aren't wanting to commit to them. The last reason that we discussed was this idea of how many are in the dating game just to find a mate. They don't look at dating as a way of getting to know people, having fun, and exploring their options, but instead view dating as the way to finding their mate in life. This can cause people to postpone dating if they feel like they aren't ready to fully commit to someone, or once again it can lead to challenges when the two individuals going on dates together have different expectations in regards to dating.
This week's class has been really interesting to me and I can't wait to see what is in store!