Avoiding That Valentine\’s Day Date Fright

For lots of us, going on a first date is the most nerve-wracking thing since waiting to be hung, drawn and quartered (probably), and on Valentine\’s Day the pressure becomes even worse! To help out, here at Will Williams Meditation we’ve decided to put our heads together and come up with some brilliant dating tips which will have St Valentine\’s himself winking at you in sexy approval.

Of course, meditation makes you calmer, more composed and improves self-esteem, all of which contributes towards making you a complete dating wizard, but if you need a bit of extra guidance, read on.

Picking your Date

It’s often difficult to find “The One” when there’s literally BILLIONS of eligible people in the world and there’s no real reason why you couldn’t meet and form a relationship with any one of them. It’s not like the like the good old days when you were simply assigned a partner. Back then you just had to turn up to a few parties until your mum pointed at some crusty prospect and said “You’re engaged to them. Don’t complain, they’re VERY rich”. Unless of course you were a penniless vagabond, in which case the main aim was to jump someone’s bones in the small window between puberty and catching the plague.

But now, you have to pick a beau for yourself! And if dating sites are involved, your ideal partner is usually suggested from a very limited and not so clever algorithm. How very romantic!

Well, first things first, don’t overthink it. When it comes to dating, aiming simply to have some fun and meeting up with anyone who catches your eye is a great idea. The worst thing that can happen is that you spend an hour or two with someone you don’t hit it off with, and you could find that someone unexpected surprises you.

How Do I Look?

Before going on a date, brains have a lovely habit of accentuating all the things we’re insecure about. Some terrible curse comes down in the hours before meeting a potential sex god where every outfit looks terrible and the slightly sticky-out tooth that you happily ignore the rest of the time becomes your distinguishing feature, sending self-consciousness to stratospheric levels. What’s more, the mono-culture of “desirable” people on TV and in magazines can make you assume that human beings only like one very particular kind of look, so nervousness over appearance can get quite intense.

The first thing to remember is that it’s very likely that your date feels exactly the same way. The second thing is that YOU ARE SMOKING HOT. Phwoar! Just look at you! People actually like all sorts of people and chances are there’s always going to be a sizable chunk of the population that fancies the pants off you. This is just science. If you’re especially nervous, dance it out to some empowering music before you leave the house.

Thoughts. So. Many. Thoughts.

Most of the time we can ignore our perpetual inner monologue. But on dates – presuming you’re not just internally screaming – your brain can go into overdrive. On and on it goes, chatting away like the person you were desperately hoping wouldn’t sit next to you on the bus, and for some reason, it never thinks ANYTHING helpful! It just shouts incoherent self-criticism and terrible advice, including thoughts such as-

• “oh for goodness sake, I definitely fancy them; What an absolute nightmare”
• “I’m laughing too much. Or maybe I’m not laughing enough? Laugh more, immediately!! Oh, nope, it was definitely too much.”
• “I’m not telling… I can’t be… Oh yes. Of course I am, I’m telling the naked and climbing a streetlight story. Fabulous.”
• “Bloody hell, brain, won’t you give it a rest?”

It may be tempting to order a triple vodka (with cherry for sophistication) to calm the nerves, but this is not particularly advisable if you want to avoid being a stumbling mess when you first meet someone.

The best thing to do is to simply acknowledge all this silliness and let it die down in its own time. Of course a short twenty-minute meditation in a toilet cubicle would help, but your pasta would get cold. Better to do it beforehand, and you\’ll be a paragon of desirability. Better still, do it before you tackle the wardrobe because a) it will help you make a sound and sexy choice and b) it\’ll ensure you don\’t run out of time in a tide of last minute garment changes.

Awkward Silence

The problem with dating- particularly when you are staring desperately into your coffee trying to think of something to say- is that it’s hard to convince yourself that you’ve simply reached a comfortable level of intimacy where the odd long silence is completely natural.  In fact, all you are going to be able to comprehensibly convince yourself of is that everything is absolutely terrible and you should probably never leave the house again.

If a date is nearly entirely comprised of awkward silences, then it would be fair to assume that you truly have nothing to say to each other and it’s time to climb out of the nearest window. But if a huge awkward silence lumbers up like an unwelcome bear in an otherwise lovely conversation then Do. Not. Panic. Panicking leads to statements like “Would you like to see my weird scar?” or “How many sugar cubes can you eat in one go?” which frankly never helps anyone.

Instead come up with a few questions that you can arm yourself with for occasions such as these. Your date will be so relieved to get the conversation going again that it shouldn’t matter if the questions aren’t earth shattering or a little clichÃÆ’©d at all.

You could probably fill manuals with dating advice but the thing to remember is that we are all just as clueless as one another, and in all likelihood your date is just a nervous as you. And, of course, you should aim to HAVE FUN, even when you are gibbering with nerves, because this is the thing that makes looking for love exciting. Happy Valentine\’s and good luck!