I just got back from a second date with someone. It was my attempt to see if there was more than what met the eye on the first go around.

As we ate ice cream, he asked about things I like to do. And with each thing I shared, he tried to make a connection. Agreeing with my thoughts on dating, relationships and solitude. Expressing a similar taste in music and love of the outdoors and people.

Now don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with looking for common ground. It’s a part of the dating experience. But as I sat there with him, something felt amiss.

It occurred to me that my responses were being listened to more for the purpose of assessing the match and less for the purpose of knowing me as a person. In his eagerness to confirm the match, he was missing the person in front of him.

Don’t we all fall prey to this tendency at some point in our dating experiences? I know I certainly have so I can’t blame him. But it’s an approach that’ll never get us where we want to go.

Approaching dating in this way is the ultimate flawed experiment. It’s doing the test with a desired outcome in mind that dictates the way you approach the experiment and the way you interpret the results. What results is no experiment at all.

Lord, help me to approach dating as a true scientist does– with great curiosity, an unbiased, open mind, and a healthy detachment from the results. Amen.