Tantric Dating – Why is Dating so Hard?

Why is dating so hard?

Have you sometimes had the feeling that dating is so hard?

Well you’re not alone.

Most people who are, or have been, dating think that it sucks. A survey of almost 5000 US adults carried out in 2019 by the Pew Research Center found that 67% of people reported that their dating life was awful, with 75% saying that dating was really difficult.

Of course dating is complicated, because humans in general are complicated.

But what often happens is that we make life more complicated for ourselves. As the Chinese philosopher allegedly said…

“Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.” – Confucius.

And this holds true for dating. In our quest to find “The One”, we make things more difficult than they need to be. Unfortunately, the conditioning we get bombarded with as we grow up, from society, from education, from our family, from our peers at school, leads us down a misguided path when it comes to love, romance, and dating.

The good news is there are ways and tools available to us turn this around, and make dating quite a lot easier than we have experienced up to now.

Tantric dating can be so much more fun, enjoyable, and rewarding than conventional dating.

Tantra is one such way. The path of Tantra is a remarkable philosophy dating back thousands of years to India, which is perfectly suited for living a spiritually fulfilling life in today’s modern world. By adopting a Tantric approach we can make the dating process so much more fun, enjoyable, and rewarding.

Before I discovered Tantra I struggled with the dating process. I found it frustrating to have to keep on searching, messaging, going out on dates, and then get disappointed that we didn’t click. Then I would have to start the whole process again. It was exhausting, and I would end up with a pretty skeptical and critical attitude about dating, which only served to close me off from better experiences.

Looking back I can see how I was stuck in the conventional approach to dating… one based on an un-loving and negative attitude about myself and others.

Listen to the podcast episode of this post, over on TheTantricLife.com

Conventional dating can keep us stuck in an unloving and disposable attitude towards people.

It’s sad but true that the modern society in which we are brought up in conditions us to be unloving towards ourselves, to not value ourselves, to focus more on our imperfections, and to demonise those parts of ourselves which are not accepted as beautiful in the eyes of social media.

The media in general brainwashes us with marketing and advertising to make us feel inadequate. We are subliminaly encouraged to compare ourselves to others, and to build a false idea of happiness based on seeing the faults of others so that we may feel a little less insecure about our own faults.

And many people subconsciously carry this mindset into the dating process. This conventional way of dating encourages us to feel that there is something wrong with us, and that there is probably something wrong with the other person. For women, this may typically be the feeling that “I’m not attractive enough”, and for men it may be “I’m not accomplished enough”, or some variation.

All too often we enter into dating with extremely restrictive and limited criteria about what we want in romantic partner. Telling ourselves that we have “high standards” can lead to totally unrealistic expectations of what we are hoping to find in a potential lover.

Law of Attraction is a great tool for attracting a soulmate.

Sadly many people misunderstand the Law of Attraction when it comes to looking for their soulmate, believing that you have to stick rigidly to a clear and detailed vision of how you want your future partner to be. 

This teaching from Law of Attraction is meant to help you to evoke the emotions and positive feelings that will attract into your life someone aligned with that energetic vibration. But if we become too fixated on looking for our exact “type”, then we risk missing opportunities for true, soul-level love.

Instead of focusing on the authentic beauty of their quirks, we are looking out for potential deal-breakers. We are constantly evaluating whether or not this person is a good candidate for the fantasy of perfect love. And if not, we are ready to discard them at the drop of a hat… later to become just another horror story to laugh about with our friends.

This unloving attitude towards others and ourselves has created a culture of disposable dating. We are so accustomed to using things, then throwing them away and buying new replacements. This mindset is prevalent in the dating industry… one only needs to spend a little time on dating apps such as Tinder to see how many people are ready to drop their potential date just as quickly as they would throw away a used tissue.

Tantra teaches that everything is sacred and beautiful.

The Tantric approach to dating starts from the basis that everyone is an expression of the same Divine consciousness.

As Lama Yeshe, from the Tibetan Buddhist Tantra tradition, writes in his Introduction to Tantra – The Transformation of Desire, “The nucleus of each human being, each person’s essential nature, is something Divine, something pure.”

From this perspective every single person you meet has the potential to be your beloved. Every person you chat with, or go on a date with is exactly the right person for you in that precise moment. It is the Divine in them interacting with the Divine in you. That interaction is happening for a reason. Even if you choose to go your seperate ways afterwards, there was something in that experience that has enriched the two you. Some lesson was learned, or some feeling awakened… perhaps a new feeling or something long-forgotten from the past, which will give you an opportunity for new insight.

When we recognise that everyone is special, that everyone is a unique living spark of the Divine, then we realise that the person we are with right now in this moment can be our beloved. Whether just chatting online for the first time, or out together on a date, this person is our true love… even if only for that moment. In that moment we can share a profound love through the simple opening up of our mindset and attitude.

As Catherine Auman says in her little book Tantric Dating, “The beloved is not somebody you’re going to meet in the future; it’s not somebody who’s going to ride in on a white horse or be spotted across the dance floor. Right now, this is where love is available; This is who it is possible to love. Are you available for this love?”

I would like to share with you a Tantric Dating Tip…

This Tantric dating tip helped me to meet my true love partner.

And that is to devote more time to loving and dating yourelf.

Cultivate this Tantra mindset of loving yourself, recognising yourself as Divine, and then seeing others through the same perspective.

But itt’s not enough to just say “I love myself”… you have to show it with actions.

Treat yourself in some way… maybe buy yourself a gift, or go somewhere special, treat yourself to a massage. Show the Divine within you your love through actions.

The Tantrik master Abhinavagupta wrote in his text, the Tantrasara, 

“In the heart-lotus [of awareness]…the bee of self-awareness buzzes, cherishing its own radiant beauty, humming “I am Lord Śiva, overflowing with the reality of all beings!” || [4.3a]

Embrace the Tantric way of cherishing your own radiant beauty as a very special and unique part of the immense Universal Divine consciousness.

View people with compassion, empathy, and love. Understand and accept a person in their totality. All their qualities are a part of their Divine essence.

Nothing about you is broken, or wrong, or unspiritual. There is no need to be ashamed of your own or other’s wounds. Those all make up your uniqueness and are the lessons/karma that is helping you to grown in exaclty the way you need to.

Everything about you is beautiful.

Sources:

Most daters say their dating lives aren’t going well and it’s difficult to find people to date. Article posted 2020 on pewresearch.org

Cherishing your own radiant beauty (Tantrasaara Chapter Four, Part 5)Article by Christopher Wallis. Posted 2019 on his blog Hareesh.org

Introduction to Tantra: The Transformation of Desire. Revised edition 2014. Wisdom Publications. Lama Yeshe.

Tantric Dating: Bringing Love and Awareness to the Dating Process. 2nd edition 2020. Green Tara Press. Catherine Auman.