Shut Your Mouth – what you shouldn’t reveal on a first date.

“You never get a second chance to make a first impression” is nowhere more applicable than on that nerve-wracking first date. In this world of online Jewish dating and Jewish matchmaking, if you’ve made it past the horrific photo and profile screening and actually scored a genuine face-to-face encounter, you should consider yourself lucky. Getting to date #2, however, is not a given, and your behavior now

Matchmaker

just might be the make-or-breaker.

Obviously you’ve dressed appropriately and gussied yourself up to show off your best physical assets, and hopefully your conversation will reveal some shared interests between you and your date. But just how much do you disclose about yourself and your personal history? Let’s make it simple and cover the five topics you should NEVER mention on a first date under ANY circumstances. Is that clear enough?

1) Past Relationships: Asking if your date has ever been married is a legitimate question, but that’s where it should end. At this point you don’t need to know the who, what, why, and how of that relationship. And you don’t need to provide this information about yourself either. This advice also applies to anyone you have ever dated. Do not discuss these relationships and most of all- do not BASH your ex (or ex’s). Nothing is less appealing than someone who is still so bitter that they feel the need to trash-talk an ex. Given the fact that there must have been something about the person that attracted you in the first place, if you trash talk them now it only makes you appear to possess either bad judgment (why did you date them in the first place?) or confirm that you’re still hung up on them. Neither of these conclusions places you in a positive light.

1) Medical Issues: Wanna put your date in a squeamish state of mind? Start talking about the rash you developed at the beginning of summer, or how the doctor keeps upping your Prozac dosage. Or maybe you prefer to launch into a discussion of how Siamese twins runs in your family or how there seems to be a history of dementia on your mother’s side. Believe me, medical issues are not to be shared on the first date. In fact, you may be better served by keeping these beauties under cover until you’ve returned from the honeymoon.

2) Family Problems: Giving your brother the ten-year silent treatment? Hate your sister and think her kids are holy terrors? Well, you may have a point, but if you want to give the impression that you’d make a great spouse and an even better parent, you probably don’t want to reveal the fact that you can’t even get along with members of your immediate flesh and blood. You also don’t need to get into the difficulties your Aunt Shifra is having getting pregnant or discuss the exploits of that scandalous womanizer- your Great-Uncle Moishe.

3) Money Woes: The whole neighborhood is whispering about your past-due credit cards and the local mini-market has your bounced check stapled near their cash register, but if you’ve scored this date, he/she might be the one person in town who doesn’t yet know you can’t balance your checkbook. Please, don’t be the one who breaks the news. Steer away from all money topics including how much you earn, your clever trick of paying the minimum on your credit cards with other credit cards, and your entrepreneurial method of selling food stamps on EBAY for gas money. Oh, and don’t ask your date for their salary quote either.

4) Religion and/or Politics: Briefly disclosing that you’re more liberal than right-wing, or that you follow a Modern-Orthodox stream of Judaism rather than Reconstructionist isn’t a bad thing. As a matter of fact, aside from the inexplicable love between hard-core democrat James Carville and Mary Matalin- his Republican Consultant of a wife, I would venture to say that being on common religious and political ground is going to make your bond stronger. Unleashing two terms of pent-up aggression towards the Bush administration and that fiasco in Iraq over your fat-free cappuccino, however, is not the way to forge it. Religion and Politics are touchy subjects for everyone no matter what their beliefs and you’re probably not going to agree on every facet, so let’s leave this alone for now. Once you’ve gone out a few more times and your date is aware that you’re not a fanatical republican-hating, love bead wearing, anti-war hippie throwback.

Relocate For Love- are you up to the challenge?

In these modern days of Jewish internet dating and Jewish Matchmaking, many potential partners live in separate cities, separate states and sometimes separate countries. One of the first questions a matchmaker will ask is “are you willing to relocate?” For many, this can be a loaded question. Of course you want to find the right match with whom you hope to live a long and happy life, but on the other hand, you’re probably well established with a career, friends, and possibly even family already in your area. Do you really want to uproot yourself and start all over again in a new location? It’s a question with no easy answers and may require that you do a little soul-searching.
What are your priorities in life? Have you made your job your number one priority? Have you made your friends your number one priority? Family, of course, is another matter. If you have an ex-spouse and you share custody of children, then making a move to a distance locale may not be in the best interest of everyone involved and it may be that you simply don’t wish to sacrifice the relationship that your children have with either you or your ex-spouse. That is a completely legitimate reason to stay put. If, however, you are reluctant to move because you want to stay close to your parents or your siblings, then you may not be taking marriage seriously enough. The Torah states in Genesis “Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife…” This is a clear statement. One is to leave the safety and comfort of his/her childhood environment and forge a new bond with their spouse.

Life and love are really all about priorities. The adage “you can have it all” is a fallacy. Very few people, if any, “have it all”. Life is actually not about “having it all”. Life is more about deciding what is most important to you and having that. The result will be a happy life, not one that pulls you in a million different directions and leaves you unfulfilled in all of them. If marriage and family are priorities in your life, then you commit yourself to do what it takes to have a successful marriage and happy family- if your career is most important or your friends are most important, then it’s a given that your marriage and family will suffer. Be daring, take a chance; show that you are committed to the success of a personal relationship. You will find another job; you will make new friends, and you’ll be doing both with the support and love of the wonderful person whom you never would have met if you had stayed where you were.

So, next time you’re faced with the question of “are you willing to relocate?” Take a deep breath and vow to commit yourself to the cause of finding your Jewish soulmate. Just say “yes”.
Sara Malamud
www.worldofsingles.com