Mark: Seven surprising signs on a first date that he could be the one I've got Dr. Benjamin
Ritter back with me. You might've seen Benjamin, he was in yesterday and we were talking about
the one mistake that sees you wasting months and often years on the wrong guy. If you haven't
watched that video, check it out. Today, I'm going to show you exactly how to do that so
that you can be intentionally dating without an agenda and filtering in the guys that are
ready to build a great relationship, a great healthy relationship with you. So Dr. Ben,
you've been a coach in Chicago here for a long time. You coached men for a long time
before that. What's sign number one? And how do women find it?
Ben: The first sign is does he support you? So does he support your passions, the things
that you're saying on the date and when you start talking about your friends and other
interest and their activities, does, does he support that you will have a life outside
of the relationship?
Mark: Yeah. Just a little thing. Cause I say, well I don't know if he supports me. He's
not my boyfriend. You can tell from the very first date, is he enthusiastic for you to
have a good time with your friends, right? Does he encourage you to follow your passion?
He's like, that's awesome. Like I love this. You can get that vibe from the very beginning.
Ben: Is he judgmental, right? And is he negative? Is he dismissive? If not, if he's, if he's
egging you on and asking for more, then he supports you.
Mark: I love that. Number two is consistency. Does he immediately from the very beginning,
start to do what he says and says what he does? Even if it's like a little thing, I'm
going to call you at seven. So he calls at seven or he texts saying, Hey, I'm really
busy but I'll call you at nine and then he calls at nine, right? Is he consistent in
his actions? Do his words match his actions? Every one of these is an essential non-negotiable
relationship skill. If you want a healthy relationship, and as you can see, you can
already start to see these things from the very beginning. Ben, number three,
Ben: Number three is respect. Does he respect you? And that is almost like a gut reaction
because you know when someone doesn't respect you, you know when someone's looking down
on you, does he treat you as a peer? Does, does he treat you almost as he would a friend
and I mean, I'll go even as far as his mom now. Now of course, there's going to be some,
some level of attraction and connection, but not that he puts you on a pedestal, but he,
he's treating you as an equal through how he speaks to you and the things that he says
and how he looks at you and yeah. How we kind of, you can communicate with you.
Mark: Just check in how you feel, you know, do, do I go, Oh, do I feel like he was, he
was talking down a bit or do I feel less or do I even feel like he's putting me up on
a pedestal or do I feel like I really, I really feel like he's equal. After that, he treated
me like an equal. That is the very first sign from the first date that you can already find
a guy who's going to respect you for the long, long term. So number four is interdependence.
When I talk about interdependence what I'm really talking about is the ability to empathize
and connect with you without entering into sympathetic codependency.
Ben: Empathy is similar to compassion in a way where you may be really sad. And so instead
of dismissing your emotion, he goes, tell me about, tell me about that. Tell me more
about that. Is there anything that I can do to help you? Now interdependence can also
be like you can get a side of interdependence from is he actively listening to you? Is he
paying attention to you and is he working off of what you're saying? Or is he throwing
a new topic right away?
Mark: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love that. Number five is purpose. I've got to tell you right
now, if you're with a guy who's not on his purpose, and the relationship is not the purpose,
it's not. If you're with a guy who's not in his purpose, lacks direction, you are going
to struggle in a longterm relationship with that man because he lacks direction. And a
man lacking direction just doesn't feel good about himself.
Ben: Yeah. He kind of, if a man doesn't have direction, he's lost. Yeah. Right. And so
he's constantly looking for the right path to go down and he's constantly trying new
paths. And you don't want to be one of the paths that he's trying. Yeah. You want to
be the path that he's certain of. And a man can't really be certain of a relationship
unless he's certain of himself. Yeah. And so that purpose means that he finds a meaning
in his life. And if he has that, then he can actually dedicate, right his, his relationship
essence and his relationship values to you, to you.
Mark: On the first date. Listen to how he talks about what he does. You know, does he
have this clear direction? Does he have this clear purpose and, and bonus points if he
can really dive into some vulnerable emotions around it. Like, if he can really say, yeah,
you know, I was, I was in this, this show, I was in this bad place. I was sad, it really
hit me. If he dives into that and then just lights up and he's like, that's why I dedicated
my life or my time to this. Like wow, this is the guy who knows where he's going. He
knows why he's connected to himself. And he's pushing forward with that. And thus can push
forward with you.
Ben: He's comfortable with himself. Yeah. He feels comfortable with how he defines who
he is. Yeah. And so he's not seeking, he's not seeking that anywhere else other than
internally. And that, that relates to so many like positive attachment, you know, theories
and just how, how we can now like develop the relationship in a way that is actually
congruent to who he is. So cause if he changes later on and the relationship isn't in sync
with that, then you're going to be left on the wayside.
Mark: Yeah. Yes. So important. Number six is boundaries. And on the very first date
or few dates, you can see this by simply responding, you know, if he wants to go to a bar that
you don't like or if he wants to do something that doesn't vibe with you, how does he hear
your, no, because it's easy to like someone's easy to get along when they're complying with
everything you want. That doesn't really test the quality of a relationship. What test the
quality is when you put a healthy boundary in place six months, six years from now, does
he respect that he accept it or does he try to push through it?
Ben: What's powerful about boundaries too is you kind of learn how he deals with conflict.
Yeah. Don't go test and just say no for no reason. Don't don't play games. But when you
say no to somebody or you say, you know, I don't want to talk about this topic even.
Right, because maybe you don't want to talk about a certain topic. You see how he, how
he reacts? Does he, does he respect your no.
Mark: Yeah. Cool. Totally great. Now, we're you're moving on. Yeah.
Ben: Yeah. And there's, they're connected to so many of the other values that we're
discussing because if he respects your no supports your no, right, and then it's consistent,
doesn't come back to pushing you on.
Mark: Number seven, Ben.
Ben: Well, you kind of hinted at it and that was being vulnerable and that was being open
and being able to connect with certain, certain emotions that, that are important to the success
of a longterm relationship.
Mark: Yeah, I love that. And being able to, I talk a lot about ability, a guys' ability
to dive into his feminine. And if you see him expressing an emotion that's classically
difficult for men, which might be fear or sadness, and if he's expressing that authentically,
um, not to make you feel sorry for him like I had this sad sob story, but you're just
like, wow, he's just really expressing here and he's sharing the fact that the guy can
own that part of himself means that part of himself is not going to get pushed down in
two, five years from now, which is going to cause an unhealthy pattern.
Ben: And part of vulnerability is, is he candid, right? Is he actually saying what's on his
mind. And so he's, he's not worried about your reaction, right? He's worried about the
success of the relationship or the success of the partnership right now. And if he can't
be frank and just honest, right? Cause the candor is a different type of honesty. Yeah.
No steer attached.
Mark: Not where someone just ignores how you feel. It's not like Ben your shirt effin sucks.
Right. It's like if he asks me how his shirt, honestly, not a fan that's candid.
Ben: And it's also a really easy way to express an emotion. So like you said, we've talked
about vulnerability. If you go, how are you feeling today instead of him just going, great.
Well, you know, actually I kind of had a bad day at work. Yeah. And then all of a sudden
now you start getting into these different values that we discussed.
Mark: Yeah. This is, and that relates back to boundaries. You can see how these all tie
together and these truly are seven signs that you can see if a guy could be the one from
the very beginning. You still need chemistry, you still need compatibility, you still need
a whole bunch of things, but as Ben referred to in the last video, which if you haven't
watched, you should link is in the description. It's like is the house there? Because too
many women waste too many years with a guy who has the chemistry and compatibility, but
then he doesn't have the relationship house. And when you know how to filter from his house
from the beginning, from the very first date, every of these you can start to spot and know
if he's on the right track to potentially being the one for you. Well that's the video.
Mark: Thank you for coming in. Ben.
Ben: Thank you for having me.
Mark: What a treat to have been here. Hey, if you want to find out more about Ben heads
of benjamin-ritter.com don't forget to check out yesterday's video as well. Should we bring
him in for one more? What do you think, put it in the comments below and I'm sure he'll
answer some comments too. So leave your questions down there as well. Hit the like button and
the big red subscribe button with the little bell. Ben, it's been a pleasure. Thank you
so much for coming in.
Ben: Thank you so much for having me. I hope one more time.
Mark: Yeah, and let's see you in the next video.
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