A Man's Guide To Dating After Divorce (Or Long Term Relationship)

All right, dating after divorce or dating after a long-term relationship. Let's talk about it. What are the dos and don'ts? How do you actually go through it? It's one of those things where you get out of a long-term relationship and I hear so many guys, maybe they were in a relationship for 4 or 5 years, maybe they were married for 20 or 30 years or 10 years and they get out and they're like, "I don't really know if I can do this. Like, I don't know how to actually go through this process anymore." And it can feel awkward.. You can have a lot of questions about timing. You can have a lot of questions about, you know, how to find the right person. And you can have a lot of worries about, is it too quick? Is it not? You know, is it too fast? Are we going too quickly? Is it the right time? Do I ask the right questions? And the big one, which is, how do I make sure that what just happened doesn't happen again? That I don't go through the same, you know, thing where I'm in this relationship where I'm married for a long time and things fall apart. Well, the reality is, is that it can be challenging. It can be really hard. And it can honestly push and test your limits. And so in today's video, I'm gonna share some of the main lessons, some of the main things that you can look for and do in order to have successful dating post-divorce, post-long-term relationship. And where I wanna start is why it's challenging, why it's so confronting. In a way, especially if you've gone through a divorce, or you've gone through the end of a long-term relationship and that relationship has ended, divorce really is a kind of a death. Having a long-term relationship end really is a kind of death. And I mean that directly and seriously. You've just had a marriage die. You've just had a long-term relationship come to an end. And you didn't just lose a partner, you lost in some ways, a future that you had been planning, a future that you were living into. And as we know from the data, the majority of you men that are watching this likely didn't choose the divorce, right? In most states, it's like 75 to 80% of divorces are initiated by the woman, by the wife. And so for a lot of guys that I work with who are going through a divorce, who are trying to recover from a divorce, who are trying to date post-divorce, it can feel like you've had something die. You can feel like you've had something that, you know, you were living in, that you were building, that you were working towards. Maybe some stuff had happened and you'd gone to couples therapy, or there was a betrayal that you were trying to recover from, or you'd just grown apart and you were trying to reconnect. And then suddenly one day it's over. You're not working towards it anymore. You're not building it anymore. You're not creating it. And for many what can happen for many men, what can happen is you don't know what to do with the grief, with the anger, with the frustration of maybe it's not actually what you wanted. Maybe that you wanted to continue to try and work on the life that you and your wife or you and your previous significant other were working towards. And so there can be a tremendous amount of frustration, of grief that shows up. And the second thing that's challenging is that your nervous system and your body will likely be preconditioned from that past relationship. And so it can be very hard to choose a great relationship coming out of one that was maybe very dysfunctional, sexually disconnected, lots of anger, lots of fighting, lots of animosity, lots of tension. And your nervous system can be sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop. And so you can get back into dating and it can be misleading. It can be disorienting. And you might find yourself asking yourself questions like, "Am I really that attracted to her?" Or, "Is this really as smooth as it's always going to be?" Or you find yourself just waiting for the other shoe to drop, for her to act in a certain way or behave in a certain way, or for things to go downhill. Or you might even find yourself worrying like, "Okay, when's she gonna leave?" You know, "When's she gonna leave too?" Or, "When am I gonna screw this up?" And so your nervous system can be almost like preconditioned from the past relationship, and that can get in the way of dating. And the third thing is that, and this is where a lot of guys struggle, is that in many ways, in some ways, not all the ways, you contributed to the ending of that relationship. And the big thing that I wanna start with here, obviously that's the hard part of why dating is challenging after a divorce. But why I wanna start here is that you need to kind of do the autopsy. So step number 1 to really great dating after divorce is obviously giving yourself enough time. Don't jump straight back into it. I see a lot of people online now, like celebrating divorce And this isn't so much, not to like call women out, but this isn't so much the men. I don't see men going online and like burning their tuxes and popping champagne and, you know, celebrating this like, you know, this liberation from this heinous thing that they were in. A lot of men really go inwards. They become reclusive. A lot of guys shut down. A lot of men become depressed. They get frustrated. For a lot of men also, it is kind of a reckoning. And so you might find yourself in this place where a lot comes up in the divorce. And usually for a lot of women, when they enact the divorce, they've done a bunch of work to say, "I'm clear and clean of this. I want out of this. I don't wanna be in this anymore." And sometimes women will turn around and date somebody very quickly. And for men, what can be challenging is that you might find yourself wanting to do that immediately. You might wanna find yourself trying to skip the grief, trying to skip the anger, skip the frustration. You know, a lot of guys are like, maybe I'll just F my way through this. I'll drink my way through this. I'll, you know, do drugs through this, and I won't have to deal with the pain that I'm feeling inside. So step 1 is grieve first and then do the autopsy. Okay? Grieve first and then do the autopsy. So before you date anyone, don't bring the baggage into that. Don't bring the grief into the next relationship. Don't bring the, like, the big questions into the next relationship. As much as you as you can. Obviously, sometimes it's still gonna happen, but grieve the death of that previous relationship. Grieve the death of the marriage. And you actually have to let yourself feel the loss of the life that you were building with that person and the consequences that come along with that. Maybe you had kids with that person, and you can see that your children are struggling because the divorce has happened, the separation has happened. Maybe you find yourself waiting forever to date because there's a part of you that doesn't actually want to grieve, doesn't want to feel the sadness of the divorce and of the marriage ending. But let yourself feel into the grief of the time that you spent, the effort you put into it, the love that was there, maybe how much you had poured into it financially. For a lot of men, when divorce happens, you lose a massive part of your net worth. And sometimes life can become very financially challenging. This is something that oftentimes doesn't get talked about enough, or it gets, you know, undercut or demeaned. It's like, well, why are men even worried about that? And it's like, well, because now, you know, you're having to pay child support and alimony and you're living in a, you know, studio apartment while your ex-wife is still living in your 4-bedroom house. And, you know, you're barely scraping by while it looks like she's living a good life. So grief, let yourself feel the wide range of emotions and the truth of how you feel about your current circumstances. If that means that you can go and work with somebody, a coach, a therapist to move through it, great. But really let yourself grieve and notice the inclination to move towards some type of numbing mechanism. The desire to numb out your grief is going to be so strong. And what I've seen for a lot of men is that two things happen post-divorce, okay? Scenario number 1 is they've intellectualized it so much that there's a period where they're like, actually, I think I might be okay. And the grief is sort of put on pause for a month or 2 months or 3 months. And then all of a sudden, 2, 3 months later, boom, that man gets hit like a Mack, you know, like he's been hit with a Mack truck. That's scenario number 1. Scenario number 2 is you feel a tremendous amount of grief and it happens immediately. Maybe you felt blindsided, maybe you felt like you just didn't see it coming. Maybe she was having an affair and the relationship ended, whatever the circumstances is, but the divorce happens, the relationship ends, and you are just smashed with grief and sadness and anger and animosity. And the desire to numb out is probably going to be very strong, but allowing yourself to stay with the grief is going to be important. Then once we have grieved a little bit to start to do the autopsy. What a lot of guys are going to do is they're gonna wanna skip the grief and do the autopsy first. But what we wanna do is do the autopsy after we've let some grief happen. And what I want to say about the autopsy is I want you to look at two parts. The main part is what is my role truly that contributed to the death of my marriage? What's my part in the ending of that marriage? And the second part is, what did I learn about the woman that I was with, the person that I was with, that I no longer am willing to entertain in my next relationship? And what were some of the qualities that I want to take with me? So we can do the autopsy and say, what did I contribute? What led to the death of that relationship? What contributed to it falling apart, but also what was great about it. You know, there was likely some things that were pretty damn good about that person, about the relationship itself that you want to carry forward in the next relationship. The second piece that I want you to know when it comes to dating, once you start to date, the big thing that I want you to remember is let it be awkward and let yourself have a beginner mindset. For many of the guys that I've worked with that have gone through a divorce, especially after like, you know, 10 years, 20 years, don't expect yourself to enter back into the dating pool and have it all figured out and like, you know, be Rico Suave right out the gates. That's probably unrealistic expectations that are gonna set you up for a hard time, to say the least. So what you wanna do is remember that you're entering into something that you haven't done. In a long time. And the asterisk here that I want to really put into it is that for a lot of guys, part of the reason why the relationship ended before is that you stopped dating your wife. You stopped dating that person. And it turned into monotony, it turned into logistics, it turned into complacency and mediocrity. And the dating of that person, the dating of your wife, the person that you were with, stopped. And so as you enter back into dating, notice that there might be this feeling of invigoration, of excitement, but there also might be a huge amount of anxiety, of feeling like you're getting back onto a bicycle for the first time in 10, 15 years. And there's a question of like, can I do this? So let it be a little awkward. Let it be embarrassing if it is. Let yourself make mistakes. Give yourself a huge amount of grace in order to get things wrong. Now, I'm not advocating for you to act in ways that are ridiculous and outlandish that are going to, you know, get you canceled or some shit, but give yourself the grace to really own it and say when you go out on dates, like, you know, this is tough for me. I haven't been out in the dating market for a long time. I haven't been on a date in a long time. The first time you go on a date with somebody, be upfront about it and say, you know what, this is my first date. Post-divorce. They might tuck tail and run. So what? Own where you are at in the, in the process. And if you can be transparent and honest about that, if you can be real about it and you can take ownership over where you are in the process, then that's going to make dating a lot easier because the other person is going to have compassion for that. They're going to understand. And to be honest with you, you don't want somebody anyway who is worried about, you know, dating a guy after divorce. You want somebody who is understanding, who's caring, who's compassionate, who gets where you're at, and who's able to go through this little bit of a re-understanding and re-immersion into the dating world. So give yourself grace, let it be awkward, and come at it with a beginner's mindset, because the reality is, And this is the last thing I'll say on this step. How you date now should absolutely be different than how you dated before the previous relationship. Like if my wife and I, God forbid, if she died tomorrow, or if we got divorced tomorrow, and somewhere down the road after that, I went back out dating, I sure as hell would not be dating the same way that I dated in my late 20s and early 30s. That would be ridiculous. So please know that a different version of you is going to date. Hopefully a more mature, more grounded, more reasonable version of you is going to be out in the dating world. And the third step that I want to say is lead from clarity, as much clarity as you have. So you're not the same man as you were before you got married. You're not the same man that you were when you were married. Start to really see if you can be specific and direct about what you need, what you want, what you're okay with, what you're not okay with, what you're not interested in, and really allowing yourself to tune in to your gut, to your intuition, to what you know is true for you. And that might be challenging because the reality is that you may have lost yourself in your marriage. You may have lost the things that you really needed to be doing. Taking care of yourself physically, taking care of yourself financially, taking care of yourself socially. You might have noticed that your social circle is largely gone because most of your social circle was her social circle. That's pretty common. But start to lead from what you know to be true wherever you are right now, right? Maybe adventure and travel is really important to you. Maybe starting another family is really important to you. Maybe co-parenting and specific things around co-parenting are really important to you. Try and be as upfront as you can, as soon as you can. Now, that doesn't mean that on the first date you should lay down a list of non-negotiables and say, here's what I'm looking for and here's what I'm not interested in. That's not it. But if somebody is asking you a question about what you're interested in and you have clarity on what that is and what you're not interested in, try and say that, try and be upfront, try and be forthcoming. Because again, the best relationships, and I wish every single human being had this like on their shirt, you know, tattooed onto them, the best relationships have zero guesswork. And so ideally you want to enter into the dating world where there isn't guesswork. And that's gonna be challenging because there's probably gonna be a lot of confusion. You're meeting new people.. It's new circumstances, it's exciting, it's maybe there's nervousness, maybe there's a lot of uncertainty, but what you want to do is hold onto, here's what I know I need, here's what I want, here's how I want things to look like, here's how co-parenting would really ideally look to me, and be upfront about those pieces. And when you do that, you're going to filter out all of the people who would likely lead to a same situation happening again. Because the majority of guys that I've worked with who have gone through a divorce, in large part, it's because they didn't bring clarity into their relationship. They didn't bring needs, wants, desires into the relationship. They didn't bring truth and honesty and integrity into the relationship. And that's in part what caused the collapse of the relationship. So you want to enter into this dating opportunity as a chance for you to really be known by somebody else. And to be known by somebody else, you have to bring who you are, what you want, what you need, what you desire forward into the relationship. And so if that means that you're like, you know, I'm not really looking for a long-term, serious, committed relationship right now. I just want to date. I just want to know what that feels like. Say that. There are plenty plenty of people who are open to that, who maybe are in the exact same stage. If you are only interested in getting back into a serious committed relationship, say that. There are plenty of people who are interested in that too. So be as clear as you can. And again, referring to step number 2, have the grace to know that you're probably still in the space of figuring it out. There's still probably a whole bunch of things that you're like, I don't really know what co-parenting is gonna look like. I don't really know whether I want a long-term relationship. So if you aren't sure, be clear about that. Be upfront about that. All the things that you're like, I don't really know, don't lie, don't alter it, don't try and cater to what you think that that person wants to hear. Be upfront and clear. Say, "You know what? I actually don't know, but as soon as I do, I'll let you know. I'll tell you. That's my commitment to you." So these are just some main steps that you can take in order to start to date after divorce. Please give yourself as much grace as humanly possible. And the final thing that I'll say, and this is super, super, super important, don't fall into the dating is garbage nonsense. Please don't go online and fall into the trap of all the content that's out there that is just riddled with the nihilism and the animosity and the hatred towards modern dating and modern relationships. There are so many wonderful people out there who want to be in healthy, functional relationships, whether that's for the long term or the short term. Know that they are out there. Hold that as your core. Don't be naive because obviously there's still terrible people out there. There's still people who have their shit and, you know, are gonna get things wrong. But don't fall into the trap of being hyper pessimistic towards women, towards relationships. Be clear, know what you want, and stand on some level of realism or, or optimism. All right, thank you so much for tuning in. Comment below, let me know what you're taking from this. Don't forget to man it forward to a man who could use it. And as always, I'll see you next week. Connor Beaton signing off.