The No-Ultimatum Way to Get Him To Commit

Welcome to another episode of Love Life. I'm your host, Matthew Hussey. Every few days I'll be bringing you a new episode filled with practical advice you can use right away to improve all of your relationships romantic, family, friends, career and most importantly the relationship you have with yourself. If you've been listening to me for a while, please do me a favor and leave me a five star review in iTunes. In the iTunes app or on your desktop, just look up the show, click on ratings and reviews, and then click write a review. I'm not asking for the ego boost. It's simply because the highest rated programs get the most visibility in iTunes and together we can help reach more women by helping them find the show. Thank you so much for your help. Let's start the show.

Very excited to have a caller coming in today. Her name is Tiffany and I believe she's on the line now. Are you there, Tiffany?

I am. Hi, Matt. I'm such a huge fan of yours.

Oh, thank you so much. So tell me your question.

Okay. Well, my question basically is when should you have the exclusivity talk? Essentially, I've been seeing this guy for a while now and things are going really well. We did meet online and I know he's still active on the website where we met, but we're sexually active. We enjoy each other's company. I'm just afraid of having a talk and ruining like what could potentially be a really good thing, because I'm not sure if he sees us as going towards something amazing or just being friends with benefits at this point. I'm not afraid of the rejection side, but I don't want to waste my time if it's not going to go anywhere.

Let me ask you a question. Have you actually at any point in the last two months made it clear that you want a relationship, not with him, but with a human being that you want a relationship? Have you stayed at that as a goal?

Yes.

Okay. And how did he respond when you said that?

We actually had a six hour long conversation.

Did he say in that conversation, did he say specifically that he wanted to be in a relationship?

He did, yes.

He did. All right, I can give you my answer to this, but before I do that, I want to see what your answer would be. Let's say you go and have the conversation with him today.

Okay.

What do you think is an appropriate way to have that conversation?

I tend to be a little cutthroat, so I would probably just bring it up and ask him if he would like to take things on a more serious level and move from just casually seeing each other to actually dating.

What might be the problem with asking a guy? Do you want to go from what we have now to a relationship. What might be the problem from a guy's point of view?

He may not feel like it's his decision.

Absolutely. He may feel a little bit like he's being sold. Yeah. He, a guy in that position, generally speaking, not in every case, but generally speaking, a guy wants to feel like he's the one making that decision. He's sold himself on the idea and now he's coming back to you to tell you or to convince you. Now, how would we create that effect? Rather than just going up to him and asking him, do you want to go from A to B? You might instead say to him, look, I know we've both talked about wanting something more in a relationship, not necessarily with each other, but we both want more. The fact is, I like you. I don't know whether we would have a great relationship right now or not, because you never know. So I can't make that prediction, but what I do know is I like spending time with you. And I also know that, you know, if I'm gonna keep doing that in any meaningful way, I need to feel like it's going somewhere. That's okay if it's not the case for you. That's completely fine. I want you to be happy and do your thing. But I'm just letting you know that because I can't just indefinitely keep doing this and being intimate with you and seeing you nonstop. Without there being any actual direction to what we're doing. So look, you don't need to we don't need to talk about it right now. I just wanted to let you know and get that off my chest, that's all. Now here's what's so beautiful about that. At no point in that are you putting the pressure on him. And one of the greatest gifts you can give a guy is to show that you're okay with whatever he is. the other cool thing about the way you've phrased this, I just want to give you the psychology of this so that you word it right. If you say, I don't even know if we'd make a great couple or we'd be great in a relationship. How could you know, by the way, that's truthful. That's not manipulation. That's truthful. How could you know? So you saying, I don't know if we'd make a great relationship or not, but I know I like you and I know that if I'm going to continue to see you, then I at least need to know this has some direction. Now you're allowing him to go away and sell himself. And a guy really understands the message that when you say that, there is a standard that you are showing that you have, that you don't just continuously invest in someone who doesn't invest back, and that there is some sort of time span on this that if he doesn't actually act, maybe not this minute, maybe not tomorrow, but if he doesn't act, then there will come a time when he will lose you. And you've planted that in the most subtle and elegant way without giving him an ultimatum and without trying to pressure him into a to a relationship. Does that make sense?

That is amazing. Thank you.

Go do your thing. And remember, if it doesn't work out with this guy, there are plenty more where he came from.

Yes.

Look after yourself.

Take care.

Thank you so much. Bye.

I hope you got a lot out.

Of the show today.

I know I always do.

Coming soon, I've got more amazing shows in store for you. so be sure you do not miss them. If you haven't done so already, click the Subscribe button in iTunes and I'll deliver each new episode straight to you as soon as it's released. Thanks for listening, have an incredible week.

And I'll talk to you soon.