Going on a date

[Ashley-Kate]

tomorrow i am going on a date now i have been on many dates in the past but this one is more stressfull for some reason cause i really want it to work and the last relationships i have had never ended up great at all so i am scared. i don't want to scare him off i want to be able to trust him but how can i ..
i really like him but everytime i get close to someone i always end up pushing them away
yours trully
ashley

 

[Daniel E.]

Re: going on a date

A video of a brief therapy session in which Albert Ellis treats a patient with shyness dating men:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7965308202224028422

Some paraphrases from the video:

My hypothesis is...what you are afraid of is not just failing with this individual man...but that you will miss this one [guy] and therefore you will miss every other [guy] and therefore you will never be up to getting what you want, and wouldn't that be awful? You are bringing in these catastrophes.

...If you would really accept yourself as you are, and force yourself to open your big mouth and be you for awhile even though it may hurt...after a while, you would start swinging in the groove and would be focusing on "what I nice individual this [guy] is and how can I enjoy him..."

...If you are always trying to please him, you never have a self, and you never are yourself.

You can't spy on yourself and be yourself at the same time.

...instead, think: There must be some human beings who like me as I am. Let's see if this is one of those human beings.