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oomis and Health – Like I said, I do walk the girl to the door, but to make it the end of the world if the guy doesn’t (assuming, of course that he waits for the girl to get inside safely) is way too far. Perhaps she should wait a few dates and then bring it up as something that concerns her so that he has a chance to explain himself. I know there were things that bothered me about certain girls and that is exactly what I did. And you know something? I learned something from it and it gave me a new perspective. We have to stop making rules about things to “dump” someone over. A little flexibility here folks. It would be helpful for dating AND marriage.
Ofcourse and tbt- I won;t get into too much detail, but I meant that the thing I did for the person was emotionally painful and I knew it would be before I did it. However, I knew the other person needed me to do it to have peace of mind. I won;t go further than that.
tbt – I am not sure how you define a selfless act as love of yourself and I know this line that everyone says about love can only be after marriage. no one has ever explained that to me in a way that made sense. I think love can come before marriage. I agree it is very different from the love you feel after marriage, but it is possible to love someone before. Just to go extreme here, you love your father, mother, brother, etc. and you are not married to them. So why is loving a girl different? Like I said, I am agreeing that after marriage it is different/more/better or whatever you want to call it, but I don;t see why you can’t love the other person (as opposed to yourself) before.
tbt – anyone who is a parent has to read Z’riah U’Binyan. However, I would slightly disagree with your previous comment. It is not necessarily true that a person dating has never done anything for the other person. It really depends how long and serious the dating is. For the vast majority of yeshivish people, I agree. Not everyone gets engaged after 5 dates, however. I can tell you that when I went out seriously with someone, I did many selfless things. I cried sometimes because they were painful for me to do but I did them because it made the other person happy. So, I don’t want to put labels like love on any emotion, but it’s not like it was just infatuation and thinking of myself.
The reason is since usually the car is parked a bout 5 feet from where the steps are and it seems silly to get out and walk the 5 steps with little or no conversation and then turn back to get in the car. I do the walk usually anyway, but it feels really dumb.
also, there may be a reason that the person is unaware of since it is more subconscious. generally, when two people get into a relationship and there are “no things that are bothering them”, the emotions would go somewhere. the fact that they haven’t is an indication that there in fact are problems that are just more under the surface.
tomim tihye – If a person has a FIFTH sense in shidduchim I think that person may be blind. sorry. couldn’t resist.
I agree with smartcookie on this one. A lack of chemistry is important but its not the only thing. That said, chemistry has to be there. chemistry means different things to different people. For example, I would say that if everyone would be looking for the same kind of chem as chassidim on a beshow, most people would consider themselves to have chemistry. Also, there is a difference from a gender perspective. guys and girls need different things to feel the chemistry. In a practical sense, since chemistry is an emotional thing, it can be said to be the thing that makes your emotions feel good enough that some of the fears and anxieties you may have about marrying the person go away, but I will not commit to that being the only definition.
Not sure if you should be dating if you are unwilling to give the person a chance. Yes, sometimes you are quite sure that you will be saying no. In those cases, I think 2-3 hours is enough but after a half-hour, even if the person is hideous and is certainly not your “type”, it is just common decency not to signal to a person that you can’t be bothered with them for more than a half hour. This is especially true if the other person (more likely) is a girl. She spent a lot more than a half hour dressing up for the date and getting ready. Have some decency. And who knows? maybe when your guard is down and you are so “sure” that you aren’t interested, the person may say something funny or intriguing that may pique your interest and get you to say “You know, I think it would be worth it to try a second date” or at least “This wasn’t a waste of time since I learned something”
yitayningwut – Thank you for enlightening me. I saw that piece and certainly you were accurate with your paraphrase of the Rambam and what I have been saying is not in line with that. I will do as you suggested and discuss this with my rebbeim since it is a chiddush to me. I will only say that I do remember hearing about a different but similar topic which the Rambam discussed that when it comes to matters of philosophy, we don’t always hold like the Rambam (I am not talking about the allegations that he may have been influenced by Aristotle). Nonetheless, this is not my place to argue with him so I will leave it to my rebbeim. Seriously, though, thanks for the discussion. I appreciate it.
“the last of the 8 perakim” of what? I am not sure how what you are saying is a disagreement to what I have been saying.
Right. So Shimshon didn’t do what Hashem would have preferred Shimshon do, but he ended up marrying exactly who was Bashert for him since bashert means it was ordained by Hashem and nothing can happen without it being ordained by Hashem.
yitayningwut – Firstly, please don’t take me that literally. Of course I didn’t mean that I have seen EVERY mareh makom.
Also, that Ohr HaChaim clearly says that it was in regards to proving whether Yosef was CHAYAV misah. again, just because a person is not literally chayav misah in a way that b’nei odom (like the shevatim) see doesn’t mean that Hashem will not kill him.
As far as your quote from the famous hakol biyedei Shomayim…, I stand corrected. In a case of absolute peshiya, it is mashma from the meforshim that one can affect something in this life.
tbt – here are the positions as I see them:
bochur24: One cannot affect occurrences in his life; he can only affect his choices (also just amended as per the beginning of this post). An example of this would perhaps be choosing whether to marry someone. I feel that yes, you have the choice to marry someone, but that that choice is limited to your choosing right or wrong and not whether the marriage actually takes place.
tbt: One can affect the occurences in his life as well as his choices. As per the above case, one can choose to marry someone even though Hashem does not have it planned for him to marry someone.
BTW, like I said: most of what we are talking about here is pretty much semantics. I feel that you must live through your life at the level you are holding. This means that at each turn you definitely have to do your hishtadlus otherwise you may not be ro’ui to get whatever is that is coming to you. However, hishtadlus is relative to where you are holding. For some people it means getting a job. For others it means davening. Obviously, one has to be holding at a very high level to really feel that his hishtadlus is solely davening. Most likely there are very few people if any who are alive today who can claim such a level. However, the fact remains that Hashem has autonomy and your hishtadlus is not what is causing the result. This is clear according to everyone who writes about bitachon. in fact, the chovos halevovos is mashma that everything that happens was encoded into briyas haolam other than your choices themselves.
and this is why I said it doesn’t NECESSARILY have an affect on this life. I am not sure how you can say “Hashem controls what happens to you” and also say “you control what happens to you”. That sounds paradoxical to me. please elaborate and give examples. Assume for a minute that your schar veoneish ALL comes after this life. Is there anything in that statement that is contrary to what you are saying or the truth of the matter?
However, Schar V’Onesh doesn’t necessarily have to do with what happens to you in this life.
tbt – what I am saying is that if you choose to marry someone, work in a certain field, or anything else for that matter, no outcome is a result of your efforts. The marriage will succeed or fail if Hashem wants it to. The job will bring you a good parnassah or not if Hashem wants it to, etc. And yes, Hashem sometimes does “shlep” you in a certain direction. That DOES NOT mean you don’t have a choice. You have absolute free will, in fact. However, Hashem will pull you toward the outcome HE wants, regsrdless of what you choose. And in your example of hitting your own foot, I will posit a very “crazy” theory that if Hashem doesn’t ant you to spend 2 weeks in the hospital you won’t! BTW, I am not saying that things that happen in your life can’t be reward and punishment for what you do. Therefore, the mon is a bad example the way you said it. By that reasoning, you could say that there is c”v no point in tefillah. That is not what I am saying. I am saying that you may do everything right or everything wrong in any given situation and still, the outcome of the situation will be completely independent of your efforts. i.e. you can invest in a very lucrative stock that is pretty much a guarantee to make a 15% return in a month and if you make 15% after a month, I guarantee that Hashem had a way of giving you that money independent of your investment. Also, if you lost 15%, Hashem had a way of taking that money from you independent of the investment.
P.S. I don’t think it is beyond your so-called “simplicity” to learn shaar habitachon. Please learn it a few times. I am not being derogatory in any way. I mean it sincerely. Also, if you look back at your life in the last, say, 2 years, you will notice countless times where you wanted very strongly to go in a certain direction and put your efforts into it and Hashem shlepped you in a differrent direction no matter how much kochos you put in. This should be some proof of what I am saying
truth be told – I believe what you are saying is bordering on kefirah unless I am missing your point. To say that we have control over our own destiny is like taking Hashem out of the equation. It is exactly “Kochi VeOtzem Yodi…”!! I have learned Shaar HaBitachon several times and, again, unless I am misunderstanding you (which is possible), what you are saying is very close to kefirah. Besides for the Chovos Halevovos, see also Daas Tevunos near the beginning where he lists the 5 types of minus that prevent a person from accepting Yichud Hashem with a full heart. The third type has 2 distinct possibilities in it and I believe you should see the first one. I am sorry if I am being blunt but what you are saying is potentially very dangerous.
I think you misunderstood me. Of course we are responsible for our actions. All I am saying is that the consequences don’t necessarily come out the way we would think. By mechiras Yosef for example, we would think that the brothers did something to hurt Yosef and therefore he should have been hurt. However, Hashem made those actions which they did turn into the very thing that made him powerful as he had foreseen in the dreams. The fact that the brothers chose the bad thing didn’t change the plan one bit. However, they could have chosen to do other things that were good and the same result would have happened – Yosef would have become a king and they would have bowed to him. Is this any clearer now?
truth be told – Your questions are somewhat valid but, and this is not a knock on you, pointless. The Rambam writes that a person has absolute bechirah. His words are “Neidah sheMaaseh HoAdam beYad hoAdam, VeEin HKB”H Moishchoi…”. Yes, a person has the choice to do wrong or right. However, as Yosef said to his brothers: “Atem Chashavtem Olai RoAh, Elokim Chashova LeToiva”. This means that no matter what we decide to do, Hashem has a way of working it out in a way that works for Him. All we can do is our best. If one will now ask, once we know that we have the choices, how can Hashem possibly know what will choose so that He may work it out, the Rambam writes (and this is a p’sak Halacha) that this answer cannot be understood by human beings. What I am trying to say is that this whole thread about Bashert is kind of moot. Perhaps this is what you meant to say, truth be told. All we can do is make decisions for ourselves and weigh them to see whether they are right or wrong. After that, it is all up to HKB”H. As an example which keeps showing up: Should 2 people get divorced? Only of it is the right thing to do in your situation. But aren’t you supposed to try and work on your marriage? Yes. Divorce is a last resort 100%. You should not take it lightly. But rest assured that if Hashem wants your marriage to crumble, C”V, you could be doing everything right and He will find a way to make it happen. What this means is that we should stop trying to figure out Hashem’s plans and just worry about what we are doing in our own lives. If we don’t, then cases like the example I just gave can make us crazy. Oh, I can’t wait to hear the feedback on this 😉
Are we really going to go through this again?!! Not EVERY boy who isn’t married or EVERY girl who is 25 (I guess that’s way over the hill. ridiculous to think that’s soooo old even for a girl. Yes, it would be great if she were married and she probably cries a lot that she isn’t and I feel bad for her, but let’s be real. 25 is not old.) and single is being picky. And all of you who keep up this type of attitude are guilty of the same thing you are accusing these people of: labeling and pigeonholing people into a very small number of possibilities. I recently heard a first-hand account of a mother who was asking information about a 26 year old boy and she asked “So why isn’t he married yet?” as though the fact that he was 26 and single was an indicator that there must be something wrong. Have we completely forgotten that Hashem runs the world? He is the one that has ultimate say on what happens in the world. What each person does and decides how to go about their life is THEIR choice. But rest assured, if the person was the most picky person in the world and Hashem wanted them married at 18, it would happen! And if they were the most flexible person in the world, Hashem may just have them waiting for many years to get married. This topic really is getting played out and I can’t understand why other people aren’t yet as sickened as I am.
WiseWoman – As far as a guy not letting you go first that is a tznius thing. I consider myself extremely courteous on dates (and, surprise surprise, in real life too) but I try to go first unless it seems the girl is in a rush to get ahead of me 😉 I do hold the door open behind me though.
ckbshl – Checking the car door lock (and, for that matter, opening the car door for a girl), are not things that are common decency manners that you would just do for anyone. I would not feel the need to open a door for my friend who was getting into the car for me to drive him to a baseball game. Yet I absolutely do it for a girl who I am taking on a date. This has nothing to do with manners and being considerate. Trust me, the girl is perfectly capable of opening the door for herself. I do it because it is chivalrous! That chivalry does not apply the other way around. manners do.
PS – if I were in a passenger seat of a car with no power locks with my friend getting in and my friend would have to reach for the key to open it I probably would open it from the inside. However, this does not apply as much to a girl in the passenger seat on a date since she may feel too reserved to reach over. Why is that? I think it is since in the heat of the moment, we can expect a girl to be reserved. I think it’s actually attractive if her middos check out. makes me more confident in her natural tznius.
It’s called chivalry.
What exactly happened that made you feel so stuck?
You can’t marry someone expecting them to change but it is a good idea to go out with the person, discuss your concerns and see if the person is willing to try. Hashkafah is definitely important in shidduchim but i think the specifics of it are far far less important than the relationship itself. if someone is kind of on your track with hashkafah but you connect in terms of the relationship (caring, feelings, chemistry, etc..), the marriage is a much better idea than if you are exactly on track with Hashkafah but not so much on the other stuff. One caveat: what I say is true for those who date in a style where they are trying to build a relationship of some sort. if you date like beshow style or 4 dates and you’re engaged, this may not apply.
lighitup – Moed Kattan 18b
memo – It’s not about knowing if you chose the right one. The question “Is this the one Hashem had planned for me?” should never be part of the equation in making your decision. It is impossible to know what Hashem’s plans are. As one choshuve person put it “I know people who were told by gedolim that this is their zivug min hashamayim and they got divorced. vaist duch ois divorce is also min hashamayim!”. You have to make your decision based on where you are holding in life. Does this make sense intellectually, hashkafically and emotionally for you in your life right now and can you see a future? If the answer is yes then the rest is up to your hishtadlus in treating each other and the priorities in your bayis properly and, of course, Hashem.
As my s/n suggests, I am a guy and I have gotten into relationships with a few girls where it didn’t work out. Even when it was mutual or my side, it was somewhat hard. It was much harder when it came from the girl. Anyone who doesn’t understand this has b”H never been in the situation and is completely clueless about relationships. Hashem created us to have companionship. When we have it, and then we don’t it is, as someone pointed out, akin to losing a loved one. I am not talking about going out with a girl once or twice (although for some people that is difficult in its own way for different reasons). I am talking about a relationship where you feel comfortable calling the other person or showing up at their house whenever you feel like it, etc. It is almost like being married in a small way. To lose that person is like losing a limb, c”v. It’s never easy to get over. Some circumstances are easier than others but it is absolutely always hard. Anyone from the yeshivish (5 dates and you’re engaged) world would have no clue about this (not that there is anything wrong with that approach but it doesn’t facilitate sensitivity in this field).
charliehall – how can you compare physical attraction to crabcake? Why not a burger at KD or a steak? where in the torah does it say you can’t have a pretty wife? yes, beauty ideally should be based MAINLY on personality and middos but as Moq said, the physical attraction is a REALITY. perhaps it is unfortunate but still a reality. and don’t pick on the fact that he used the word mishugas. what he means is that it is certainly not the way Moshe Rabbeinu would have looked for a wife, but then again Moshe wouldn’t have set foot into any of the restaurants we have hear either. does that make the restaurants silly and against Judaism? perhaps in a very ideal world, but unfortunately we live in America in 2010. Sorry folks.
theprof1 – your attitude that any person who isn’t married at the tender age of 21 (ok, that was an exaggeration. you probably meant 23 or 24) has unreasonable demands is preposterous. I hate to be melodramatic but there is something wrong with your emunah and you stink of apikorsus. Does Hashem have no say in this? The Kli Yakar says by Eliezer when he found a wife for Yitzchak that although by money one can make excuses and rationalize why the wealthy are wealthy, when it comes to shidduchim it is clear that Hashem is in control precisely because so many great people take long to get married and so many people with a lot left to be desired are married early. I personally am a bochur who is older than 23-24 and i can tell you that I am one of the least picky people in the world. When I go out with a person who has a flaw, whether in looks, personality, even frumkeit, I give them a chance and look for every drop of chein I can and discuss with my rosh yeshiva how to go about it. It is people like you who make the parsha of shidduchim so difficult and painful. People like me are always being made to feel like there is something wrong with us. Sorry to be so upset but unfortunately there are many theprof1’s out there and it is very frustrating.