Intimacy costs commitment. If i’m not in the position to pay in the cold, hard cash of commitment, I have no business going shopping for my future mate.
Before two people are ready for the responsibility of commitment, they should content themselves with friendship and wait on deep emotional intimacy. Exercising this patience will not handicap them relationally. In friendship, they can practice the skills of relating, caring, and sharing their lives with other people. In friendship, they can observe other people’s characters and begin to see what they’ll one day want in their mates. While it’s true we can learn worthwhile lessons from dating relationships, we need to make sure those relationships don’t bog us down. Wasting too much time trying each other out as boyfriend and girlfriend can actually distract two people from the more important task of preparing to be good spouses."
