During Season 12, Episode 23 of Grey’s Anatomy, Alex (Justin Chambers) proposed to his girlfriend Jo (Camilla Luddington). The episode ends and Jo hasn’t responded to Alex’s proposal. Fast forward to Episode 24. Alex asks Jo why she hasn’t answered him. Jo asks Alex is her being in love with him good enough because she isn’t going anywhere.

Frustrated, Alex proceeds to tell Jo that he wants a wife and children and if that’s not what she wants, they don’t need to be together. During Alex’s monologue, he said the following quote which then inspired this blog post:

"I'm a man, and I'm done with games." #GreysAnatomy pic.twitter.com/S6uHQtsQ12

— Greys Anatomy (@GreysABC) May 20, 2016

My dating life is full of experiences, both good and bad. I’ve stayed in relationships longer than I should. Hell, I’ve gotten into relationships that I shouldn’t have gotten into. It took a long time for me to learn the lessons and now that I’m older, there are a lot of things that I’m unwilling to accept. I’m at a point in my life where I have non-negotiables and if those non-negotiables cannot be met, then I have no need for you.

Below are two of my dating non-negotiables that I refuse to bend on:

Say What You Mean & Mean What You Say

I have a zero tolerance policy for bullsh*t. I’ve been a sucker for believing someone’s promises. They usually started with “I swear”, “I promise”, “I bet”, and so on. Those phrases usually ended in disappointment because they failed to follow through. Never again. Nowadays, I pay more attention to what you aren’t saying. If you can’t back those words up, you can go.

 Don’t Settle

There are a few of my exes that I shouldn’t have dated. After repeating the pattern several times, I finally figured out the reason.

Me + Loneliness = Settling

My problem with loneliness was that in the past, I would be more focused on curing the loneliness versus finding someone who was worthy of my time & energy. I didn’t see that they weren’t financially/emotionally stable and/or monogamous. Why? My focus was skewed and I ignored the red flags that were waving in my path.

Don’t ever settle because you’re lonely. In fact, don’t settle at all. You have standards and if you put those standards aside for even a hot second, you invite all kinds of red flags into your personal space. You can’t get that time and energy back.

[bctt tweet=”Don’t spend your precious time entertaining those who are unworthy.” username=”MsWalton”]

Having non-negotiables in place help you navigate through the madness of the dating world. You can dodge the scrubs and make way for what you truly want. No need to make dating harder than it already is, right?

Until next time,

Jae