How many times have you said the following to your friends, or have they said something like this to you?

We were talking online, and then he asked for my number to make it easier to schedule the date.  Well, it’s been a week, and all he does is text with no date in sight!

Or…

I don’t know… I guess I pictured him differently in my head from all his texts.

Or, how about this one?

OMG—I love this girl!  We’ve been texting every day, and I’m really falling for her. 

It happens all the time… someone puts his or her phone number down on a dating site or app and says, “Text me” or “Reach out to me.”  Does it really make communicating easier?  Isn’t it just as easy to check your email or your Tinder/JSwipe/Hinge as it is a text?  (Okay, maybe it’s not quite as easy, but still…)  And really, is there a need to text before the date, except to confirm the day before?  (Very important: do this)  My recommendation is simply to exchange numbers a day or two prior to the date so you can 1) confirm and 2) contact each other the day of in case something goes awry (you need to cancel, you’re running late, etc.).  As a side note—and I know I’ve said this before—if you’re cancelling the day of the date, especially if it’s within a few hours of when you’re supposed to meet each other, please do have the decency to call.

Besides the never-ending text relationship that might form with no date in sight, by texting (or emailing) too much before the date, you run the risk of building a false impression of this person that may not equate to what he or she is like in real life.  We often have a tendency to share things behind the screen that we may not reveal to someone in the flesh until much later.  The New York Post even has a name for this—premature escalation.

The article says this: “It’s a trend we’ve coined ‘premature escalation’… since our whole world is so instant now, people can craft entire personas through their slew of texts… by the time you meet your partner for an actual date, you’ve built up this whole image and fantasy in your head of who you think they are, and then they turn out to be totally different.”  Sound familiar?

What’s the solution then?  If you’re intent on texting before a date, then try to keep these texts to a minimum, with the purpose of determining the logistics of the date.  Whitney Casey, a love expert for Match.com agrees: “If your date starts sending you ‘How was your day?’ texts, it’s on you to cut him or her off — nicely.”  Saying something as simple as this should do the trick: “Hey—I’m not really a huge texter, but I’m really looking forward to seeing you on Wednesday!”

Now, I’m not saying all texting is bad.  In fact, I love texting!  It’s great when you’re in a relationship to check in with someone during the day or to send a sweet inside joke.  But just as I would never advise anyone to “friend” a potential date on Facebook before the first date, I would strongly advise you to just set up the date and go from there.  The sooner you meet, the sooner you’ll know if there’s chemistry.  And then text away!

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We all know what an obstacle is. According to our good friends Merriam and Webster, an obstacle is, “something that impedes progress or achievement.” Now, what if that “something” is you?

In dating, there are so many potential obstacles to that first date:
1. Emailing someone online
2. Talking on the phone (I actually never recommend this… article coming on the topic soon.)
3. Text messaging before the date

Each of these obstacles listed above is a potential rejection point for your date to decide not to go out with you (and vice versa). I know I’m a former economist and all, but you don’t need to be a math whiz to know that by removing one of these potential rejection points, the probability of actually getting to the date is greater.

Let’s look at a few scenarios below:

At each point, the date is presumed to have messed up in some way, but there may be an explanation for it. For Endless Emailer Ethan, perhaps he just doesn’t know how online dating works. Give him the benefit of the doubt and (gasp!) even suggest meeting him. For Chatty Cathy on the phone, perhaps she just talks too much when she gets nervous, but as she gets to know you, she calms down a bit and actually breathes between talking about her precious cockatoo and her trip to Finland last year. And for Texting Timmy, maybe he’s just plain excited to go out with a great catch like you. It’s better than the alternative – not contacting you at all. Simply saying, “I’m not really a huge texter,” should do the trick.

Do Ethan, Cathy, and Timmy hit a bit close to home? Or maybe you’ve dismissed one of them in your dating days. My advice? Remove the obstacles to the first date. You never know if you’ll have chemistry until you meet in person, so don’t get in your own way by setting up all of these rejection points. A couple of emails back and forth should be plenty, and then get right to the date. As a client just emailed me recently, “What came across in emails was not there in person. I guess that happens quite a bit and the more experience I get at this, the sooner I will try to get to a meeting so I don’t have to [spend] my time emailing.” Obviously, this can go either way – better in person or worse – but you have to actually meet to find out.

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