I have recently come to realize that my focus within relationships has become overly narrow the last few months. I used to deliberately pursue friendships with members of the opposite sex, without any preconceived intention of moving towards a more romantic relationship in the future. That was reasonably successful, and a huge part of my growth over the last few years. But I have realized that now that I have a sufficient number of close female friends, I haven't really left that possibility open to new people I am connecting with. Pretty much any relationship development I have undertaken with females over the last few months has been very deliberately focused towards dating or those types of interactions.
Now developing new relationships with girls is never a simple process. Both parties are trying to figure out what direction the friendship is going to take, and what the other person is looking for. Neither one usually wants to express how they feel directly, without knowing where the other is at. (Although there are a few out there that don't hesitate to make the "pre-emptive first strike")
There was someone I had known for quite a while, who had been taking a lot of initiative in pursuing a closer relationship with me. She never actually talked to me directly about that, there was just a steadily increasing stream of invitations to get together and do things. This led me to the outlandish conclusion that she was looking for a “relationship” with me. Even though I found it hard to imagine that happening, and was very focused elsewhere, I will admit that I saw her interest as a positive thing, or at least encouraging, among a series of other doors closing. While I didn’t force a discussion of the issue with her directly, I made sure to keep our interactions on neutral ground. Eventually it came to a point where it had to be addressed because of the way other people were treating us, and I had to think and pray about how to approach that issue. I deliberately tried to open myself to the possibility that she might be a suitable partner for me if I gave her a chance. When I asked her how she felt, she claimed to have no interest in dating, but just wanted to be close friends. I found this surprising, but I can recall being inspired by girls who seemed very relaxed about being friends with guys. That drew me towards them as friends, since I knew our friendship wasn’t breaking any new ground for them, and would therefore be easier. This appears to be the same thing in reverse, which implies that “I have arrived” in regards to being friends with girls, if other people see me that way.
Because "dating is bad" in certain Christian circles, you have to be friends first. But that can result in two people pursuing a friendship together for VERY different reasons. This can lead to all sorts of misunderstandings, or the awareness of that possibility erodes trust even when both parties actually ARE seeking the same thing, as in my case above.
The best way to develop a close friendship with a member of the opposite sex, is to make sure that both of you are blindly attracted to other people. Ideally those other potential relationships aren't going anywhere, but neither of you can get over it. (Because if either relationship did go somewhere, you wouldn't have time for each other) And the lack of progress in those endeavors will give you something in common. Obviously I am not recommending taking this approach, but I can say from experience that it works incredibly well, at least for a while.
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