As The Leader Grows with Ken Joslin

Coaching with Ken | Top Mistakes I’ve Made In Dating

• Ken Joslin

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Have you ever found yourself repeating the same dating mistakes, wondering if you'll ever get it right? Well, you're not alone. Join me, Ken Joslin, as I bare my soul about my dating faux pas and the deep insights they've brought into my life as a faith-based entrepreneur. It's a heartfelt narrative of transformation and the pursuit of meaningful connections, underlined by a commitment to personal growth and healing past traumas. Alongside tales of therapy breakthroughs and support from trusted confidants, this episode promises to be a compass for those navigating the unpredictable waters of modern relationships.

Relationships are a journey of the heart, but they're also a strategic endeavor that requires pacing and patience. This episode is a candid exploration of the delicate dance between emotion and information in the world of dating. I'll share why it's critical to let your understanding of a potential partner grow alongside your feelings, drawing from influential books and my personal roller coaster of love and life. It’s about being intentional and strategic, and it's designed to empower you to build a connection that's as sturdy as it is heartfelt.

Finally, I'm reaching out to all the single, faith-based entrepreneurs wrestling with the highs and lows of dating. This is your beacon of hope in a sea of swiping and superficial encounters. With an eye on next week's vital conversation about red flag recognition, I urge you to consider this episode as a key to a clearer, more focused journey toward finding a life partner. Share this with friends who could use a dose of wisdom on their path to love – let's unlock the secrets to successful dating and personal fulfillment together.

Welcome to the ATLG podcast I am your host Ken Joslin, former pastor turned coach & host of CREATE, the #1 Faith-based Entrepreneur conference in America. My mission is to help faith-based entrepreneurs become the best version of themselves by growing in our Core 5: Faith, Health, Relationships, Business & Finances. You can get more information as well as join our FREE Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/676347099851525

If you enjoyed the podcast, come join our FREE GSD Community of hundreds of entrepreneurs & a ton of FREE Content including CREATE Conference recordings with Ken, John Maxwell, Gary Brecka, Ed Mylett & more. growstackdrive.com/free

Speaker 1:

Hey guys, welcome to another episode of as the Leader Grows. I am your host, ken Jocelyn, and I'm super excited for this new kind of mini-series. I guess, as we kick this off, this is the first podcast that I have ever re-recorded. I've never recorded an episode, but I went back in and I looked at the notes and I actually sent it to. A couple people got some feedback, because I think that this information that I'm going to be giving you over the next few weeks is so vital and so important.

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I believe it can be transformational, especially for those of you guys I know you've looked at the title already Top mistakes I've made while dating. For some of you guys that are single, faith-based entrepreneurs, you're in your 30s, 40s, 50s and you're like what in the world is going on in my life? Let me say this before I even kick this off and start sharing with you guys some of the things amazing therapists that I pay and I have some of the most amazing friends who are also therapists that are just friends that I get to. Just I get to run stuff by. I get to not only run stuff by, but I run relationships by. Like I don't. I have not had a relationship. I don't guess, probably in the last two years that I haven't been able to run a relationship by my therapist. Number one, my therapists always know what's going on. But number two, my friends. Here's where I'm at, here's the situation, and I'm going to share some things with you guys today that are that are going to be uber personal, and because I really I really want to be able to help you and here's how you can help me at the end of this, at the end of this show, if this has helped you at all, I want you to share this with about three to five of your friends, who this would add tremendous value to. If you've got friends who are single 30s, 40s, 50s they need they're going to need to hear what I'm about to share with you, and so the number one thing I want to share with you is if you find your, if you find yourself in this place today, where you're in your, especially in your 40s and your 50s I mean, I'm 55 years old this year and I've been single now for almost four years and this journey of really trying to find number one myself and really trying to walk through this healing process myself it's funny because three years ago. This past week it popped up on my Instagram. It was Gabby Bernstein's Happy Days book. It was right after I started reading that book, right after I walked out of a therapy appointment with my therapist for the very first time after my divorce was final, and I'll share this with you real quick, for those of you guys that may or may not have heard this story.

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I walk into this therapy appointment with Maxine in Birmingham and she is super cool. I tell people she's a mild version of Medea, she's an older black lady. She's hilarious. I walk in the office and she's like Ken how are you and Jesus doing this week? You've been praying in the Spirit this week. How are you doing Like, I'm good, maxine, but I'm good Maxine. But the very first time I ever walked into the office with Maxine Now at this time I'm 52, 53 years old and I walk in the office with Maxine and we sit down and she just does you know, a little bit of an intake just to get to know who I am, and within five minutes I had the second biggest aha moment of my entire life.

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You know, ken, that's, that's huge.

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Like second biggest aha moment of my entire life.

Speaker 1:

You know, ken, that's, that's huge, like second biggest aha moment.

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Yeah, the first one was August, the 22nd of 1993, when I gave my life to Christ. And then this moment, and she started out asking me some questions. She said tell me a little bit about Ken. And I said yeah. I said, um, you know in my fifties, was born in Detroit, raised in Pontiac. Parents got divorced when I was eight years old. I was in the second grade and mom moved us to the Atlanta area and from my sixth grade year to my senior year of high school I moved back and forth to my dad's in Michigan, in Pontiac, six different times, 12 different schools, six different high schools.

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And I'll never forget she's taking notes and again she's. She's kind of funny, she's taking notes and she looks at me, she goes woo honey, she goes. Why in the world would you move so many times? And I said, maxine, I did not have a choice. Anytime I got in trouble, my mom would tell me to go pack a bag, and I had 24 to 48 hours and I was on a plane, a bus or my dad was on the way to pick me up. And she's writing notes and her face gets serious and she looks at me and she says these words Ken, how has that affected your relationship with the women in your life who are supposed to love and protect you? And I lost it. I'm literally sitting in this woman's office, this therapy office, and in the first five minutes I am a, I am a crying mess and you're like Ken. What hit you so hard it? What hit me so hard was the fact and the truth and the aha moment that I had been dealing with trauma Since I was a 12 or 13 year old boy at this time, probably 40 years.

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And I went back three weeks before this, this meeting with her, I was in san francisco. I'd been dating a woman that I loved dearly. I loved her dearly. She had picked me up at the airport in San Francisco and we didn't even make it across the bridge to go North. We had an argument Well, I mean within 10, 15 minutes had an argument. I made her pull the car over, I got my suitcase out and I left. And here was a. Here was a 50 some odd year old man still living out the trauma of a 12 year old boy. Except now, the woman in my life was not going to tell me to leave. I was going to leave before she told me and I had no idea that that was on the inside of my heart.

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And you guys have heard a lot, man. I have shared. I've been ridiculously transparent with my audience, with my GSD collective, with our mastermind Heck. Even at Create, I host the number one faith-based entrepreneur conference in America with guys like John Maxwell and Brendan Bouchard and Ed Milet and Gary Brekka and Vic Keller and Randy Garn and Jesse Itzler and friends like Amberly Lago and Marie Cosgrove and, and um, I mean just a ton of amazing entrepreneurs. And even at my conference, lauren, who's was my somatic therapist for a year, came on and I gave her 25 minutes to share. Uh, dr Morgan Anderson, who's a who's a dear friend, who is a clinical psychologist. Morgan Anderson, who's a dear friend, who is a clinical psychologist. She has her PhD. She is an attachment theory expert. I had her come on this year. My good friends Henry and Taryn Amar, who are a phenomenal couple Again, these are friends. I run relationships by these friends. I had them share at my conference as well.

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So this is a huge part of my life and I know that one of my, one of my five affirmations, and I just posted this on my Instagram account and you can find it there at Ken Jocelyn. I just posted this and this is what I said in my affirmation I am whole. I choose to use past pain to help others find healing because I know that the things that I have been through in my past, the pain that I've been through, the trauma that I've been through, all of the experiences that I've had, god has given me this unbelievable platform to be able to share this with people so you can find healing quicker, so you don't have to make the same mistakes that I've made. It's for 20 plus years when, anytime, somebody says, ken, how can I pray for you? Or when I was pastoring, pastor Ken, how can I pray for you? It's always the same answer Wisdom. I need wisdom and people go. Kimmy, you've got so much wisdom. Like I'm 55 years old, do you realize how many mistakes that I've made in 55 years? Like a ton. And this is why podcasts and listening to people and being mentored and being around people are so important.

Speaker 1:

So I just shared my story with you from about three years ago, when Maxine just literally dropped that bomb on me. How do you think this has affected your relationships, with your relationship with the women in your life who are supposed to love and protect you. And here, here I was, a 50, some odd year old man grabbing my suitcase and getting out of the car after I just flew seven hours across the country to be with a woman that I I, I love dearly. And it started that journey. And literally last week it popped up on my Instagram three years ago Gabby Bernstein's book Happy Days, when she talked about trauma and how trauma affects us and what it looks like. And that was my beginning of my healing journey.

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That and my time with Maxine and guys, listen, I've been in ministry for a long time. I've been in therapy, I've been in counseling a lot, but this was a journey for me because I had that aha moment of holy cow. I had no idea this was something that was even there, and so I've got past podcasts where I talk about how you realize if you have unresolved trauma in your life, and I've even talked about this extensively at our create conference, so you can jump back on that. But I want to talk about some of the top mistakes I've made in dating. And again, this is the only podcast I've ever rerecorded. I've never rerecorded a podcast until this one because I wanted to share this from a from a different angle, and I the order. I think I shared things in the other one. I think this will be better and help you more from this perspective. So, top mistakes that I made in dating and this is the number one thing you cannot let your feelings outpace the information that you're gathering. You cannot let your feelings outpace the information that you're gathering.

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Now, guys, I am a coach and a pastor. I love people. I love helping people become the best versions of themselves. Even all the way back 25 years ago, when I built one of the largest youth ministries in America, I did that with one of my mentors telling me that youth ministry was loving God and loving teenagers. My mentors telling me that youth ministry was loving God and loving teenagers, and she used to say youth ministry is literally pulling your heart out every single day and giving it to students and teenagers and watching some of them trample on it and then you have to pick it back up, let God heal it and do the same thing over again. My best friend, nate, who worked for John Maxwell for a long time. He always tells me he goes, ken, he goes. I've never seen anyone lead with their heart the way that you lead with your heart, which is phenomenal. In what I do, in working with our clients and working with our GSD collective and working with our people in our mastermind, I care for and truly love people. So when I give a talk, like great leaders want something for people, not from people it is an authentic piece of who I am as a man and as a Christ follower.

Speaker 1:

But the one mistake that I've made in the number one mistake that I've made in dating, is letting my feelings outpace the information that I was gathering. And this is something that I've learned from Dr Morgan Anderson. For those of you guys that don't follow dr morgan, as a matter of fact, I just did a podcast with her, probably last month. Um, you need to go back and listen to that podcast that we did. But she she always tells me she's like ken, when you first meet someone, for the first three to six months, you are gathering information.

Speaker 1:

You are gathering information, especially, especially if you meet someone and there's like, wow, there's this unbelievable connection and listen, if you're single and you're in your forties or fifties, there is a pressure, it feels like, and you, you have to really push against this and be aware of this pressure. There's a pressure that can come to you and go dude, you're 55 years old, you don't have much time left, man. You need to. You need to speed it up, man, this list that you have of what you want in your ideal partner, dude, you're asking too much, you're expecting too much. You're believing that there's a unicorn out there that God has for Ken.

Speaker 1:

Well, I believe that, in who I am as a man, in my heart, that I am a unicorn, because there is absolutely zero in my life that is untouchable. When it comes to being in a relationship, there is no area I will not work on. There is no area that I will not go. Hey, listen, if this is something that needs to be worked on, I will do it. As a matter of fact, five, six, seven, eight years ago in therapy, before I filed for divorce, I'll never forget looking at the therapist going. If you tell me what I need to do to save my marriage, I will do anything you tell me to do. Like, there is absolutely nothing that I will not do, but the one mistake that I want to start with today and then probably next week I'm going to jump into the next two and they're huge, letting my feelings outpace the information that I'm gathering and this was a huge lesson that I have learned, especially guys, listen to me you go on a date Like I haven't dated anyone longer.

Speaker 1:

In the last two and a half well, probably the last three years I dated someone for about a year and a half total. Um, that was the individual that I mentioned that lived in Northern California, dated her for about a year and a half total, really loved her a ton. And then the other people that I've dated I it hasn't really been. I've had one that's been significant timeframe, about 90, about 90 days to a hundred days, and other than that it's been a week, two weeks, three weeks, four weeks, five weeks. And then really what happens is and in all of those relationships I said this in most of those relationships I was like, okay, let me see who this individual is.

Speaker 1:

But what happens sometimes is, as someone who is a coach, pastor, empath, loves people, I would let my feelings outpace the information that I was gathering. So when I met someone, I'm like holy cow, I'm smitten with this woman and through the process of and I'll just say this for all you men out there if you have not listened to David Data's book the Way of the Superior man, I'm telling you, if you could come to my conference or come to our mastermind in Puerto Rico we're having next month, or read this book. I would say go read this book. As a matter of fact, not only go read the book, but I've read this book five times in a row, like literally October, november, december, five times in a row and I've read it again since then. And the four agreements, those two books right there, absolutely helped change the way that I looked at me as a man and me in the pursuit the intentional pursuit of finding a partner.

Speaker 1:

But the number one mistake is letting your feelings outpace the information that you're gathering, because what happens is when you do that, it's hard to know who the other individual is, because here's some things that I've seen happen in relationships with me and some of these terms I'd never even heard of until I'm talking to my therapist, talking to my friends, like Dr Morgan Anderson and this is a huge lesson that I've learned in the past six months is things like intermittent reinforcement. Intermittent reinforcement when you're in a relationship with someone and they're there. Some people may call it breadcrumbing someone and they're they're. Some people may call it breadcrumbing Like they're they're. They're all in upfront and they're doing great. And you're all in and your feelings are in front of. Your feelings are outpacing the information.

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What happens is you can wind up in a situation with somebody who's not healthy, who may appear healthy but they're really not healthy. You, let me say this you, it's very, very hard for you to know, especially listen. If you're just dating to go out and have fun and hook up and do all the stuff that that, to be honest with you, the majority of America is doing, then by all means go do what you want to do. But if you're out there and you're in your forties and your fifties and you're looking for a life partner, like you are on this intentional pursuit to find someone to not only build the rest of your life and build whatever business or whatever, whatever ministry, whatever it is you're trying to build with this individual, you cannot let your feelings outpace the information you're gathering, because it takes time to realize if this individual is healthy or not. Things like intermittent reinforcement which man? You can look it up, I did blew me away. It's where they give you enough reinforcement and it's not even when you do things right and it changes subconsciously the way you show up in a relationship.

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Why? Because your feelings have outpaced the information you're gathering when you're in the first 90 days of a relationship. I mean you really need to be in the pursuit of information, am I? Because, listen, I've got a list of what I'm looking for in a partner and I don't share it super early in a relationship. I've shared it a couple times. One relationship I actually shared it early and the person said, oh, I'm all these things, and a lot of people do believe they are all those things, but the reality of it is is you don't know what's on the inside, especially men. You don't know what's on the inside of that woman until you get in a relationship.

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And if you let your feelings outpace the information you're gathering and you don't grow slowly and you don't grow slowly, you don't let the affection and the love and the intimacy and the passion grow slowly, if you don't start off that relationship as friends, if you don't start off that relationship by asking tough questions, you're in trouble. Questions you're in trouble If you don't start off that relationship slow. And now. Let me just throw this out there for all of you guys listening, ken like, what do you mean by slow? Like if you're in a relationship and you're having sex with this person within the first 30 to 60 days, you're not, you're not, you're not, you are not starting slow.

Speaker 1:

Listen, women need to feel loved in order to want to have sex. Men feel loved when they have sex and so if you're having sex and you're intimate with this woman that you might think has the potential to be the woman that you want to be with the rest of your life, and you've already had the let's be exclusive conversation and you start entering into a physical, intimate relationship too early, your feelings are always going to outpace the information that you're gathering. You have got to upfront, take that off the table and, guys, this is just. I can't be more transparent with you in. I did not do a good job at this in a few relationships. You have got to have this conversation up front. You've got to say listen, my sole intention on dating you, or my sole intention on dating anyone, is to find the partner that God has for me.

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I've shared this scripture in Proverbs a million times A man who finds a wife finds a good thing that scripture, that literally, that proverb the word picture is, as a man goes is on his path to chase God and to fall in love with Jesus and be the best version of himself that he can be. God causes the path of a woman to intersect his path and I used to do a six week courting series when I was a youth pastor. Hundreds of kids and parents, hundreds and hundreds of we pack them in six weeks Series was called God, will you go with me? Because you know when your kids like, hey, mom, I'm going so-and-so, and your parents would always say what, where are you going? But I used to do this series and the whole theme about it was stop worrying about finding Mr or Mrs Right and worry about becoming Mr or Mrs Right.

Speaker 1:

But if you don't have the conversations early in your relationship I'm talking about like date number one, date number two, date number three and especially if you meet somebody and there's a connection and there's a holy cow, man, I am into this woman or I am so into this dude If there's a connection, especially when you're in your forties and fifties, it's just different. I was married for 27 years. Our sex life was never an issue. And when you're used to that and suddenly you're single man, you want to talk about being a difficult situation for a person that's faith-based and loves God. It can be difficult for a person that's faith-based and loves God. It can be difficult.

Speaker 1:

And when you meet someone and you let your feelings outpace the information, what happens is you'll enter into a physical, intimate relationship with an individual and you're just in the information gathering part of the relationship, your feelings will outpace the information you're gathering and when that happens, I'm just telling you you're in trouble. Can you make it? Maybe Do you stack the odds against you One thousand percent. You have got to grow slowly. So I'm in a space right now for the last couple months where I'm like, okay, god, I hear you. God, I am going to gather information and purposely be intentional on not allowing myself to develop emotions or feelings for another person, for a woman, until I've gathered enough information, because it's easy to look at my list. I mean, I prayed through this list. As a matter of fact. I posted it on my podcast, I posted it on my Instagram, I don't know about three or four weeks ago. I've never done that. I posted this because I wanted people to see. This is how specific I am in the partner that I am going after.

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But if you let your feelings outpace the information you're gathering and you enter into a physical, intimate relationship with a partner too early, you're in trouble. You've got to gather the information, which means you have conversations like this. Listen, because here's the deal If you go out with somebody the first couple times, two or three times, let's say. You're going out two or three times and you guys find yourself back at your house and you're having a cocktail and you're sitting on the couch and you're just kind of chilling and you've had a great time and there is a physical chemistry that is like holy cow, guys, you've got to have the conversation. Hey, listen, I really like you and I want you to know well, let me rewind this a little bit before you even get into that position hey, I want you to know that I really like you and I want to be, I want to honor myself and this journey that I am on personally in finding the partner that God has for me, and so I want you to know that I don't, I don't, I'm not going to norm, nor do I want you to put up, allow us to get in a position to where we could be physically intimate with each other. I want us to have that conversation. What does that conversation look like, ken? That's uncomfortable. You better believe it is. It is uncomfortable. You better have lots of uncomfortable conversations, because if you don't have uncomfortable conversations, I saw this Instagram reel about two, three months ago and, man, it was right when I needed it and it was the beginning of a relationship, isn't for what did he say?

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Pictures that go on your desk, or pictures that go on your nightstand Like, oh, we had this great time, we went out here and we did this weekend trip and we went to this concert we did, which. All those things are fine, but that time when you get to know someone just isn't about having a great time, but it's also about asking questions, and one of the questions that I asked in a relationship in the last couple, two or three years was I'd met someone and I was like this is great, and then I'm going to. I'm going to jump in these last two points next week, so I'm going to share this one story and then we're going to. I'm going to close this out and we're going to go, cause I'm already about five or five minutes over what I'd normally do on this coaching with Ken episode and we had a conversation. We had a great time, amazing weekend. We.

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I said, hey, listen, if, if I'm going to do this and I'm flying to come see you, we're physically we're staying two separate places, I don't, I don't even, I don't want the temptation, I don't cause I I'm really attracted to you and I'm looking for my partner and so I go into the, I go into the weekend. We have an amazing, amazing weekend, great time, church service, worship. I look at her. She's weeping and I looked at her and I said, why are you crying? And she goes. I've never had a man worship with me the way that you worship with me. I've never had a man that I could watch worship and sing and see man the passion he had for Jesus. I've never had that before. Amazing.

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We had an amazing two, three days together and at the end of those end of those actually three days, I just said, hey, listen, I want us to. I would love for us to sit down and look at our calendar and get some more time on the calendar and I would love for us, I'd love for you to consider us taking the next 60 days and us being exclusive. Now, I haven't had this conversation with maybe a couple people in three years, but I knew I was like, man, this is really good, this is really easy, it's really organic. I would love for us to have the conversation and I'll never forget. We sat down and she broke out her calendar and she's looking at dates and she's like well, I'm going to be in this city in this day and I'm going to be in this city in this day and this city in this date. And so it was going to be like three or four weeks and I'm like, okay, great, you know, I'm not, I'm not looking for, you know, a relationship where I can get you know I see you every three to four weeks. Cause it was, this was going to be a long distance relationship. It was a pretty decent flight to be able to get to where she lives. I didn't have a problem with but not, you know, going three to four weeks and not seeing each other.

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And then in that process, she was like well, let me be really honest with you, I've talking to some other guys and this one weekend I was going to spend five days at this conference and I was staying with this guy that I was dating. And then this other time I had another three, almost pretty much what we had just done. I had another two to three day weekend with this guy and I just said, hey, listen. I said, and then I'm going to get to the backside of the story next week on my podcast. I just say, listen, that's not what I want. And if that's what you want, I perfectly understand it. But man, I just I wish you the best and I'll never forget the look she gave me and she was like what? And I'm like I don't, it's not what I want. And if you want that, that's okay, but that is not what I want. I've had such an amazing time these last 48, 72 hours that I would love to and I'm willing to take off the table seeing anybody else, just to be able to focus on you and pray and go okay, god, could this be the one that you have for me? And it took her about four days before she finally called me back, cause when I left I was like, okay, well, that was amazing weekend. She's going in a different direction. I'm not. I'm not willing to.

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I mean, I'm going to talk about red flags and boundaries on the next episode, because this is huge. I had my boundaries. I had done the work. I had been doing work for almost three years on myself. I knew exactly what I wanted. Years on myself, I knew exactly what I wanted.

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And when I knew what she wanted was different than what I wanted, and I said hey and I'll never forget. She even said this guys, listen, guys and girls, listen to this, listen to this. She goes. It feels like you're giving me an ultimatum. I'll never forget it. She looked me right in the eye. It feels like you're giving me an ultimatum. I looked at her and I said I'm not giving you an ultimatum. These are my boundaries. I'm not interested in seeing you a weekend and you flying across the country and seeing another guy and then I see you for a couple of days and you flying across the country and seeing another guy. I'm not interested in that. I've had an amazing time with you and I would love to see and I'm willing to say hey, I'm willing to set aside, just like you are. I'm willing to set aside 60 days to see what God has for us. And it took about four days before she called me back, she goes okay, I'm I'm willing to do that. So, top mistakes I made in dating man I hope this has helped you.

Speaker 1:

Number one you cannot let your feelings outpace the information that you are gathering. Next week I want to talk about because what happens is when you let your feelings outpace your information, you ignore red flags, and I want to talk about that next week. Guys, thanks for joining us again on another episode of as the Leader Grows, and I want to talk about that next week. Guys, thanks for joining us again on another episode of as the Leader Grows. I am your host, ken Jocelyn, super grateful for you guys helping us become, just in this past couple weeks, in the top 2% of all podcasts in the United States.

Speaker 1:

Listen, if you've got a single, if you've got a friend who is single, faith-based entrepreneur man, they're trying to listen. It's mean on these streets out here, guys, is these dating streets are nasty Like if they're trying to navigate these dating streets. Listen, do me a favor, send this podcast about three or five of your friends. That's all I ask of you. I don't want you to. I don't want you to to subscribe out. I'm not asking you to do anything else Share it, review it. Simply take this podcast, hit the share button, send it to about three to five of your friends that you know are single and could use this information, and I'll see you next week. The next episode. Can't wait to jump into ignoring red flags and guys, I promise you, if you let your feelings outpace the information you're gathering, you will ignore the red flags every single time. Y'all have a good one. I'll see you next.