It is so natural to want our dating days to come to an end, but we should never lose sight of the genuine merits and delights that lie closely entwined with their pains.

Dating might seem like a trivial and relatively inconsequential part of love, but it is in fact key to getting into the kind of relationship that can last and help us flourish. Dating sits on top of some of the largest themes of love: how to know whether or not someone is right for us; how soon to settle and how long to search; how to be at once honest and seductive; how to politely extricate oneself without causing offence.

This indispensable guide teaches us about the history of dating, the reason why our dating days can be so anxious, how to optimise our attempts at dating and how to digest and overcome the so-called ‘bad’ dates. The book is at once heartfelt and perceptive, and never minimises the agony, joys and confusions of our dating days and nights. It provides us with a roadmap to the varied sometimes delightful, sometimes daunting realities of dating.

Topics Include:

•  A Brief History of Dating
  •    How to Prove Attractive to Someone on a Date
  •    What to Wear 
  •    Common Oddities We Meet When Dating 
  •    Why the First Kiss May Be the Best Sex We Ever Have
  •    Two Reasons Why We May Be Single

Extracts from the Book:

On What to Talk About

"Our initial impulse might be to pick up on a current event, some detail of the environment or a few impressive things about our careers. But if a date is a test for the success of a long-term relationship, then what we should really be pursuing is mutual understanding of our deeper selves.”

On Should We Play It Cool When We Like Someone?

"We become experts at deliberately not phoning or sending messages, at treating our dates in a carefully off-handed manner and in subtly pretending that we don’t much care if we never cross their paths again. We are told that the only way to get them to care about us is to pretend not to care for them. And in the process, we waste a lot of time, we may lose them altogether and we have to suffer the indignity of denying that we feel a desire that should never have been associated with shame in the first place.”

 On Dating Too Little

"One of the most important principles of choosing a lover sensibly is not to feel in any hurry to make a choice. Being satisfied with being single is a precondition of satisfactory coupledom. We cannot choose wisely when remaining single feels unbearable. We have to be utterly at peace with the prospect of solitude in order to have any chance of forming a good relationship, or we’ll love no longer being single rather more than we love the partner who spared us being so."

The Love Series by The School of Life aims to be like an ideal friend around the dilemmas of the heart. Each title zeroes in on one of the central issues we’re liable to confront – from dating to heartbreak, from affairs to arguments. What unites the books is their combination of psychological insight, humanity and warmth: They lend us the advice and comfort we need to find the happiness we deserve.

Hardback book | 114 pages  | 155 x 110 mm