What’s Your Dating Skill Level?
Love isn’t a fairytale—it’s more like a video game, and the #1 reason anyone is single is because they’re trying to have a Level 25 relationship with Level 3 skills.
Today we’re going to look at the major skill level differences and how they impact your romantic progress.
(If you haven't already taken my free dating skill quiz, click here to see where your dating skills currently stand.)
We tend to have an ideal of the perfect relationship that no one’s actual relationship ever measures up to. This is what I call the Level 25 relationship. But, as you’ll see shortly in my explanation of the skill phases, there is no Level 25.
There are only 12 relationship skill levels altogether and we only need to reach about Level 7 to feel the peace, ease, and confidence of a competent dater. The 12 levels are grouped into four distinct phases of three levels each.
Let’s dive into the phases.
The Dating Novice Phase: Skill Levels 1-3
Key Indicator: Unconscious Incompetence
At these skill levels, we don’t know what we don’t know, and that’s usually what causes us to struggle. We’re optimistically uninformed and unrealistic in our expectations.
Biggest Obstacle
Our own ignorance of the process. However, our beginner’s mind is open to instruction and lacks preconceptions that would impede our learning.
Primary Goal
To acquire the prerequisite knowledge necessary to develop the higher skills within a domain. This includes investing in relationship books, courses, and workshops to improve our foundational understanding of both the dating process and ourselves within that process.
The Romantic Apprentice Phase: Skill Levels 4-6
Key Indicator: Conscious Incompetence
At these skill levels, we become aware of two things: 1) We may know what we need to do, but not necessarily how to do it well yet; and 2) we recognize that there are many things we still don’t know. In this phase, many singles become jaded and frustrated, since everything feels hard when we don’t know what to do.
Biggest Obstacle
Getting stuck due to our own emotional avoidance, which allows our feelings of inadequacy, shame, fear, guilt, anger, and/or stress to keep us from taking the actions needed to move toward competence.
Primary Goal
To develop the emotional awareness and processing capacity needed to navigate the discomfort that is required for our romantic growth. This includes dating purely for practice and/or hiring a mentor/coach to hold us accountable when we want to give up—because in this phase we likely will.
The Love Alchemist Phase: Skills Levels 7-9
Key Indicator: Conscious Competence
At these skill levels, we know what to do and how to do it effectively, but only while applying conscious effort. Achieving this level and beyond is the goal for every intentional dater.
Biggest Obstacle
Overconfidence—our egos can easily convince us that we no longer need to practice, since we’ve already been able to intentionally achieve a few results. But if we don’t practice, our skills can return to a level of inadequacy that reactivates the emotional avoidance of the previous phase.
Primary Goal
Consistent practice, because practice makes permanent and is the only way to keep our skills sharp and effective. Practice involves the implementation of our skills for actual use, like practicing law. This applies to both intentional dating and conscious relating once we’ve committed to a partner.
The Relationship Master Phase: Skill Levels 10-12
Key Indicator: Unconscious Competence
At these skill levels, the required mindset, heartset, and skillset are now integrated into our lifestyles, so we don’t have to consciously think about them. We can also easily transfer our abilities to other areas of life.
Biggest Obstacle
Complacency. Because we’re now in a comfortable pattern, it’s easy to allow new insights and updates to pass us by.
Primary Goal
To reinforce the habit of continual improvement so that our skills don’t become obsolete as life evolves beyond us. This includes periodic reviews and updates of our mindset, heartset, and skillset in response to the changes that occur in our lives and our relationships.
To be fair, anyone can find love, even at Level 1—we’re just more likely to struggle through it with lower-level dating skills.
The vast majority of daters who come to me for help do indeed have Level 3 skills, on average. This is why I coach 100% of my matchmaking clients, and will only consider taking on a matchmaking client once they’ve reached Level 7 dating skills.
If we’re searching for something unrealistic and unattainable while simultaneously lacking the adequate level of skills to handle what is realistic and attainable, it creates the perfect explanation for why so many people struggle with love.
But now you know what you need to do: Take responsibility for transforming your own love life by developing your dating skills, because Prince Charming is not coming to save you.
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Amari Ice is a relationship coach, matchmaker, and hypnotherapist who helps gay men master their romantic magic by developing their dating skills, healing subconscious patterns of self-sabotage, and enhancing their romantic magnetism so that love becomes inevitable. Take the free Dating Skills Quiz to discover your dating skill level.