Background
This is a really exciting article series for me to write, because it is going to be the first of more than 100 articles we are carefully creating to help purposeful men learn how to date in Colombia.
Note: Every article you read on this website is from direct human perspective and will never be AI generated. This is because the perspectives we have to share do not already exist on the internet, are not commonly expressed by travelers on threads or even Redditors, and most who figure out the information we are sharing are living happy, undistributed, quiet, successful lives and they don’t really share this information with others. Why? Because they’re generally happy 🙂
Introduction
Happiness, for me, began when I saw that there was a world outside of the world that I knew. And I liked what I saw. So I began to experience it deeper and I found greater enjoyment.
Let’s set you up with a solid framework for taking emotional inventory before you travel:
Pre-Work
Before you date in Colombia, I highly recommend watching this course and taking the quiz to identify Your Dream State.
This is to get you a close look at your goals so you can prepare your emotional expectations to what you’re about to choose. [And this does include the solo traveler who is going to Cartagena for a week.]
If your dream state involves buying into the night life, there’s some critical pre-work to do that will impact the outcomes of your goals. You can have fun, or you can experience sadness and regret. You can enjoy exploration or you face a dangerous situation you never wanted to be in.
I’ve written several articles to support your preparation leading into this path. See recent articles at the end of this post.
What Is Your Dream State?
Your Dream State is extremely relevant for a foundation of emotional inventory and setting expectations within ourselves. By forming this foundational dream state, you’ll gain a vision for what you really want, then we can align goals to the future and track progress.
1. If you’re on a pursuit for a second world that levels up the enjoyable life you already have, excellent.
2. Or, if you’ve just lost your partner, ended a marriage, broken up with your girlfriend, or have just become turned off by the dating culture in your neck of the woods and you want to explore what else is out there — Colombia is an amazing place to develop solutions for these pursuits. And now is the time to do the emotional work, goal planning, and set your vision.
Start With Some Questions:
What are you expectations of my next girl? How am I going to grow with her?
Why am I pursuing this travel or transformation?
What am I looking for and how is Colombia going to serve that?
Why now: What is motivating this? What have I become fed up with?
How was I treated in prior dating relationships? How do you want to be treated?
Reflection: Why I Stopped Dating In The United States
When I did my emotional pre-work, I realized that I pursued Colombia because of the shifting dating culture in The United States.
A big hit: I was literally a couple days away from marriage before a surprising fallout with my fiancé.
Smaller hits also added up: I experienced how the games being played in US dating were become darker and colder. The types extreme personalities I encountered while dating, and the depth of strategic lies was becoming more and more unhealthy for me to experience and then learn from. From rising narcissism, dating women who were sweet and cute but then showing explosive behaviors with complex agendas and diminishing strategies, with behaviors that were justified by painful recounts of the traumatic experiences they had with their fathers or other men men they had previous dated — I was connecting over and over again with people who were crumpled on the inside before they met me. Even within my friend groups, seeing the messages women were getting on their phones from men from married police officers and married doctors and family men they worked with at the office, and how they thought it was fun to break up someone’s marriage, I couldn’t stomach the environment around me or rationalize that I was living in a healthy dating environment anymore. Or, at least, I knew that the environment I was in was not going to be able to provide what I really want to build in life.
But it’s more complicated than that. I reached a point where I knew the environment wasn’t going to be what I wanted, but changing the environment took a lot of time to figure out how what to do next. And during that time, seeing my own choices, rationalized by the darkness around me, began to show me that I was more than capable of joining aspects of it, if I stayed in the environment. For example, when your entire professional downtown environment drinks like fish, you blend that with prescription there fact that 20% of people are on heavy psych meds, and then you drive on the road? Anxiety starts to enter. But then I woke up and realize that unresolved trauma is persistent in almost every person who walks by me on the street, test that out at in conversations with the most popular bars in the city, and I could literally visualize, year over year, how my 6-figure professional, urban environment was inventing and evolving into new levels of loneliness each year that wasn’t worth going outside the house for anymore. For me, nursing a beer at the bar and talking to some hot girls that were going to be explosive later had absolutely no value for the human connection I desired.
Ultimately, I reflected upon each of the women I dated over a 4 year timeline in the US. I realized that each was living double or triple lives with multiple men. I saw how the lack of monogamy wasn’t even being talked about anymore in our culture. Polygamy was being embraced without anyone calling it that. Maybe a personal issue with me, or an issue I share with other men who are reading this, but my traditional nature and values just didn’t match up to my culture and environment in the USA anymore. The emergence of dating apps, modern dating advice on social media introducing “independence” to convince people not to commit, and influential frameworks for “keeping your options open” transformed the American Dream I grew up with. With all of the complexity, unless it happened in high school, very hard for a good person to meet another good person and build a good life together.
So after almost marrying a woman who was a master of disguise, I chose a different world where everything couldn’t me easily hidden behind smoking mirrors. This was to for my future, but also my present wellbeing. After a lot of travel to 32 countries, I chose Colombia. I learned their language. I threw myself neck-deep into 6 years of travels in Colombia, without going to other places anymore, and pursued new understanding like it was a full-time job. I invested 25% of my time and life in Colombia, then 50%, then 75%… and over $100,000 of travel and relationship investment, I’m writing these articles for you.
In Pursuit of Well Being
Colombia is the place where I found motivation again.
Real relationships here are buildable, coachable, patient, and the desire for problem solving and conflict resolution can be naturally learned and taught here. Communication inside of a relationship is still so relevant in a dating relationship here. Lies are not normalized. Dark games are not typical. You’re playing checkers instead of chess, so you can play as light-hearted or as serious as you want, so long as your goal is clearly communicated for enjoyment, experience, and growth purposes.
Somewhere between Bogota and Barranquilla, I began to opt back in to what was basic human, positive, and logical dating. What had previously turned me off to date was found again through the cultural and relational skills that made dating meaningful for me. And I certainly wasn’t as perfect or as “skilled” as I thought I was. I actually came to Colombia and accidentally led some people on. I hurt some good people that way. And they didn’t try to destroy me for it. They coached me through it.
After getting engaged to the USA girl that I had met at church, seeing the married men involved in her triple life, and still chasing after her love bombing over and over again for more than a year after, it was clear that I had some emotional pre-work to do on myself, too. And, in Colombia, I learned that every man can respawn after getting slayed in dating. It doesn’t matter how many times we get shot down. There’s still another gameplay, there’s still another life, there’s another battle ahead. When you remove the huge culture of judgement around you, and go to a world where you are valued, positive dating can return.
And that’s a common place I think we can arrive: Whatever you’ve been through, there’s a woman in Colombia who will value you. You can have a really exciting new opportunity for positive dating h\ere.
Conclusion:
I’m valuable. Because I’m valuable, I need to be clear about my goals before I begin dating. Otherwise I will hurt myself and hurt others. You’re valuable. Because you’re valuable, you should get clear about your goals, too.
Identify Motivating Factors
A New Environment
I met a beautiful woman in Colombia who lived a different way, inside of an entirely different culture, that reminded me of the “Boys Meets World” younger years of dating. I soon realized I was in a new environment that was worth learning about and exploring. And after 6 years, it is still true. Colombia is an amazing environment to heal through, date through, and grow through.
Being Wanted
Being valued and wanted is a motivating factor for most men. And along the way, you can explore how life can really be lived. There’s freedom here. You can date way younger than your age. You can just have fun. You can date and have it not work out, and keep moving. You can team up before marriage. You don’t have to get married. You can adventure date and travel. You can dance in clubs until 4am, at any age if you want to. Some men have multiple partners. Some have one. Some have none, stay in a tree house in the jungle and write a book. You won’t be judged as easily here, unless you treat people wrong.
Honesty
In this way, treating people right involves communicating your goals and expectations honestly. You won’t be blamed for it. Isn’t that awesome? Communicating your goals and expectations should be a motivating factor for every man that is considering dating. Here, in Colombia, honesty is king. If you’re honest, you can be treated like a king. You may even choose to live like a king. For me, the ability to actually be honest in a relationship, and being rewarded for honesty, is a huge motivating factor.
Figure Out Your Goals
I highly recommend you take a moment to identify your dream state, then do the emotional work that follows. Figure out your goals, upfront, before you travel and date.
Doing this now is part of the time and money savings that will impact your travel and enhance your experiences while dating in Colombia, connecting you to the right people and leading you to adventure and transformation. When you know your dream state and your goals, you can step into a clear path towards the experiences you really want to have along the way of the life you’re building.
If any of this speaks to you, whether a member or not, setup a call and let’s consider direct coaching that can support your goals.
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