Date three men at once to find ‘Love in 90 Days’

Having a tough time dealing with the one guy you're dating? Pick up a couple more! In her new book, “Love in 90 Days,” Dr. Diana Kirschner says dating multiple men is key to finding true love. In this excerpt, she shares why this method works and what guidelines you should use for success.

Chapter three: Dating three to find the one
When it comes to dating, the Bard got it right. Moderation is key. It keeps you from moving too fast or too slow when you’re getting to know new men and what they bring to your table. And the most powerful way to achieve moderation is by using the Dating Program of Three.

The Program of Three is exactly the opposite of the urban legend “three-date rule,” which dictates that you must decide by the third date if a guy is the potentially the One and have sex or lose him forever. On this dating program, you avoid that pressured decision and its aftermath: a Flame-Out that usually kills the relationship. Instead you date three men at the same time without having sex with any of them. By not seeing any one man too often, you find the men who are really into you and who will stay the course. Plus, you break out of your prison of Deadly Dating Patterns and maneuver more skillfully in the dating world. By following this program, you build your self-esteem and find men who are much more fulfilling.

Although the idea of finding, much less juggling, three guys may sound challenging — if not downright impossible! — at this point, let me reassure you: It won’t be once you begin using all the tools you’ll learn in this Program.

Why it works
There are sound biological reasons why the Dating Program of Three rocks!

First of all, it helps you avoid the number one mistake that single women make: the addictive moth-to-a-flame overinvolvement with some new guy who is supposedly the “One,” which you now know as the Flame-Out Deadly Dating Pattern. As Helen Fisher, the renowned anthropologist, describes in her fascinating book, Why We Love, romantic love is a real addiction. It is like shooting up cocaine or heroin, which means reason often goes out the window. When we “fall in love,” our brains make large quantities of dopamine and norepinephrine, which also happens when you take speed! These brain chemicals create the excited, exhilarated, and focused state that allows us to have eight-hour dates and remember every detail about what our new hottie did and said. These speed-like chemicals can also drive up our levels of testosterone, which increases sexual desire.

Second, when we fall in love, serotonin levels fall and resemble the levels found in people with obsessive-compulsive disorders. So we tend to ruminate, fantasize, and obsess about our new (drug-like) boyfriends. The new love is in our thoughts all day and in our dreams at night. Your brain says, Focus on him, focus on him, focus on him.

Once this process takes you over, you become like a craving coke addict. You lose touch with reality, seeing only the positives in the hottie. You lose self-control. Instead you are locked on the target, the fix — hot-wired and ready to do outrageous things, sometimes self-destructive things, whatever it takes to be with him. One look, one sweet word, is all it takes. Even if you don’t really know him. Even if it is not in your best interests. And as you continue to spend more time together, the addiction intensifies. As Homer wrote, you fall prey to “the heat of Love, the pulsing rush of Longing, the lover’s whisper, irresistible — magic to make the sanest [wo]man go mad.”

If you move too quickly into the pulsing rush of love, you put yourself at risk for an agonizing withdrawal if this man rejects you. Then sleeplessness, crying jags, over- or under-eating, obsessive and upsetting thoughts, all mess with your brain chemistry even further.

The Dating Program of Three safeguards you against all these dangers of love addiction. On this program you will see the new hottie less often and have a measured coming together. You will be less likely to lock on to him with a singular focus that puts you at risk. In this way you elegantly avoid getting physiologically and emotionally devastated if it turns out that he is a player or all wrong for you.

The Program of Three also stops you from having sex prematurely. Why is this so important? Simple biology. When you have sex with someone, your body drives up the levels of oxytocin both during the whole sexual act and after you leave the scene. Oxytocin, which has been called the cuddle, bonding, or tend-and-befriend hormone, creates a strong biological attachment. This means that your body may automatically start the attachment process with almost anyone you bed, whether or not you want to be in a relationship with him! Add that chemical to any dopamine surges and you’re desperately waiting for his text, e-mail, or phone call. Jumping into bed too soon means you open yourself to premature infatuation, dependency, and a kind of pseudo-intimacy that almost always backfires. Then, caught in the chemical soup of dopamine and oxytocin, you will likely lose yourself.

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Another benefit of the Program is that dating multiple men usually gets the guys’ juices flowing. Some men (especially achievers) are wired to compete and win in the courtship game, so competitiveness gets them aroused. When his reward (you) is not easily gained, his brain will pump out more and more of the rapturous chemical dopamine. Extra dopamine intensifies his feelings of being swept away by love. As one love researcher puts it, “Those who want to trigger romance in a would-be lover might artfully create some mystery, barriers and uncertainty in the relationship.” When you are on the Dating Program of Three, you do not have to fake this quality of not being so available; the program automatically accomplishes this desirable state. As one of my Love in 90 students discovered, “Now I don’t have to pretend. I am hard to get.”

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