There’s a very specific kind of stupid in dating that didn’t exist before smartphones.
It’s 11:47 pm. You’re in bed. You’ve been talking to someone for six days.
And somehow you’re now discussing abandonment wounds, attachment styles, and whether you want two kids or three.
You haven’t met. But he knows your deepest fear.
This isn’t connection. It’s acceleration. Courting on steroids.
You’re not in a relationship. You’re in the feeling of a relationship.
And feelings lie. Every. Single. Time.
Most of us have lived some version of this. And most of us have felt the crash when the closeness built through a screen turns out to have no floor beneath it.
So here are three boundaries that actually work. The kind that make dating feel calmer, safer, and weirdly more steady.
1. Don’t let texting create a false sense of intimacy
I once watched a friend, (smart, discerning, loves the Lord) get absolutely leveled by a man she never once met in person. Weeks of constant texting. Voice notes. Late-night vulnerability. Future hypotheticals. Pet names. The whole thing.
Then one day he just… stopped replying.
No fight. No explanation. No fade. Just gone. Like he evaporated.
She spent weeks trying to decode what happened. Rereading texts. Replaying voice notes. Wondering what she said wrong. It felt exactly like a breakup, except there had never been a relationship in real life.
That’s the trap of word-built intimacy.
The attachment is completely real. The foundation is completely imaginary.
Here’s the contrast Scripture shows with God.
He lets Himself be known, but gradually. People walk with Him, fail, get back up, learn, trust, and then know Him more deeply. Knowledge follows relationship, not the other way around.
Modern dating flips that. Disclosure first. Reality later. Or never.
The boundary
Keep some emotional layers in reserve until real-world time has been shared.
Ask yourself one honest question: Has this person earned the level of access I’m giving him? If the answer is no, slow the reveal.
This doesn’t mean being secretive. It means being wise.
2. Say what’s wrong without turning it into a verdict
Long-distance and online dating have a special knack for creating stories in your head.
He takes longer to reply. Your brain writes a screenplay.
He sounds distracted. You imagine fading interest.
He’s busy for a week. Your nervous system declares abandonment.
We’ve all been there.
The tricky part is how that gets voiced.
One person says, “I missed you more than I expected this week.” Another says, “You’re pulling away.” Same feeling. Completely different impact.
One is true. The other is a guess, a conclusion that corners the person into a defensive position.
There’s a moment in Job, after everything has been stripped from him, when he pours it all out. He questions, laments, struggles. And it’s allowed. But when God finally speaks, He reminds Job that he does not see the full picture.
That’s surprisingly relevant to dating.
Feelings are real. How we talk matters.
Our interpretations are often guesses.
The boundary
Share emotions as experiences, not verdicts.
Say:
“Distance is getting to me.”
“I miss you, and I’m trying not to be weird about it.”
Don’t say:
“You’re losing interest.”
“I’m clearly not a priority.”
One keeps the bridge intact. The other quietly erodes it.
3. Value the person, not just how they make you feel
A friend once admitted something uncomfortable after a breakup:
“I think I liked the relationship more than I liked him.”
It’s an honest line. And not that rare even in Christian circles.
Young women remain in mismatched relationships because they love the attention, the companionship, the relief from loneliness, or the identity that comes from being chosen.
Sometimes our attachment is to the what, not the who. We’re attached to the role they play.
Think Jonah, everyone’s favorite runaway. God called him out on exactly this.
After finally deciding to obey God, he becomes upset that Nineveh was spared. Then a plant grows over him, provides shade from the sun, and then dies. Jonah grieves the plant.
God’s response, and I’m paraphrasing but barely: you care this much about a plant you didn’t grow, yet you’re upset that I did not destroy an entire city of people made in My image?
We do this in relationships.
We protect the shade plant, the comfort, the consistency, the way someone makes us feel chosen, more than the actual person in front of us. A person who belongs to Christ and is being shaped by Him.
When the focus shifts from who a person is to what they bring to the table, we begin to treat them like a means to an end.
The boundary
Care about the person. Not the benefit.
So in practice:
• Notice who they are when they are not “performing” for you.
• Don’t reduce them to how well they meet your needs.
• Pay attention to the fruit of their walk with God, not just how they make you feel.
The TL;DR
The old proverb still holds. Slow and steady wins the race. Emotional access is earned. Let it be earned.
Your feelings are real. Your interpretations are often fiction.
The person you’re dating has a pulse. Don’t treat them like a vending machine.
These three boundaries keep intimacy tethered to reality, communication free of accusation, and affection rooted in the person, not the conveniences they bring.
