Jan 9

When and What Should You Share in a New Relationship?

Navigate tiers of vulnerability while building trust through gradual disclosure.

Whether you are looking for a new relationship on dating apps, setups from friends, or just counting on random meetings, you might wonder what you should reveal in the early stages of connection with a potential partner.

There are actually reliable tiers of feelings, thoughts, personal information, and past experiences that can help guide you in deciding when to share those parts of you as you get to know someone.

Each tier risks more vulnerability, so it is crucial to make sure the first layer is laid down successfully before you move on to the next level. You’ll also accrue more information about the person on the other end as you move through each level, and this will allow you to tweak the process accordingly.

Tier One: What to Share in the First Meeting

The most important things you need to get across in the early moments of connection with a new person are the things you love about your life. Tell them some of your most treasured experiences, adventures, important people who have affected you deeply, and what means the most to you in your life.

Do not complain ever about past relationships, whether you have been taken advantage of, the ways that life hasn’t worked out, or your fears about the future. You don’t want to attract a rescuer who will be expected to heal you.

If the person you are with responds in kind, you’re off to a good start. But, if they complain and moan about how life has mistreated them or justify their cynicism or pessimism, they might be expecting you to be the rescuer who will make it all better. This is never a good start or a healthy ending, especially if you’ve done this before.

Pay attention to the things that are what you are looking for and for any red flags that could signal too much disappointment in the future: hardline, fixed opinions that do not match with your beliefs, blame of ex-partners, the absence of accountability for past errors, or treating you as a sexual object are sad harbingers of potential deal-breakers.

Tier Two: Share What You Can Give and What You Need in a Relationship

Hopefully, you have learned a lot about who you are from your past relationships. It is so important to share what you have learned about yourself along your dating path and what kind of a person you believe you would be the best you with. Coming across with self-respect and clarity will let this new person know that you have benefited from your experiences and intend to always be open to learning more.

Each step along the way, make sure that the person you are opening up to seems to welcome your sharing of these important things about you and willingly and enthusiastically reciprocates. Look for ways your lives overlap and how they are different. Ask, and share, about other, current, and important relationships.

If the situation is going well, ask that person what they feel they could have done better in their past relationships and share the same about yourself. Talk about how and why the relationships ended and how you both felt about those consequences.

Caveat: This may be the time when you may be considering a sexual connection, if you haven’t already. Being open about any STDs is crucial for future trust. The admission may end the relationship, but anyone who finds out later will wonder what else that is pertinent was not shared, and trust will be hard to recreate.

Tier Three: Discuss Childhood Trauma and How It Has Affected Your Relationships

Everyone has some harrowing or painful experiences from their past. Whatever you have gone through was at the hands of people who were supposed to guide and protect you but were not able to or didn’t care. No matter how much therapy you may have sought to help uncover and treat your childhood sorrows, experiencing words, phrases, sounds, people, or places that resemble what hurt you in the past will always trigger you. A future partner needs to know that about you, as you do about them.

Letting your partner know where you are susceptible to being triggered and what they can do instead can help build trust in a relationship. Doing this ensures that you will not have to face that distress again and innocently and inadvertently mix up your partner with someone from the past who may activate prior pain or helplessness.

You can actually help to heal those prior traumas if you care enough about each other to watch for the triggers and talk about them together. Even during an argument, if those traumas emerge, you can comfort each other instead of trying to resolve the issue at hand.

Tier Four: Open Up to Critique and New Growth

As you build quality trust with your new person, you will hopefully become the kind of friends who can openly challenge each other as a way of transcending any limitations and protecting one another from the criticisms of others who do not care the way you do. The partners in great relationships create safety but not indulgence for each other. They are reliable mirrors and endless supporters of each other’s growth.

Learn and openly share what you see in the other that makes them your hero and those things that would wear on you over time. Ask for critique and lean into it by wanting examples and preferences. Try not to make assumptions or to take things personally that are not about you. Show the difference between true apologies that lead to change and those that are just excuses.

Help each other heal past unresolved relationships and build new ones with other couples who stand for the same growth and commitment that you are now sharing with each other. Being in the company of like souls is crucial for keeping your own relationship on track to expand and grow in trust and deeper love.

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