A "serious relationship" is when you stop going on dates as a way to spend a weekend and start going on dates to spend time with somebody that you realized you don't ever want to be without. Commitment is when you are willing to switch from "I might stay with you or I might someday be going with somebody else" and switch to "You are the one for me forever." Commitment is scary because you have to close a lot of options and you never know where those other options may have led. But you have to close all but one in order to commit to one.
Do you mean specific goals for a person I'm looking for or what I want the relationship to be?
I haven't met her yet so I have no idea what kind of person she will be. I want the relationship to be two people getting through this life together instead of one person going it alone. Alone is doable. Together would probably be more fun.
I'm 40 years old and I'm still a virgin. (And if you quote that idiotic movie, so help me I WILL put you on ignore!)
Sex is not all there is to life. As for promise rings, I have no idea. If it helps a person remember and focus on the reason for waiting, I guess it's a good thing.
Emotionally, neither. Intimately, I have no idea. See my answer to question 3.
I have seen people in a relationship try to establish themselves as dominate or be submissive and let the other be dominant. From what I have observed it never works very well. Even if they do stay together longer than a year, it's always a struggle to maintain. They never can get their relationship to move forward and grow because it takes all their energy just to maintain it where it is.
The relationships I have seen that work well, thrive and last for the long haul are the ones where both are partners and each does what he is good at. It's not a matter of one being the boss and the other obeying. It probably takes a lot more talking between them to make some decisions, but they trust each other, they know their own strengths and each other's strengths, and BOTH are the boss.
This is important enough to need a new paragraph. In the best relationships I have seen BOTH PEOPLE be the boss at different times, depending on who is better at dealing with a given situation. They both know "I am better at this and you are better at that" so as situations come up both of them might take the lead and say "Okay this is what we need to do" and the other will follow because they both know and freely acknowledge "Okay, you are better at this so I will do what you say."
It never seemed to hurt my father's pride to admit that my mother was the one who balanced the checkbook. She was better at it. She also made the budget for our home. He was fine with that because she was better at it and he was happy to let her do it. He was better at hauling firewood. He was also better at running a leather shop, but she did the accounting and they were both fine with it. It's amazing how much bickering dies down when both people in a partnership don't let pride get in the way of deciding who does which tasks best.
Sorry, that was a bit of a long answer. The short answer is I'm probably neither dominant nor passive. Passive? Did you mean submissive? Well I'm not either of them either. I'm cooperative.
You're welcome.
