Dating Decisions

Tomorrow I am teaching the YW Manual 3 Lesson 35 lesson. It is about dating decisions – how the standards they choose to keep now will affect the happiness of the rest of their lives. It’s a great lesson – I particularly like the talk in the supplemental material by Jeanette G. Smith, Unsteady Dating. I think we will have some really interesting discussion about why we wait to date until age 16, about the importance of group vs. steady dating, and also about the law of chastity. I will probably bring a laptop to watch this video, and I found a good object lesson in one of our family’s favorite books, “Why – Powerful Answers and Practical Reasons for Living LDS Standards”.

It talks about doing things in the right order; that sexual relations before marriage can lead to bitterness and grief. The book suggests trying the following experiment: “Pour a tall glass of orange juice, and drink half of it. Tasty isn’t it? Now, brush your teeth and rinse with mouthwash. Nice and fresh! Now, drink the other half of the orange juice. How does it taste? Isn’t it interesting that if we do this in the wrong order, something sweet can be bitter? Physical intimacy is no different.

Physical intimacy is similar to orange juice and mouthwash. If physical intimacy comes after the marriage covenant, it is beautiful and sacred. If physical intimacy comes before marriage, it leads to a whole list of ugly results.”

I don’t think I’ll actually have anyone brush their teeth in the middle of class, but most of us have tried drinking a little OJ after brushing our teeth. It is not yummy. I think this object lesson is a fun way to show the importance of living our lives in the order the Lord has set out for us.

We bought the “How” and “Why” books as Christmas presents for our girls, and they have been a great investment and resource. The girls love flipping through the “factoid”-type layouts and I have used several ideas as object lessons in classes and firesides with the youth. I’ve made an Amazon page with links to both these books, and other things that I love will be added as I come across them.

This entry was posted in youth. Bookmark the permalink.

17 Responses to Dating Decisions

  1. Sam says:

    If u do decide to have them
    Brush… U could get those whisps that colgate makes. They are the 1 use disposable brushes w the paste already on them

    I think the object lesson
    Is great & should be experienced =)

  2. Jennene says:

    I love all of your ideas.. I have used many of your RS handouts and the sisters just love them.. Thank you for all your hard work..Btw, I love your new website..

  3. Jackie says:

    Nice write, great page theme, continue the good work

  4. horny hot says:

    Great post! It always amaze me how people can take time to write them. But to be honest maybe you should change the color of the texts? Sorry if I am being rude, just trying to help. Kind regards, Sophia

  5. Michelle says:

    I taught this lesson (I always seemed to get these ones ) 🙂 Anyway I got the little mouthwashes from the travel section at the store and attached the saying and gave them an orange with it. Just a thought

  6. Cristy says:

    WOW…..I love it!!
    What idea do you have for lesson 36.?? ..I would like to do something like you did for your lesson,but I don’t have any clue :/
    Cristy♥

  7. Megan says:

    Thank you, this is so great and so helpful! Michelle, I love your idea about the travel mouthwash and orange!

  8. Tristin says:

    I just taught this lesson last Sunday and started out by putting on the table noodles and spaghetti sauce. I asked the girls what they thought I was going to make. Of course they all said spaghetti. I told them I was going to make cookies. I compared the ingredients to standards/values we look for in dating young men and the end result being a Temple marriage. For my handout I printed a baseball card size print of the temple with the list of commitments from the lesson on the back and had them sign it. I told them to put it in their purse not their scriptures so that they would have it when they went on date.

  9. I created a cute little handout of the funnel theory: dating if you click on the link. I hope you like it!

Comments are closed.