How Long Should the Talking Stage Last?

The talking stage should last a few days to a couple of weeks, and it should end the day you meet her in person. If you have been texting for a month and have not sat across a table from her, you are not in a stage anymore. You are in a stall. The "what are we" conversation is a different step that comes later, after you have been out together a few times.

"Talking stage" gets used for two separate things, and the answers differ.

The first is the stretch between first contact and the first date. That one should be short.

The second is the stretch after you have started seeing each other, when nothing has been named. That one is a situationship in the making, and it ends when one of you says what you want. Treat them as two steps and the timing gets easy.

a dating coach's teaching on closing is the clearest explanation. If you ask too early, before she has any sense of you, she has nothing to say yes to. If you ask too late, you have been filed under "text buddy", and a woman who enjoys your jokes on her phone has no reason to give up an evening for you.

It can be worse than that. Men who "take it slow" with a woman they like usually lose her, because she starts to wonder what you are waiting for while a man who just asks her out gets her attention. Going quickly does not stop her from becoming a girlfriend. It is usually how she becomes one.

There is a plainer reason too. A phone gives her a few lines and a guess about the rest. Meeting you takes the guess away, and in person you are warmer, funnier and easier to read than a screen.

You do not need a day count. You need a handful of good exchanges. Ask her out when:

• She answers with content, not one word.
• She asks you something back.
• She sends the next text without waiting for you to carry it.
• The last few conversations were fun and the next one would be the same conversation again.

If the last point is true, you are overdue. Make it one place and one time: "You're fun to talk to. Thursday evening, a drink near your place?"

Ending the talking stage by meeting is the easy way. If she says yes, the stage is over and the first date begins.

If she is vague, offer one more time with a different day. If she answers "maybe, I'm swamped" and gives you nothing back, treat that as a soft no for now and stop initiating.

The other ending is yours to call. End it if you have asked twice and heard nothing concrete, if the same conversation has repeated for weeks with no meeting, or if you are the one doing all the work. Ending can be kind and short: "I'd rather meet than text forever. If that's not where you are, no hard feelings." Then step back and let her decide.

When she lives far away, the stage can run longer because meeting takes planning. The rule stays the same: it needs a date. A video call can count as the first date in the meantime, and a trip with a booked day is better.

Plenty of men say they are taking it slow with a long-distance girl when they have never met her. Nobody can take a relationship slowly before it has started.

As for six months of talking: that is not a stage, it is an arrangement where nobody has asked for anything. Women often work to a shorter timeline than men and tend to pull away when a man keeps putting off what comes next. Think of it from her side. Would you wait half a year to be invited anywhere?

Once you have been out a few times and you know you want her to stop seeing other people, say so. coach teaches that the way you act sets the terms of a relationship. If you act like a boyfriend without saying it, or like a casual date without saying that, she fills in the blanks and you may not like her version.

Keep it short and said in person: "I like where this is going. I'd like us to be exclusive. Where are you at?"

If she says yes, you are done with the stage for good. If she asks for time, give her a couple of weeks and keep seeing her. If she says no, you have lost a month and not a year, which is the point of asking early.