Often in Gay Dating, It’s “The Issue Beneath the Issue”

One of the most powerful things about relationship coaching — especially with queer men — is that it can help you identify “the issue beneath the issue.”

Let me explain:

The Real Issue is Often Underneath

One scenario I see at lot is that, for example, someone is having trouble making great connections on the apps.
“Everyone I match with is completely not my type, I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.”

So our first topic of conversation is probably around what’s in their profile, how they’re sharing or “pitching” themselves to others.

Here’s a sped up version of what often happens next:

Me: “There’s not a lot of information about you on your profile. What else could you share about yourself?”

Him: “What do you mean?”

Me: “Well, if you share more about yourself, you help the right people for you see that you have plenty in common. You give them some conversation starters, things you can connect over that aren’t just photos.”

Him: “Urgh, why would I do that? I don’t want people judging me for my interests.”

Me: “Are you saying you’re worried about being judged or rejected online?”

Him: “Of course, I don’t want people thinking bad things about me.”

So basically we’ve started with the surface issue of “The apps aren’t working for me”…

…but uncovered the deeper issue of “It’s not that I don’t have anything about me that’s interesting, I’m just wary about sharing that online”

…because of the deepest issue of all: “I’m afraid of being rejected.”

At some level, he was afraid of sharing himself in the exact way he needs to to form the deeper connections with others he really wanted.

Queer People Often Don’t Realize How Much Their Internal Beliefs Are Impacting Them

Again, this is a summarized version of this story I pulled together from multiple real-life versions of it. But again, this kind of scenario is really common with queer men.

So much of how we act and operate in our lives comes from avoidance or shame or just the daily stresses of living as LGBTQ+ in a world not built for us.

And the saddest thing of all is that we often don’t connect the surface-level problem with the ultimate cause: homophobia, basically.

So actually, you could say that the deepest level of all is more like:

“I’m afraid of being rejected because living in a homophobic society, I’ve become sensitized to rejection and I learned to avoid it.”

(That’s an article for another time.)

And OK, it’s not as simple as saying you can blame every tiny inconvenience in your life on homophobia.

(Though please, don’t stop posting all the “My bus was 10 minutes late, that’s homophobic” memes you want to.)

But as countless professionals who work with LGBTQ+ people will tell you: often it’s not the issue that’s the real problem, it’s the issue beneath the issue.

And often, that deeper problem is connected to the adaptations we’ve had to make to navigate societal homophobia.

Professional Help Will Help You Examine and Adjust These Beliefs

So this isn’t me doing an Oprah and yelling “YOU need some coaching, and YOU need therapy, and YOU need a support group!”

Butttt… chances are, if you grew up queer in a society that’s still making it’s mind up about whether it’s cool with that or not, you learned to believe or do things that are not in your best interests.

In fact, I just had a big breakthrough this week working with my therapist, where basically I’d realized that some things that are limiting me growing my work as a coach are connected to a kind of “selective vulnerability” I’d learned.

Though I’m comfortable opening up about certain topics, being queer, I’d learned to filter myself about other ones as a way to avoid potential rejection or shame. And that was limiting an area of my life I hadn’t even connected it to.

The intricacies of coaching vs. therapy is another post for a different time.

But basically when the limiting issue is a belief or value (and not e.g. ADHD or depression), they’re both great ways of exploring what’s going on for you underneath what you think the issue is.

They’re both great ways of giving you the self-awareness to identify and resolve what’s holding you back, which changing your surface behavior alone often won’t do.

In short, probing a bit deeper into what we think and feel about ourselves is one of the most powerful ways we can process the queer baggage that we carry. It’s how we can live happier and more fulfilled lives.

I’ve seen this in my own life, I’ve seen it with the queer men I work with, and I’ve seen it in countless others who took the leap to work with a trained professional, do this work and ultimately live much better lives.