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Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of IHeart Radio.

Good morning. This is Laura.

Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.

Today's tip is about how busy people can still make time to meet someone

special. Valentine's Day is coming up, and if you're in a happy couple, that's awesome. But many

people find themselves in different stages of life. And I recently got a letter from a listener

who'd been on her own for a while and was trying to figure out

how she could make time for dating. Our listener's husband had died a few years ago, and she's now

raising her nine-year-old daughter as a single parent. She says that I'm ready to date, but find it

difficult to muster the energy to find someone, let alone go out on a date. It seems like online dating is the thing

to do now, but she says that it feels very weird to me, since she met her husband, when this wasn't

as much of a thing as it is now. I'm usually tired from work and extracurricular activities with my

daughter and the usual home duty, she says. My commute is at least an hour each way to work.

I finally get an hour or so of me time in the evenings after I put my daughter to bed,

but I'm also trying to read, shower, and do other focused tasks that I can't do while she's

away. So what do you suggest? How can I carve out dating and social time? How much time should I commit to these tasks? Or do I just

live life and hope someone falls into my sights? I think this is a great question. Plenty of people

with jobs and family responsibilities would like to meet someone special. But because of those jobs

and family responsibilities, dating can seem like one more thing on the

to-do list.

And like our listener, I got married before online dating was as big a thing as it is now.

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