If you are single and have ever felt like something is wrong with you for not being in a relationship yet, this book is for you.
Waiting and Dating by Dr. Myles Munroe is one of those books that shifts something in your thinking permanently. I read it during my single phase, and it answered questions I did not even know I had: about relationships, about my own identity, and about what it actually means to be ready for a partner.
I am now married, and I am so grateful I read this book. Not just because of what it taught me about finding the right person, but because of how much it shaped me into a better version of myself, one that was ready for marriage when it came.
Here is my summary of the key lessons, plus an honest take on what I got from it.
Key Lessons from Waiting and Dating
“Healthy relationships should always begin at the spiritual and intellectual levels – the levels of purpose, motivation, interests, dreams,and personality.”
Dr. Myles Munroe
1. You are not half a person looking for your other half
Before reading this book, I genuinely believed relationships were about two incomplete people completing each other. Myles dismantles this completely.
His argument: you should not bring 50% of yourself into a relationship hoping the other person brings their 50%. You come as a whole, complete person, your full 100, and meet someone who is also their full 100. Together you do not complete each other. You complement each other.
This changes how you see being single. It stops feeling like a waiting room and starts feeling like a season of becoming.
2. The will of God is not one specific person
Many Christians grow up believing there is one specific person God has chosen for them, and the fear of missing that person is real.
Myles reframes this gently but clearly. The will of God for your relationship is a standard, not a name. Your partner must be a believer, share your core values, and be someone you can respect and build with. Within that standard, there is room for choice. It removes a lot of unnecessary anxiety.
Prayer is one of the most powerful ways to discern God’s will. If you want to build a stronger prayer life, these will help:
3. Love your single phase
Being single is not a problem to be solved. It is a season with its own purpose, self-discovery, building your identity, growing in faith, and becoming the person your future partner will meet.
If you rush out of it, you take an unfinished version of yourself into a relationship. That creates its own problems.
4. Friendship before romance
The best relationships are built on genuine friendship first. Not romantic feelings. Not physical attraction. Friendship, the kind where you actually know the person, understand how they think, and have seen how they handle real life.
Romance built on friendship is more stable. Romance built purely on feelings tends to fade when the feelings do.
5. Purpose compatibility matters more than personality compatibility
Two people can have great chemistry and still not be right for each other if they are going in different directions in life. Myles argues that shared purpose, where you are both headed, what you both value, what you are both building, matters more than how well you get along in the moment.
Knowing your purpose starts with knowing who God says you are. Speak these over yourself daily: 50 Powerful Daily Confessions to Start Your Day With God
6. Boundaries are not restrictions. They are protection.
The book closes with practical guidance on navigating a relationship with clear values and healthy limits. Not as rules imposed from outside, but as standards you set for yourself because you know your worth.
Who Should Read This Book
Anyone who is single and struggling with the waiting. Anyone in a relationship needing clarity on whether it is the right one. Anyone who grew up with church narratives about relationships that left them more confused than helped.
Read it before you enter a relationship, not after you are already deep in one.
Get the Book on Amazon
Final Thoughts
Myles Munroe had a way of making spiritual things practical without stripping them of depth. Waiting and Dating is not a long book, but it is a dense one. Read it slowly and sit with the ideas.
It is one of the books I recommend without hesitation to anyone navigating the single season or thinking seriously about relationships.
If you have read it, tell me in the comments which lesson landed hardest for you.
The maths doesn’t add up. That is the idea that both of you are complete (100%) before coming together. But that is how the things of God usually don’t follow our own rules. No wonder Jesus said the two shall come together and become one, a mathematician would have said the two halves shall come together. This is evidence that you have to be complete in yourself.
Nice review, I’ll add it to my reading list.
You’re very right. Thank you so much