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age
41-50,
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writes: What does it mean to you "take it to the next level" regarding relationships? I hear this all the time and I'm starting to doubt what this means. Please share your definitions.I know what it means to feel closer or more distant and even have conversations or conflicts about certain aspects in a relationship, but this idiom throws me off completely. On the face of it, I would say concrete commitments might move you to "the next level"...like moving in together, or getting married, or having children. Your relationship should seem to have more value if you have more skin in the game...but I know plenty of people who are dating and know how to communicate well who have better relationships than married couples (or divorced couples). If I were writing a chick-flick, I might say the moment someone says "I love you" and redeems themselves from the first 70 minutes is taking it to "the next level"...and that seems pretty immaterial to me. Perhaps I'm just personally conflicted...I would like to think I value people's actions more than what they say...but at the same time, I often claim that communication is the most important thing in a relationship. And maybe that's why the phrase puts me off, I hate to feel as if "the next level" is something defined by well-intentioned commitments or mere verbal threshholds...or maybe I just don't like the idea of a caste-system for relationships. But, I'm ready to hear other opinions since I can't seem to find my own, please share your experiences or definitions?
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male
reader, anonymous, writes (8 January 2012): Usually to me it means getting physical or if already physical, becoming committed. In my circles, if someone "takes it to the next level", it is usually physical, and when it becomes committted, we say "they are a 'thing'". Not saying thats how others define it, just how I do.
A
reader, anonymous, writes (7 January 2012): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionI appreciate all the feedback, especially that first female anon poster:
"...just because two people are at one stage or outward status or another, says nothing about the quality of the relationship between them"
Now, I think I know why I wish we had left this word behind in 2011. Some of the lists are pretty interesting or insightful. I already feel the urge to rearrange some of them. I'm single and casually dating, but haven't met anyone I feel strongly about so maybe I've just lost perspective. Thanks to all and happy new year.
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A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (7 January 2012): Taking things to the next level would be to go from dating to a committed relationship, a committed relationship to engagement, getting engaged to being married.
All other "next levels" from a guy have to do with prolonging the sex he gets out of you and never reaching those concrete milestones. That's why sex doesn't lead to commitment and living together doesn't lead to marriage in most cases.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (7 January 2012): As Ciar said it's a generic term. I use it a lot because it's interchangeable and it's an easy concept to grasp for most people. You can spend an hour talking to a person in detail about what they should do next and they won't understand or will get confused but say "the next level" and most people will get what you mean straight away.
It's useful like the term "the talk" which is linked to "taking it to the next level". The best advice is the most easily digested and when one partner says to another they want to take it to the next level then there is no confusion.
Taking it to the next level in its most base form is one or both partners wanting the relationship to move forward in some way. Friends to lovers, lovers to committed relationship, relationship to marriage etc.
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A
female
reader, Ciar  + ♥, writes (7 January 2012):
 'Take it to the next level' is just a generic term that simply means some kind of progress or advancement.
Personally it has been so overused that is now on my pet peeve list.
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female
reader, YouWish  +, writes (7 January 2012):
 Heh....hey mish! I know what you mean, because I read it on here all the time and consider how it's being said by whom and in what context.
There are many "levels" in a relationship, and I've seen where that means different things to different people, which is the source of a lot of miscommunication.
Example:
To someone, just saying "I love you" for the first time means that the relationship is going to the next level, where to someone else, it's just an expression of emotion.
A next level could be to become exclusive, versus a casual dating situation.
Next level could mean moving in together.
Next level could mean proposing.
Next level could mean becoming physically intimate.
Next level could mean the day when someone introduces their partner to their parents, family, or children.
I don't know if I would call it a "caste system", so to speak, but I understand what you mean. I'm thinking to speak in terms of "next level" takes the slow process of partnership and commitment and turns it into bite sized pieces or baby steps. Here's a rudimentary example, and these steps aren't for everyone, and some would classify different steps at different times.
Example, personally, I don't go for moving in together until marriage (I know, old fashioned!), and I don't go for sexual activity until exclusivity at least. Others feel differently about these things.
Level 0.1
Level 1. First date
Level 2. Enter casual dating
Level 3. More frequent dating
Level 4. Becoming physical
Level 5. Deciding to be exclusive
Level 6. Declaring love
Level 7. Become more serious (i.e. talking about a possible future)
Level 8. Introducing to families.
Level 9. Moving in
Level 10. Proposal
Level 11. Engagement
Level 12. Marriage
Level 13. Children.
Again, these aren't MY personal step opinion on how a relationship SHOULD progress. Simply a generic example.
All "moving to the next level" means is..moving to what someone believes is the logical next step in a growing and nourished relationship.
I'm not the greatest lover of that phrase either, primarily because of people's different definitions of what next levels are in relationships. Too many misunderstandings happen because people don't think of levels the same way or in the same order or at their same pacing. There are some who won't profess love until they're ready to propose, and even more disturbing to me are those who believe that being Friends with Benefits is a step or a level in a relationship, only to find out that they feel used and discarded.
So those are my thoughts on the matter. Hope that helps a little...
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (7 January 2012): well that's cos in our society, relationships are "supposed" to follow this script or pattern:
causal dating, then exclusive dating, then maybe moving in together, then getting engaged, then getting married and having kids.
So 'taking it to the next level' means going from one outward status to the one "above" it.
I agree totally that just because two people are at one stage or outward status or another, says nothing about the quality of the relationship between them. Plenty of people get pushed along "to the next level" of the relationship by their partners, or go into that next level thinking it will make the relationship improve or that it will make their life complete. And plenty of people are at the "top level" of the relationship hierarchy - i.e. marriage with kids - and yet the relationship sucks and they are headed toward divorce.
So really I think the problem is that society seems to equate the outward status of the relationship with the 'quality' of the relationship. And because many people also unconsciously do that, they focus on the outward status to the exclusion of everything else. Hence people getting focused on getting married (or staying married despite a bad marriage), and their partner's feelings are secondary.
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female
reader, aunt honesty  +, writes (7 January 2012):
 You need to first explain what level your relationship is at, at the moment so I can give you a clear view of what the next level means, as it has all different levels at all different stages of relationships.
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