This truly isn't meant to be a humble-brag, but I'm wondering if anyone else out there is or has been in a similar situation? It's like a double edged sword!

I'm [43M] seeing a woman [41] who I fairly consistently have to talk myself down from her being out of my league and freaking out. Or, at least, I'll acknowledge she may very well be out of my league but try and focus on the fact that she's still responding positively as I try and progress things towards a relationship and hopefully she'll let me know if she stops 'feeling it'. Until that happens I should just enjoy our time together.

I'm about two years out of a 10 year relationship which included three years of marriage. My ex was seven years younger than me and let's just say it wasn't an equal partnership and she was quite controlling, jealous, lacked friends or close relationships to family, made decisions that led her to be financially dependent on me, and was emotionally abusive.

The new woman has a pretty important job with a very well known college and she's just super smart, talented, independent, and attractive. She's a trained musician and has a lot of current and former colleagues who are also trained musicians, and many of them are male. She has expressed in casual conversation that she feels like it's good to get out of social 'bubbles' and doesn't feel like being surrounded by a homogeneous group of people is very fulfilling, so I remind myself of that when I start to think 'Gee, wouldn't she rather be with someone that can talk music with her?'. I know close to nothing about music, but I would be willing to learn!

So maybe my different background and interests are more attractive to her than being with someone that shares more of her own? After all, she's been surrounded by fellow musicians and the musically inclined since she was in high-school and yet she was still on a dating app in August, haha. Plus, I can understand that just because there are shared interests doesn't mean there will be attraction. And if she needs to geek out on music she has plenty of people she can do so with AND still be interested in me romantically.

Fortunately, for my confidence, I have a fairly important job at a well known cultural institution so I don't feel completely mismatched professionally. Not that there aren't many successful relationships where the two partners have very different professions or are at different places in their respective careers. It's just something I can remind myself of when those negative automatic thoughts crop up.

So yeah, every once and a while I feel a little exhausted from giving myself pep talks or suffering from imposter syndrome but never when I'm with her. I haven't expressed any of this to her as I feel like that's sort of a weird needy psychological game to play, looking for reassurances. I think I have it under control, but felt like expressing it so this turned into more of a journaling session for me! Maybe it was an interesting read for someone. Maybe someone can relate. Maybe it helped someone gain perspective on a similar situation they are in.