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Does online dating even work?
Most of the people that write about online dating write about what’s wrong with it. It makes sense. I mean, that’s what news is - emphasize the bad, misery loves company, etc. Turn on the TV and it’s not about kittens being saved from trees, but drive-by shootings. That doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of kittens saved from trees.
Go to one of those websites that reviews dating sites and the average review will be 2 out of 5 stars or something like that. Why? Because people who get married from online dating sites rarely get back online to post happy reviews on websites. They move on with their lives, while everyone else complains about the sites and the awful people on the sites.
I don’t deny ANYBODY the negative experiences that they’ve had. I just urge people to find some healthier perspective on the whole thing. Listen, you might think I’m nuts to keep on preaching positivity. That’s fair. All I know is that it’s freakin’ HARD to meet someone. We have our small lives: our circle of married friends, our work buddies, a few single people, and that’s it. And as you get into your mid-30’s, the bar scene is really old and set-ups have become a bit of a joke. This is why I believe in online dating. Not because it’s perfect - not by a long shot. But because it creates opportunity where previously there was none.
So let’s acknowledge the flaws of online dating: the liars, the bores, the flakes, the crazies, the morons, the perverts, the poor spellers, and so on. These people exist offline as well. They just have access to you online. So as I see it, you have two choices: quit online dating and make a supreme effort to go to as many parties, coffee shops and adult education classes as possible OR try to find a way to avoid the worst of the online daters. The third, and most popular choice, is to quit and wait for your soulmate to drop out of the sky, like "The Secret" for love. Yeah, keep praying, people.
Your best bet is to keep dusting yourself off, learning from your mistakes, and staying in the game. Sure, sometimes you’ll get burned. But sometimes, with enough perserverence (as well as luck, timing, a good profile and a positive attitude), you’ll fall in love. And if it hasn’t happened to you yet, you can say "What’s wrong with these terrible people on these awful sites?" Or you can ask, "How can I make this work for me, despite the obvious flaws?"
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Thanks for your post, Evan. I think your point is right on - online dating is not an answer, but a strategy.
Are you single, dating, using an online dating site? I'm wondering if your insight comes from your own experience?
Thanks,
Jillian
I enjoyed your read. I think that on-line sites are like job hunting. One can choose to be bold, though shy in person; try on a new persona; see what attracts and what repels readers. It's an opportunity to see our common needs as a community of people all interested in finding the "secret", the one that compliments who we are while tantilizing our senses. We can look for the gold in people, or focus on the flaws........our choice. It's alot more fun looking for what is right in people vs. what is wrong. Friends can get created on this road to romance. With an open mind and a smile in your heart there are bound to be pleasant surprises. Coach Jillian asked from where your experience and insights come...I wonder the same. Are you single? Donna
...but to answer your question, Donna, I'm single and in a serious relationship. But as a dating coach, my insights come from the commonalities of my clients. You may get a kick out of my blog: AdviceFromASingleDatingExpert.com.
Best wishes,
Evan
I am a veteran online dater. Although I've been in a committed relationship with someone I met online for five years now, I probably went on 150 coffee dates over a six year period before I met him. By that point I really wasn't expecting to meet someone online but I still recommended online dating to all of my single friends. Why? Because as you correctly point out it is really hard to meet single people, let alone a single man that you might actually want to date. I rarely met single men through work, and if I did it wasn't really possible to casually date them with the fishbowl of work and the need to continue working with them if things didn't go well on the dating front. Were there a lot of "losers" in online dating? Not really, just a lot of nice men who were not a match for me or vice versa. I have a lot of single friends who have given up trying to meet someone and refuse to do online dating. No one is going to meet anyone sitting at home or hanging out with the same friends week after wekk. I always looked at online dating as staying in circulation, practicing meeting and talking to someone new and learning new interesting facts about people I may only meet a few times but who usually have something interesting to say during a cup of coffee. The biggest loss you have is that you spent one hour of your time having coffee with someone who wasn't a fit, but at least you made an effort to get out and circulate in that hour. And who knows, eventually you may meet someone who is a fit.
Both of my brothers and I met our wives online. One of them suggested that I give it a try, and I wrote a profile that I thought was funny, because I really couldn't take the idea of advertising my features and personal traits seriously. No one replied. I tried again, and cut down on the funny stuff, and got about twenty replies. Most of the women I met were in need of deep healing, and nowhere near ready for a relationship. Some of them tried to sell me things, like 'alien' artifacts. One woman taked to me through her dog. She'd bend down to pet him and say things like "We should go for a walk after dinner tonight, shouldn't we?" Then after the walk: "Well, we should get back for our bath and then 'night night' shouldn't we?" She almost never looked at me, and when I called her after the date to let her know that I had an interesting time but wasn't interested, she called me back several times late in the night/early morning to harass me.
Some of the women looked nothing like the picture they posted "That was taken about ten years ago, I was a little thinner then".
Throughout the couple of months that I was trying it, I kept thinking that it just wasn't a medium that showed the important aspects of who I really was, and that I should close down my account. Just as I was doing that very thing, I received a reply from someone that I had contacted earlier, and who was coincidentally closing down her account at exactly that same time. She said she was interested in a few philosophical things that I wrote in my description of myself, and we emailed each other, then talked on the phone. Most of our conversations were punctuated with "I know, I know" and Me, too!"
We were married in Hawaii and are expecting our first child in Feb. I posted our story and offered encouragement on the dating site for months after.
Since then we've discovered that a large percentage of our friends have met their 'significant other' online.
My suggestions are:
-persevere,
-be honest, brutally honest,
-don't take any rejection personally - think Seinfeld - Jerry had a huge number of ridiculous reasons why he had to break up with his girlfriends; but they were not ridiculous reasons to him.
-Lastly: have fun, it's only one of many options that you have, so enjoy it while you're trying it, and be prepared to be amazed at the people out there.
Brian
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