I get a lot of emails and tweets from people engaged in a “Woe is Me” pity party about how they’re forever single and nobody – “and I mean nobody” – wants to date them. Being a believer in “Life is what you make it,” I hereby offer the following slap in the face to wake you up if you’re one of those people.
If you DO NOT WANT(!) a slap in the face, please click here.
5 Gosh-Honest Reasons Why Your Dating Life Sucks
1. You don’t have a social life.
If your idea of a social life is chatting with coworkers by day and your WoW guildies by night, then it’s no shocker that you’re not meeting anyone who could be a potential romantic partner. While it is true that people dip their pens in the company ink, it’s generally a very bad idea. And yes, people do occasionally meet the love of their lives via WoW or Xbox Live, but these stories are few and far between.
The Fix: Find an activity that gets you out of your house at least once a week. Join a Meetup group on a subject that interests you, take a dance class (most social dance classes – swing, salsa, etc – do not require you to have a partner!), take an adult education class at a local community college or learning center.
2. Your expectations, well, they’re a bit too lofty.
We all have dreams of meeting someone who looks like our favorite movie star or has a chiseled, god/dess like physique. And of course, they’ll be well-educated, extremely bright (but not smarter than us), wealthy (but only within certain parameters), and always smell like the dew from a Spring flower. Anyone missing even one of those qualities just isn’t good enough.
The Fix: The next time you want to reject someone, think about the exact reason why you’re rejecting them. I’ve worked with lots of single guys and seen them reject woman after woman after woman for petty reasons:
- “Her eyes are too close together.”
- “She’s too tall. Tall women make me uncomfortable.”
- “Her arm hair looks a little dark.”
- “She makes more than I do.”
- “She’s too lovey-dovey about her family.”
Really? You’re about to dismiss an entire person for that one little thing? There’s a whole list of similar reasons why a woman could reject you – but you’d be the first to pipe up and complain if she admitted to one of them. Be a little more open-minded, give people a chance and you’ll find you like some of these people more than you’d expect.
3. You’re throwing a pity party.
Do you know what’s totally not sexy? Someone who is constantly down on himself. Pity party organizers are always looking at life as if it is drenched in piss and vinegar. No matter what is going on, they’re going to find a way to spin it so it looks horrible. They’re exactly the opposite of a good public relations professional.
The worst part about you, pity partier? You always LOOK like you need help, you’re always SOLICITING help, but you don’t actually WANT the help. You just want to get people’s advice and then use that as reasons why it’s just “too hard” to get in the dating game.
The Fix: Sadly, most pity partiers don’t leave the party until they realize they’ve driven away absolutely everyone in their life. If you recognize yourself as a pity party attendee, don’t just get help, TAKE IT.
4. You don’t want to work on yourself.
Take an honest look at yourself – your body, your clothes, your hygiene, your career, your social life, your attitude. Would you want to date you? If there are parts of your life that you don’t like, how can you expect another person to fall in love with you?
Now, realize this is coming from a curvy girl, and by curvy I do mean fat. But y’know what? I’m fat-tastic. I love who I am for so many more reasons and I’m working on my healthstyle and losing weight slowly but surely. I consider myself to be lucky and blessed to have the life I do and the people who are in it.
The Fix: If you’re not happy where you are or with who you are, the only person who can change that is you. You can find people to help you along the journey (like how Darya coaches me on eating better), but the drive to be a better person each day has to come from inside you. Do what you need to do to love yourself and you’ll put out a glow that will draw the right people into your life.
5. You expect dates to come to you.
So many guys expect that they’ll put a profile and some photos up on a dating site and women will come to them. Sadly, this isn’t how it works. The only people who have it work that way are conventionally attractive women and (to a certain extent) gay guys. If you’re an average-looking girl or a straight guy, you’re going to have to do some legwork for online dating to work for you.
The Fix: Be sure you have an engaging, well-written profile and recent, quality photos. Set up your custom searches, find ten people a week who really interest you and write them personalized first contact emails that are short and sweet and invite a reply. You will get rejected by lots of people (no matter what you look like), but all you need is the one perfect person for you to say yes.
No excuses, geek friends. If your dating life sucks, there are things that you can do about it. Now get working!
About e
I did’t want a slap in the face so I clicked… but I don’t like baloons, so I read, but all your advise is too hard and I’ll never find anyone anyway!
* Just kidding! Did you go for it? :p
Was just wondering what you should do if the being down has a cause that isn’t going to be fixed anytime soon? Like the working-on-it-but-it’ll-take-a-while kind, not the I’m-the-queen-of-wronged-people-and-I’ll-never-be-ok kind? My current approach has been *no dating till issues are sorted out* for years, but I kinda DO want someone to share my life with. Socializing is hard (I do it, but I keep being theawkward, shy, scared geek in the corner, eve if I try not to be) So the not approaching potential dates and my socialising is limited and ineffective… But even when I step out of that for a while (not easy) I still end up feeling like I shouldn’t bother others or burden them with the mes that is me.
And when it cmes to dating (very rare) I end up with complete missmatches tha require me to be someone I’m not, which I dutyfully do untill they get enough of me.
What’s your opinion?
*I realise I babbled a lot here… But I promise to hire you for help me out if I do decide to try online dating again*
(if you promise not to slap my face that is :p)
You forgot the one that announces their undying love for their ex!
Rule to live by….don’t expect someone to have the things you don’t. If you’re not making 100K a year, don’t expect your potential person to make 100K a year. If you don’t have a college degree, don’t expect it of them…so forth and so on.
And honestly, if you have deep-seated issues, deal with them. See a therapist, your minister, get some meds, but don’t think dating someone is going to make it all go away. Deal with the issues, then deal with dating. As I put it to a friend–stop making my dating pool a dating cesspool!
.-= Michelle´s last blog ..Horns by Joe Hill =-.
Right the heck on! You nailed it. Gents: this is exactly what I’m teaching women…now get on board and we’ll have some real connecting going on. My take: all this being over-critical, not getting out, wallowing…it’s about avoiding because you’re afraid of something. Listen to her great advice: do some work on yourself, get out there, show your dates some kindness by giving them a break…and fake it till you make it.
.-= Bobbi Palmer´s last blog ..Do Something Different Today to Improve Your Search for Love =-.
@D – I think there’s more to your story than can be summarized in a blog comment.
@judex – Oh yes, people will use the ex excuse for as long as possible.
@Michelle – Isn’t it funny what we require of other people that we don’t require of ourselves?
@Bobbi – Thanks! I wish I could wake up everyone and get ‘em all on the right track!
@e Good guess, it makes professionals go *gasp* “I wish I knew how to help” but that’s not the point here…
Am wondering if it’d be fair to someone else to date them, cause regardless of my intentions, there will be emotional isseus and the ocasional whines and wish-I-didn’t-exists, closely resembling pitty parties (however much shorter lived than your average pitty party, which can take forever) cause you can have the windshield whipers on at their full managable power, but piss and vinegar that hit it, be they old but stirred up or freshly thrown, will not magically fall off instantly.
You’re the expert on dating, I’ve seen you say loads of smart and very true things so really trusting your opinion on this would be a usefull one.
@D – If it’s something that still makes professionals gasp, it’s probably best to work on friendships first. Then if something grows into a relationship, the person knows you much better than they would if they just hopped right into dating.
This is great, especially #4. The best way to change your situation is to change yourself.
Excellent advice. Really.
I think number 1 and number 5 are very true. You need to get yourself out there if you ever hope to meet someone. It can be anything, really, because often we meet people in the most unexpected way.
I believe you also have to try and make as many friends as possible. This will increase you social exposure – and even if your new friend is the same sex, there is a good chance that they could introduce you to someone who is not.