Online dating services, be it apps or specialized websites, have created a new kind of dating, and even relationship culture. So if you didn’t get married to your first love that you’ve met at school or at the university, you’ve probably also been affected by the new perception of dating romance.
To tell the truth, I didn’t realize it until recently, when being in absolutely fine relationships, that I’ve been craving for, I still was thinking: “am I missing something out?”, “Is it worth settling down with him, when I can potentially find someone more suitable?”, “maybe I haven’t considered all the options yet?”
No need to explain that I was absolutely petrified with those thoughts, considered them abnormal and even treacherous. However I decided to share them..no, not with a psychologist, which would be too easy of course, but with my girlfriends. And imagine my surprise, when I saw them giving a knowing toss of the head as I was sharing. It turned out they all felt this at some point.
Various dating apps with a huge range of options seem to have taught us that there is plenty of fish in the sea, and you can easily find now an absolutely perfect, and a hundred percent compatible match.
The more I was reflecting on it, the more I was realizing that we’ve actually got used to seeing such apps as our most loyal and trustworthy assistants, companions and friends. I reminisce back to my lonely years, when I was single, and can clearly picture myself at a party, surrounded by smart, interesting men, but not even considering flirting or trying to make someone notice me. These men seemed irrelevant, as I knew I had a wonderful dating app in my pocket, with hundreds of likes, matches and chat requests.
Nevertheless, after a few years that I’ve spent on dating platforms, I was lucky enough to meet a great guy on this website. But all these made me think of all those beautiful love stories that are not destined to come true for some people, just because instead of winking at someone in the bar, we diligently swipe the photos left and right on the phone.
Moreover, when I was spending a couple of hours every day hypnotising my phone, choosing a partner felt really like shopping. As soon as I didn’t like one of the questionnaire points, which in real life would hardly prevent me from falling in love with that person, I immediately closed his profile and moved on to the next one, choosing the one and only strictly according to clear and specific criteria in my head, mentally ticking the box or putting a dash next to each item on our list.
Now I understand how difficult it was for men: if he did not interest me with the first bright sentences, or wasn’t original enough, high chances I would quickly switch to tons of other options that were waiting for me.
Of course, the older we get, the less we indulge in such reflections as: “is he my Prince charming or not?” After all, if at twenty it seems that you are surrounded by opportunities, when you turn forty you already begin to be surrounded by families with children and the only thing you want is stability.
However, all these things don’t mean that websites that give you access to a large pool of dating opportunities are evil, are likely to undermine certain values, and make a person worse. No. They are definitely not bad, on the contrary, in many cases they are a real savior for people who have a hard time finding their love.
My point is that even if you’ve already found someone who you really feel a connection with, such occasional thoughts as I’ve mentioned before are okay sometimes when you feel bored, or when you’ve just had a quarrel with your partner. The main thing here is to make sure you’re not wasting time on feeding those thoughts, but rather spend the energy on improving current relationships, making them closer to what you want and paying attention to positive aspects of your life together as a couple.
Photo by Madrona Rose on Unsplash
