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If you approach it with the mindset of,"I'm going to go meet fascinating people and do interesting things," you'll be much more likely to enjoy the process. And, if you're diligent, you may end up finding that special person.
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THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO ONLINE DATING: Tips, tricks, and manipulations to navigate the pains and pitfalls She looked me directly in the eyes and smiled. Still, no response. At this time I imagined picking up the bill and slapping her across the face with it as hard as I could. It definitely wasn't my best moment, but it was not hers either. Apparently, as I discovered later, I had fallen into a trap known as"the meal program." The meal plan, if you're unfamiliar with it, is when women go on dates with guys merely to get a free meal. It was obviously quite popular with attractive college girls, a classification she certainly fell into. When I first heard about the"meal plan," I did a mental rewind as I scrolled back through all of the dates I had gone on until there: all 37 dates to be exact. How could women take advantage of me like this? As I matured in my internet relationship, however, I realized that this was actually a response for what men do to women. Online dating sucks, but... There are three major levers in our lives which, if we pull them properly, can change everything. Our career, our health, and our relationships are the difference between depression and elation. I discovered this firsthand because in the past five years I went through the excruciatingly painful and draining process of pulling all three levers at the same time. I stopped the career I had been building for more than 7 years and I left my 10-year connection with my girlfriend who I believed I was going to marry. All of a sudden I was a career and dating newcomer. After 9 months of misery and frustration I was about to give up on online dating all together. One dayI was sitting in the shower feeling sorry for myself for over an hour. And then, for some unknown reason, my ambitious gene triggered and a small voice in my head said,"you're going to give up? No, no you are not. You're going to kick online dating's ass!" I started to channel my distress into anger, and my anger into determination. I started to approach online dating just like one big experiment. I started creating what I predicted,"The Process."
In this blog post I will take you through the entire process I took to learn online dating. By optimizing your profile, A/B testing your descriptions, beginning meaningful conversations, as well as crafting interesting dates. We'll discuss how to streamline the online dating process so you can not just get dates, but possibly find the love of your life (with minimal stress). Now, before I get into it, I must preface that depending on your context, your culture, and your own comfort, your process might need to be different than the under. But, the important takeaway here is to pull back the feelings that come from dating and treat it like an experiment. If you approach it with the mindset of,"I will go meet interesting people and do interesting things," you'll be much more likely to enjoy the process. And, if you're diligent, you may end up finding that special person. UPDATE: As of 2019 I have been with my new girlfriend, who I met on OkCupid, for 4 decades and we have moved in together. So maybe these strategies are not all that crazy, but maybe they are, I will leave it for you to judge. Listen to the Modern Dating Show Podcast for more tips, tricks, and embarrassingly real stories. Note: You can also hear the Modern Dating Show podcast, where my friend Trevor and I cover a lot of these approaches as we browse the present struggles and embarrassments of his own relationship trip (and answer listener questions). The absolute most common mistake I see both guys and gals making when it comes to online dating is they don't define their target clearly. Deep down inside, most of us know whether we're searching for a serious relationship or just to have fun. The more common scenario that I've discovered is that both women and men who are looking for a meaningful relationship are maximizing their relationship for fun instead. I remember how one day when my coworker, Maddy, heard about my success with internet dating, she asked me to help her with her OKCupid profile. She is a remarkably smart and capable woman and she's' quite beautiful, a true 10 out of 10, so I was confused why she'd need my help. In less than 5 seconds I saw the problem. The photos I saw in her profile looked like they belonged more on thechive.com rather than on any dating site. Basically, in order to optimize for getting dates, Maddy had chosen to only include her most provocative photographs. Now I want to be clear, there's nothing wrong with girls having"promiscuous" photos online. The problem, in the case of dating, is the arrangement of a relationship and what you contribute with. Our brains have evolved over centuries to intuitively pick up on visual clues much faster than written hints. In fact, they've found that men who are even walking with their girlfriend, will reflexively look if an attractive woman walks by without even activating their conscious brain. Because dating profiles conceal most information aside from the profile photograph before a user clicks, leading with provocative photographs sets a bad first impression. So, while it's totally fine to have sexy photos up on your instagram, leading together in your online dating profile is sending signals that may be attracting the wrong type of guy. Additionally, there are lots of classy ways to have interesting pictures that speak to more than just the unconscious brain.
Online dating pictures can be both intriguing and classy So, although Maddy was trying to find a relationship, her photographs were sending signals that she's searching for"fun." Understandably, she had a line of douchebag guys filling up her inbox. Listen to The Modern Dating Show Episode 4 For men, we tend to have the opposite problem. Every man who has done online dating will testify to the struggle of getting a woman to swipe directly in their profile, let alone to get them to engage in a conversation. Men, this is entirely your fault. I've seen men spend hours talking about the numbers of their favourite sports team, which player has what stats, who's health is suffering, as well as how financial reports will effect the team's chances. But, when it comes to online dating, guys tend to slap a few pictures in their profile and then begin swiping like orangutans till their fingers develop calluses. Men, stop. Before you start creating or re-creating your dating profile, stop and think about what you are trying to attain. Are you trying to date a lot of people? Or are you trying to find a meaningful relationship? And"both" isn't an answer. "If you try to appeal to everybody, you will interest no one." The techniques I will outline below work for either desired outcome, but the choices you make will significantly affect your"conversion" rate. For example, the first time I mastered everything in this process, I started going on a lot of dates (3--4 per week, weekly ), but I still felt incredibly unfulfilled. I only realized months later that, while it is good to go on a lot of dates and get practice relationship (recall I was off the dating scene for 10 years), it was even more important to make sure I was dating the perfect folks. Fortunately I realized this before I was the victim of some more"meal programs ." STEP 2 -- A/B Test your online dating profile images and descriptions First impressions matter. According to a study from Princeton, it's projected that in any relationship, whether its work or social, we make up our mind about whether we like the person in less than one second.
The single biggest flaw in online dating is that the first impression you make is based solely on your profile image. They do not get to hear you speak. They don't get to shake Find more info your hand. They do not get to smell you (it's a thing). All you get is one picture and there's a 99% chance it's the wrong one. If a person is coming online dating as an experiment, obviously the first thing to check is the profile picture. I first started this process in a very unscientific way... One hundred, and I mean 100% of these said that my first picture wasn't my best. It was interesting feedback, but I was not certain how I could test multiple pictures considering that I could only put one as the default. The answer: testing across programs. I created profiles on Hinge, OKCupid, CoffeeMeetsBagel, and the dreaded Tindr. I retained my profile description the exact same on each profile, but I put up another profile picture on each. I rotated the images across profiles until I could find a large enough sample size and make sure that the platform wasn't effecting results. Four of my actual dating profile pictures Sure enough, the profile picture which I thought was my best was always the one with the least matches. Interestingly enough, a film that I didn't read much into, pic B, was really a massive turn off for pretty much 100 percent of girls. I was shocked when I found this out, because the two girls in that photo are actually good friends of mine, so I never would have made this connection. Sometimes your photographs can be your biggest blind spot. To completely test this idea out, I really enrolled a few friends (both men and women) into the experiment and had them change out their profile pictures. They got varied results, but one thing was consistent: the picture they thought was their best, never performed the best. Listen to The Modern Dating Show Episode 2 This is a super simple optimization that can look to be a pain now, but it will save you from dozens, if not hundreds, of missed matches. This is the 20% of work that will get you that 80% improvement in results, so please rotate your photos and rotate them often. Top Tip: If you would like to speed this process up, you can actually ask your games what they think of your pictures. If a conversation with a match wasn't going well, I decided to at least get some"user comments" by asking her why she swiped right and which of my photographs she believed was best. (I also used this technique
to ask recruiters why I was not getting jobs.) In highschool I had a history teacher, Mr. Hernandez, who gave me perhaps the worst piece of advice I've ever received:"just be yourself" Now, a part of the error might be my fault, because I took his advice quite literally. I began to speak my mind, dress how I wanted to dress, and act how I wished to act. This turned out to be a horrible idea. With no filter or thought behind my actions, I rubbed more than a few people the wrong way. Now that I've matured a bit, I have come to realize that there is a difference between being your total self and being yourself. Whether we like to admit it or not, we're never our total selves except when we're by ourselves. Seth Godin has a great podcast on"signals," which you can listen to here. In the podcast, he explains that we actively choose which signals to give to other people. A man wearing a button up shirt, as an example, isn't necessarily wealthy, but the button up shirt is putting out the sign that he is wealthy. Much like someone who wears all black and an anarchy necklace is indicating she doesn't wish to follow society's rules, the man in the button up shirt is signaling that he is okay with following convention. In college I met a woman at a party who immediately caught my attention. I approached her and we immediately hit off. We spent the entire party flirting and dancing. We made plans to have a lunch date at the college cafeteria after that week. I got to the cafeteria early and decided to save us a booth seat. As I was waiting, a woman walked up to me and smiled. I looked up and saw a cute girl dressed in black, wearing black eyeshadow and an anarchy necklace around her neck. Initially I didn't even recognize her, but after a few baffled blinks with my eyes I realized it was my date. She sat down and we started talking. After some awkward conversation, she explained that her friends were sick of her being single so they had dressed her up to be"cuter" for the party to attract a guy. I was that man. I didn't really care what she dressed like, but as we picked up our conversation we soon realized that we had practically nothing in common. The outfit she'd used as a sign at the party did not match her personality in any way. We finished the date cordially and moved on. Signals matter. Choosing your signals is good, but choosing false signals not so much. You don't need to lie, but you also don't want to be your complete self. You want to tell them about how you collect classic records, you do not need to let them know about the way you cry every time a U2 song comes on. You need to tell them about the way you volunteer at the animal shelter, you do not need to let them know about
how you ran over your cat. Crafting a fantastic description is perhaps the toughest and personal bit of improving your online dating profile. There is absolutely no ideal answer, but there are some wrong answers. The first step to getting a great dating profile description is having a clear structure. I break down a dating profile description into 3 parts: Headline: A short sentence someone can read quickly. Intro Paragraph: A bit longer description that gives some color to your interests and character. Call to Action: A desired action you want them to take. Internet dating is inherently awkward, so help the other person by letting them know something you can talk about. Ladies this is especially true for you. If you do not want guys messaging you"hey" or"wanna f*ck?" Then give them some fuel to begin the conversation with. Unfortunately, people tend to surf online dating programs the way they surf social media sites: quickly and without much thought. It might be, in actuality, that mobile devices have trained us to surf everything in a similar way. Due to this, I think the headline is possibly the most crucial piece of your description and you should try different variations until you find one that works for you. After a lot of testing I found that this one worked best for me: The objective of the headline is to provide a fast snapshot of what is unique about you. Having a headline that's authentic, interesting, and short acts like a stop sign for the individual who is scrolling through the dozens of profiles on their cell phone. If you ask any top-performing marketer,"how do I create content which will be successful?" Chances are they'll laugh at the question. As any solid content marketer knows, terrific content is all about respecting the medium that you're producing the content for. For instance, if I went into a girl in a bar and said,"Outdoorsy, curious, ambitious, active," she will definitely get up and leave. The reverse is true for online relationship, however. You want your headline to be fluff free. Keep it to a 3--6 words, or one sentence, and be certain that it is quintessentially you. After that initial curiosity is peaked, you should start paving a path towards them getting to know you a little bit more.
This isn't the time to compose a book about yourself. After all, this is only your 3rd touch point with this person, your headline and picture being the first two. The intro paragraph provides a little bit of colour and possibly some talking points that you can talk about in chat (again, ladies, this is extremely important to add if you want to have more meaningful conversations). The intro paragraph which worked best for me was: "I love being outside as much as possible! Some of my favourite items are surfing, climbing, and playing volleyball. I'm a creative at heart but I love learning about new and businesses ideas. I'm into photography, design, and Tim Ferriss. My ideal Saturday is playing volleyball at the beach with friends. My perfect Sunday is reading a good book at Promenade cafe" This paragraph outlines a couple of basic hobbies and activities I enjoy and some non-standard items like business, design, and Tim Ferriss that might peak curiosity. The main thing to remember about this section is to avoid the generic activities that could apply to pretty much anybody. I can't tell you how many profiles I've seen that list things like: "I enjoy hanging out with friends, watching movies, binging on Netflix, and going on hikes." While I'm positive there are people on earth who don't enjoy watching movies or hanging out with friends, probably 95% or more of the people in your area enjoy both those things too. As opposed to trying to fit in, attempt to stand out. Try to balance your description between things most people like, so you can find common ground, but also things that are uniquely you. For example in my description above: -- Many people like being outside and photography. -- But very few people like learning about companies or Tim Ferriss. The Call To Action This is optional, although it certainly helps. In advertising, a call to action (CTA) is the action that you want the user to take after they've viewed your content. In dating, you essentially want the individual to message you. This sounds like a no brainer, but I've found that a lot of people, both guys and girls, have been rejected so many times that they eventually become discouraged from making first contact. I've heard countless stories of girls who have paired with a man who they really like, but the guy never messages them. When I ask them why they don't message first, they say that they don't know what to say or they don't want to appear desperate. The call to action helps alleviate this problem by making it clear that you want them to message you.
But, obviously you do not want everyone to message you, so make your call to action specific. On OkCupid they have an individual section that states: My CTA goes as follows: "You should message me if you're an interesting person who likes to play outside." Again, as with this advice, when in doubt just check it out. Try using a call to action and see if your conversations improve. If they don't, simply delete it. The beauty of dating programs is that instead of having 1--5 opportunities to make a relationship, as you would if you went to a pub for example, you have tens of thousands of opportunities and"do-overs" to play with. STEP 3 -- Making first contact and chatting The place where online dating falls flat on its face compared to"in real life" dating is when it comes to the conversation. Having to chat online as your first conversation is a massive limitation when you are trying to start a new relationship. For one thing, it is a very unnatural method of communicating, since it's been shown that we receive 55% of our communication from non-verbal (or in this case non-typed) communicating. It is logical then that when you take millions of people and put them in an unnatural communication environment you get some pretty unnatural conversations. While it may be fun to play around with bizarre conversation openers, if you are serious about finding a good relationship through online relationship, then it is a good idea to research your results a little bit. As I got better at optimizing my profile, I started matching with a growing number of people. This gave me the opportunity to begin testing different conversation openers and see patterns that I just would not have been able to determine if I did not have a high match rate. Listen to The Modern Dating Show Episode 6 I will spare you some of the terrible ideas I had, but in the spirit of good fun, let us examine how well you can judge a good opener from a bad one. QUIZ Which of the following conversation starters performs the best? A) "Hey! How's it going?" How was your weekend?" (or some other variation of the type of question). D) "Hey! (according to a book they listed in their profile)
I will let you consider it for a second. (I'll add some space before the reply below. Scroll once you're ready.) Scroll for the response Scroll for the response Scroll for the response Scroll for the response Scroll for the response Scroll for the answer And the answer is... If you guessed D, you picked the best answer! (If you guessed C, you chose the worst answer.) In order of best to worst, the answers are D, B, A, C (D being best). There are pluses and minuses to some conversation starter. While I found that the absolute best conversations resulting from"Hey! How did you like X novel," that obviously depends if they've put a book in their profile. You can modify this to ask about some other part of the profile, such as a picture or a place in their pictures. The reason I suspect that the book one works best though is because a) it shows you actually read their profile and b) it shows that you read. If I may use the book opener to start a conversation I typically also extend it to,"Hey! How did you like x publication? I am now reading'Losing my Virginity' by Richard Branson and highly recommend it!" (This is how I opened the dialogue with my now-long-term girlfriend). Pretty much every conversation I began with this opener felt much more natural and moved past a few messages. The next best option,"Hey! Works almost as well, but it's obviously limited to Sundays, Mondays, or Tuesdays. (It would be strange if you used this on a Friday). This worked pretty well, but not nearly too. I suspect it is because it sounds too much like I'm about to ask her on a date or it puts her on the spot to think of something interesting. The Do's & Don'ts of Online Conversation Now that you've made contact and the other person has responded, it is time to have a dialogue. Every conversation varies, but there are some guidelines that I will put in here as hints. First, some online dating tips for guys: DON'T attempt to be interesting by being obnoxiously weird. I can't tell you how many messages my female friends have shown me that noise objectively psychotic. The sad thing is that I know that the man is just nervous and trying to think of something interesting to say. Just have a regular conversation like you would with a friend.
DO try to talk about things she is interested in but also add your own thoughts. One of the most common complaints I have heard from female friends is they feel like they're being interviewed. Make certain that you ask questions, but that you also discuss things about yourself in equal measure. DON'T make comments about her body or appearance. Regardless of how well intentioned you are, it will be perceived in the wrong way. Saying things like,"you're so beautiful! You have a cute smile! You are..." will only lead to a polite"thank you" and will not create meaningful conversation. Now, a couple of online dating suggestions for girls: DO be nice and help direct the conversation. Even when I have tried to be nice and friendly, I have still received very curt or standoff-ish responses. No matter how much men pretend they don't care about the dialogue, they do. And they normally don't have any clue what they are doing, so offer them some help and direct the dialogue in a positive direction. DON'T answer questions without asking any of your own. If you are tired of discussions feeling like interviews, then be certain to ask the guy about things he is interested in also. DON'T make judgments too soon. In my experience women tend to put a lot more thought into their text messages than guys do. If a man says something that seems weird or strange, give him the benefit of the doubt and don't read too much into it, chances are he didn't either. Now a suggestion for the two parties: Attempt to move the conversation from online to in real life relatively fast. Online dating is a great tool to meet someone, but it's just that. It is a tool, it is not actual dating. My overall recommendation for moving from online to in real life is either one long conversation or two brief conversations. It should never take more than a week to set up a date. So, if you match with one another on a Monday, you should definitely have started talking about using a date by Wednesday. So yes, use the apps, but also get them off quickly. In real life is a lot more fun too if you know how to set up great dates... Step 4 -- Making a date sequence that will cause you to smile more and sweat less After I had mastered the online portion of dating, I soon realized that procuring the date is only half the battle. The second half of this battle, how well the date goes, is largely determined before you have even set out from your house. Where you have your date decides about 50--70 percent of the outcome of the date. But first a question... Where is the worst place to have a date? As it happens, it is actually at the most commonly selected dating place: A sit-down restaurant. Initially I was taking all of my dates to restaurants for dinner. But bear in mind, I was completely new to dating so I was just following what I had seen in movies.
Most of them didn't go well, but I wasn't certain why. After a dozen or so awkward (and expensive) dates, I determined that I need to experiment with some other locations. What occurred next was totally mind blowing. Almost like flipping a light switch, my dates enhanced tremendously. It was not that I was doing anything differently or that I had been picking better girls to go on dates with, it was simply a matter of context. Here's why I think dinner dates do not work, it goes something like this: You meet a complete stranger out a restaurant. You have an awkward hug. You sit down at a desk. You start talking, then the waiter interrupts asking about drinks. You continue to talking. The waiter interrupts again for your food order. You're not ready to order because you've been talking. The waiter provides you"another minute." You examine the menu making remarks about the choices. The waiter comes back ten minutes later. You talk and talk. You then run out of things to discuss. What do you do next? There are no exits, nothing around to comment on, nothing to see or do. You have to keep talking. Talk... Talk... Talk! A dinner date provides no options. It is a singular task that depends on you connecting with a complete stranger almost instantly. This issue is exacerbated by the fact that most of us are getting worse at having in-person discussions. Spending so much time online has improved our written communication skills, but it has also atrophied our in-person communication skills. Therefore, if we're getting worse at having in-person conversations, why would you bet your entire love life on the fact that you'll be able to have an remarkable in-person conversation with a complete stranger? 3 Rules for Creating Great Dates I never thought that dating could be a life-or-death action, but one day changed all that. I was holding on to a little ledge, about the size of a golf-ball, while the rest of my body dangled 30-feet over the floor like a giant cat toy. "O well," I thought,"this will be a great bonding experience." As I let my fingers slip off the ledge I expected the sharp jolt of the rope on my climbing harness. But there was no jolt. I began falling for what felt like eternity. As it happens, my climbing partner had momentarily let go of the rope just as I had slipped off the ledge. She panicked and did not catch the rope until I had dropped 15 feet to what I was certain was my forthcoming death. Finally the rope finally stopped and I felt a huge jolt, both emotionally and physically. "Okay this date may be a little too exciting," I thought. My entire dating career made a 180-degree turn once I began taking my dates on fun activities rather than dinners. I would take them to play tennis, rock climb, festivals, picnics at the beach, music shows, and everything in between. Some of these activities worked better than others. However, I found out that the most crucial elements to a wonderful date spot could be distilled into three classes:
Walkability -- Do we have to sit together or can we walk around? When you are walking, your scenery is changing so you can pick up new conversation topics as you go. "O look at that naked man on rollerblades!" (It is San Francisco after all). Activity -- Can we do the action reasonably well? I've seen men get this one pretty wrong. It is fun to teach someone something that you're passionate about, but be certain it's not too hard. Taking a woman rock climbing? Make sure she is not afraid of heights first. Scalability -- Can the date increase or shrink in scale as needed? Having a terrific time? Great! Let's go get dessert! No chemistry? No issue, how do we end the date sooner? With these three criteria, I crafted a three date sequence which nearly doubled the number of successful dates I went on. Now I know what you are thinking,"This man took women out to the same places like it was some sort of regimented assembly line?" No. This was my go-to order, but, based on interests, I would substitute unique activities to keep the dates intriguing. This was merely a template that simplified my decisions and decreased the cognitive load I was putting on my mind. So here is my ideal dating arrangement: Date #1 -- Off the Grid: Off the Grid is a gathering of food trucks every Friday from the San Francisco bay. Why I like it: One of the problems of inviting someone out to dinner is that everyone has different food preferences. Then (if you are a guy) you've got to account for cost of food. Off the grid solves this because there are over 20 distinct kinds of (affordable) cuisine. Additionally, it allows you to walk around, people watch, and get drinks. Feel like going all out? Date #2 -- Variable: This date could vary based on interests but I had a couple of go-tos, namely: Little Italy, rock climbing, tennis, picnic on the beach. Why I like it: These activities had in common were the 3 variables: walkability, activity, scalability. We could walk around Little Italy, grab cannolis, stay for drinks at Jack Karouac's favourite bar, or abort early. With both rock climbing and tennis we could alternate between activity and talking. If we did a picnic on the shore, we can go for romantic walks or huddle around a fire pit on Ocean Beach.
Date #3 -- Cal Academy Adult Night: An adult-only night in the Cal Academy of Sciences where you can grab drinks and look at exhibits. Why I like it: This date was especially important because if a woman had made it to date #3, it meant I actually liked her. Additionally, it meant we might take the connection to the bedroom. The Cal Academy night fulfilled all requirements, also it was a semi-formal event so we could both dress nicely for that special night. This was also my secret test because if a girl did not like facts and science it probably would not work out between us anyway. As an added bonus, it was also a 20-min walk from my place, so that helped with the"scalability" of the evening. Listen to each of the episodes of The Modern Dating Show These are just three examples of how to take online dating offline and create a reasonably successful dating sequence. Here are a few ideas on what to look for on each date as you attempt to make your own dating arrangement: Date #1: Look for a casual environment that is not intimidating. Dark bars or loud places do not make for great conversation. Make sure that you can reliably visit this place, so avoid places with long waits or where you need to make reservations. Ensure you are able to schedule the date for a weeknight (try not to book someone's weekend for a first date). Date #2: You have broken the ice and you have both agreed to a second date, so have fun with this one! Select an activity you'll both like that is not too tricky. Avoid intimidating activities like karaoke, group sports, or water skiing. Ideally choose an activity that has a cadence in which you alternate between doing something and talking. Going on a 10 mile run is fantastic for exercise, but it doesn't allow for conversation. Watching a movie at a movie theater has similar limits. Date #3: You confirmed you like each other, it's time to take it to another level. Try to make this date a bit more special than the first two. It needs to be romantic, it should test how compatible you both really are, and it ought to confirm whether or not you want to continue seeing each other long term. Following the excitement of dates and two, there may be a lull in date 3, so be sure whatever you choose provides new intimacy to the connection. For instance, if I did not go to the Cal Academy I'd go dancing instead. STEP 5 -- Getting your Timing Right Perhaps among the most important pieces of the online dating mystery that I see guys screw up again and again is time. Assuming the man is the one driving the dating sequence (which is not necessarily the case) there are some questions you will need to ask: When should you ask her to go on a date? When should you go for the kiss? Here I'll share my answers to these questions that I've found most helpful. But again, depending on your context, your culture, and your comfort your answers may vary. I will share my experience (as a heterosexual man living in San Francisco) and you can make whatever adjustments you deem appropriate. The important thing is to actually consider timing, rather than leaving it up to"feeling." Going from Online to Offline It is very easy to let a great online conversation die out. You message her, she messages you, back and forth, back and forth. In order to make sure I don't waste all my time with internet conversations I found that it was best to ask a woman to go on a date after about 2 days of messaging or roughly 20 minutes of continuous conversation. Again, try not to linger at the safe-space of the virtual world too long. It might feel like it's necessary, but it is quite easy to waste a lot of time and momentum in the chat room.
Going from Date 1 to Date 2 once I was 25, functioning as"the new guy" in a tech startup, my desk was placed right behind the sales staff. One thing I noticed is that every time they were finishing a call they would ask,"okay so what does your calendar look like for next week? Busy? Okay how about the week after that? O that's no good also. Okay how about the week then?" No matter what the prospect said, the salesperson would insist on at least"penciling" another meeting to the calendar with the choice of cancelling if desired. When I took this technique and applied it to dating, it led to some pretty incredible results. This rule is a bit contrarian, but it's worked really well: Always ask for the second date on the first date. One of the worst things about dating is that you're putting yourself out there. You are opening yourself up to strangers and in return you are getting a lot of uncertainty. No one likes uncertainty. No one likes to look at their phone every hour to determine if you've texted them or not. No one likes to wonder whether you like them or not. Surprisingly, most people do not mind if you don't like them, they only want to know. So my suggestion is to stop playing games, both with the other person and with yourself. If you like them, tell them you like them. If you don't, have the respect to let them know you do not. (A gentle means to do this is by telling them you aren't ready to date right now. I had a woman tell me and it was the easiest let down I have ever experienced and used it later myself also ). I must pause here for a single caveat: Yes, you should tell them you like them, but not always. Nobody likes to be smothered or chased constantly. I see this a lot with both guys and girls who get very excited by the person they have just met and then they proceed to text them, call them, and see them day after day after day. Stop Chasing Shadows once I was thirteen years old, my grandfather gave me some advice that I still use to this day. He explained,"Women are like shadows, the more you pursue them, the more they run away. The more you run away, the longer they pursue you." If you find someone who you want to be with really badly, do not scare them away by being obsessive. If they like you as well, there is no need to chase them. Yes, you should actively try to set up a date, but there is no reason to go on dates every single night of the week. Permit the relationship to have some breathing room. A good way to judge if a relationship is going well is if you find yourself missing the other person and vice versa. There is a lot of truth in the saying,"absence makes the heart grow fonder," and now there is even scientific
evidence for it as well. In a number of studies, anthropologists have found that many primates invest more effort into a relationships if the individuals in that relationship have been forced apart. What's interesting is that researchers at the Aalto University in Finland have recently confirmed that the same holds true in humans. By data mining cell phone records and comparing telephone patterns and duration, the researchers at the university found that people may also invest more effort into relationships when there is a probability of that relationship weakening. I tried applying this research to dating in a relatively simple way and, to my surprise, it worked very well. It turns out that by simply allowing for some time to elapse in between dates, paradoxically, makes the relationship strengthen rather than weaken. My cadence for relationship I found worked fairly well was the following: Date 1 -- Day 0 Date 2 -- 7 days after Date 1 Date 3 -- 14 days after Date 2 Date 4 -- variable This arrangement meant that I'd spread out the first 3 dates across a 1 month period. This allowed for sufficient time for the connection to grow and helped me make sure I did not suffocate my dates, which was particularly helpful when I was really into them. Takeaways and Next Steps As I mentioned at the start of the post, these dating approaches helped me tremendously, but depending upon your context, your culture, and your comfort, your process may need to be different than the one above. In actuality, because relationship is such an emotional activity (like job hunting), it's vital to have a system set up to help you navigate the ups and downs. By engaging in online dating you're getting on a rollercoaster of emotions and, like on an actual rollercoaster, it would be foolish to just jump and hold on. Making certain you have that lap belt secured and that you've been on a few less extreme rides can allow you to enjoy the ride a good deal more. As we frequently discuss on the podcast, even when you let go of expectations and just make your target just having fun with other human beings, online dating becomes something to look forward to rather than something to dread. Like the advice of world wide investors, you want to diversify your portfolio and decrease your chance of catastrophic failure. A means of doing this is by going on dates which are not just sit-down dinners, so that regardless of how your relationship partner behaves, at least you'll have a good time doing something fun. And, to decrease the risk, you should build both an outreach and dating sequence so that you reduce the cognitive load of having to think of new dates constantly. Find a few activities you enjoy doing and then fit the dates into those activities. This is also a great way to filter out people that aren't compatible with you in the first place, which will save you time and money in the long run. Naturally, irrespective of how well I did all the above items, I still had my share of terrible dates. The girl who used
me as a meal program being just one of many. Dating is a rollercoaster that will frighten you, challenge you, and sometimes make you wish you had never gotten on. But remember, when you're feeling down and enjoy giving up on love altogether: "You are never as bad as they say you are, you're also not as good as you think you are." Take each date as an opportunity to improve yourself. If you work on your own, improving your conversations, your dates, and your relationship with other people, that investment will pay off far beyond online dating. Until then, strap in and enjoy the ride. If you enjoyed this post, I'd super love if you hit the green hand clap button below so that more folks can discover it. And, if you've any more questions about relationship, hear our podcast where you can submit your own dating questions and we'll answer them on the show.
