20 Reasons You Need to Stop Stressing About www.e-podryw

1. She looked me directly in the eyes and smiled. Still, no response. It definitely wasn't my best moment, but it wasn't hers either. Apparently, as I discovered afterwards, I had fallen into a trap known as"the meal plan." The meal program, if you're not familiar with it, is when women go on dates with men just to get a free meal. It was obviously quite popular with attractive college girls, a classification she definitely fell into. When I first heard about the"meal plan," I did a mental rewind as I scrolled back through all the dates I had gone on until that point: all 37 dates to be precise. How could women take advantage of me like this? As I matured in my online relationship, however, I understood that this was actually a reaction for what men do to women. There are three significant levers in our lives that, if we pull on them correctly, 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 once. I quit the career I had been building for over 7 years and I left my 10-year connection with my girlfriend who I thought I was going to marry. All of a sudden I was a career and dating newcomer. I was scared. And then, for some unknown reason, my ambitious gene activated and a little voice in my head said,"you're going to give up? No, no you're not. You're going to kick online dating's ass!" I started to channel my misery into anger, and my anger into determination. I began to approach online dating just like one big experiment. I began creating what I called,"The Process." In this blog post I'll take you through the whole process I took to learn online dating. By optimizing your profile, A/B testing your descriptions, starting meaningful conversations, and even crafting interesting dates. We'll go over how to streamline the online dating process so you can't only get dates, but maybe find the love of your life (with minimal stress). Now, before I get into it, I should preface that based on your context, your culture, and your comfort, your process may have to be different than the below. But, the important takeaway here is to pull back the emotions that come from relationship 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 will be much more likely to enjoy the procedure. And, if you are diligent, you might end up finding that special person. UPDATE: As of 2019 I've been with my new girlfriend, who I met on OkCupid, for 4 years and we have moved in together. So maybe these strategies are not all that mad, but perhaps they are, I will leave it for you to judge. 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 current struggles and embarrassments of his own relationship journey (and answer listener questions).

2. STEP 1 -- Decide what you're looking for The complete 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 are looking for a serious relationship or just to have fun. The more common scenario that I've found is that both women and men that 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 online dating, she asked me to assist her with her OKCupid profile. She's 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. Basically, so as to optimize for getting dates, Maddy had chosen to only include her most provocative photos. Now I would like to be clear, there's nothing wrong with women having"promiscuous" photos online. The issue, in the event of dating, is the format of a relationship and what you contribute with. Our brains have evolved over centuries to intuitively pick up on visual cues much faster than written clues. In fact, they have found that men that are even walking with their girlfriend, will reflexively look if an attractive woman walks by activating their conscious brain. Because dating profiles conceal most information aside from the profile photo until a user clicks, leading with provocative photographs sets a poor first impression. So, while it is totally fine to have sexy photos up in your instagram, leading together on your online dating profile is sending signals that could 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. Internet Dating pictures can be both intriguing and classy So, although Maddy was trying to locate a relationship, her photographs were only sending signals that she's searching for"fun." Understandably, she had a line of douchebag guys filling up her inbox. For men, we tend to have the opposite issue. Every man who has done online dating will testify to the battle of getting a girl to swipe right in their profile, let alone to get them to engage in a conversation. Guys, this is completely your fault. I have seen men spend hours talking about the statistics of their favorite sports team, which player has what stats, who's health is suffering, as well as how financial reports will effect the team's chances. However, when it comes to online dating, men tend to slap a few pictures in their profile and then start swiping like orangutans till their fingers develop calluses. Guys, stop.

3. Before you begin creating or re-creating your dating profile, stop and think about what you are trying to achieve. Are you trying to date a great deal of people? Or are you trying to find a meaningful relationship? And"both" is not an answer. As the saying goes... "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 great deal of dates (3--4 per week, every week), but I still felt incredibly unfulfilled. I only realized months later that, while it is great to go on a lot of dates and get practice relationship (recall I had been off the dating scene for 10 years), it was even more important to be sure I had been dating the right folks. Luckily I realized this before I had been the victim of any more"meal programs " STEP 2 -- A/B Test your online dating profile pictures and descriptions According to a study from Princeton, it's estimated that in any relationship, whether its work or social, we make up our mind about if we like the person in less than 1 second. The single biggest flaw in online dating is the first impression you make is based solely on your profile image. They do not get to hear you talk. They don't get to shake your hand. They do not get to smell you (it's a thing). All you get is 1 picture and there's a 99% chance it is the wrong one. If one is approaching online dating as an experiment, obviously the first thing to test 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 numerous pictures considering that I could only put one as the default option. The answer: testing across apps. I created profiles on Hinge, OKCupid, CoffeeMeetsBagel, along with the dreaded Tindr. I kept my profile description the same on each profile, but I put up another profile image on each. I rotated the pictures across profiles until I could get a big enough sample size and be sure that the platform was not effecting results. Four of my real dating profile pictures Sure enough, the profile picture that I thought was my best was always the one with the least matches.

4. Interestingly enough, a picture I did not read into, pic B, was really a massive turn off for pretty much 100% of women. When I asked them why, without skipping a beat they answered,"it makes you look like a player." I was shocked when I found out this, because the two girls in that photo are really good friends of mineso I never would have made this connection. Sometimes your photographs can be your biggest blind spot. To completely test out this idea, 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 easy optimization that may 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 want to speed this process up, you can really ask your games what they think of your own pictures. If a conversation with a game was not going well, I decided to get some"user feedback" by asking her why she swiped right and which of my photos she thought was best. (I also used this technique to ask recruiters why I was not getting jobs.) Descriptions are negotiable 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, part of this error might be my fault, since I took his advice very literally. I started to speak my thoughts, dress how I wanted to dress, and act how I wanted to act. This turned out to be a horrible idea. With no filter or idea behind my actions, I rubbed over a few people the wrong way. Now that I have matured a bit, I have come to understand that there is a difference between being your overall self and being yourself. Whether we like to admit it or not, we are never our total selves except when we are by ourselves. Seth Godin has a wonderful podcast on"signals," that you can listen to here. In the podcast, he explains that we actively choose which signs to give to other people. A man wearing a button up shirt, for instance, isn't necessarily wealthy, but the button up shirt is putting out the sign that he's wealthy. Much like someone who wears all black and an anarchy necklace is indicating she doesn't wish to follow society's rules, the guy in the button up shirt is signaling that he's okay with following convention.

5. Signals matter. In college I met a woman at a party who immediately caught my eye. She was wearing a summer dress, flower earrings, and looked very cute. I approached her and we immediately hit off. We spent the whole party dancing and flirting. We made plans to have a lunch date at the college cafeteria later that week. I got to the cafeteria early and chose to save us a booth seat. As I was waiting, a girl walked up to me and smiled. I looked up and saw a cute girl dressed all in black, wearing black eyeshadow and an anarchy necklace round her neck. At first 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 began 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 did not 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 signal at the party did not match her personality at all. We ended the date cordially and moved on. Choosing your signs is great, but picking false signals not so much. The same goes for your online dating profile description. You don't want to lie, but you also don't want to be your complete self. You need to tell them about how you collect classic records, you do not need to tell them about the way you cry every time a U2 tune comes on. You want to tell them about the way you volunteer at the animal shelter, you do not want to tell them about how you ran over your cat. Crafting a fantastic description is perhaps the most difficult and personal piece of enhancing your online dating profile. There is absolutely no right answer, but there are some wrong answers. The first step to having a good dating profile description is having a clear structure. I break down a relationship profile description into 3 parts: Headline: A brief sentence someone can read quickly. Intro Paragraph: A little longer description that provides some color to your interests and character. Call to Action: A desirable action you want them to take. Internet dating is inherently awkward, so help the other person by letting them know something that you two can talk about. Ladies this is especially true for you. If you do not want men messaging you"hey" or"wanna f*ck?" Then give them some fuel to begin the conversation with. The Headline Unfortunately, people tend to surf online dating apps the way they surf social media sites: quickly and without much thought. It might be, in fact, that mobile devices have trained us to browse everything in a similar manner. Due to this, I think the headline is perhaps the most crucial piece of your description and you need to try different

6. variations until you find one that is right for you. After a lot of testing I discovered that this one worked best for me: The objective of the headline is to give a fast snapshot of what is unique about you. Having a headline that's authentic, interesting, and short functions like a stop sign for the person who's scrolling through the dozens of profiles on their 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, great content is all about respecting the medium that you're producing the content for. For instance, if I went into a woman at a bar and said,"Outdoorsy, curious, ambitious, active," she'll definitely get up and leave. The opposite is true for online dating, however. You want your headline to be fluff free. Keep it to a 3--6 words, or a single sentence, and make sure that it is quintessentially you. The Intro Paragraph After that initial curiosity is peaked, you can begin paving a path towards them getting to know you a little bit more. This is not the time to compose a book about yourself. After all, this is only your 3rd touch point with this individual, your picture and headline being the first two. The intro paragraph gives a small amount of color and perhaps some talking points that you can talk about in chat (again, ladies, this is extremely important to include if you want to have more meaningful conversations). The intro paragraph that worked best for me was: "I love being outdoors as much as possible! Some of my favorite items are surfing, climbing, and playing volleyball. I am a creative at heart but I really like learning about new and businesses ideas. I'm into photography, layout, 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 things like business, design, and Tim Ferriss that might peak curiosity. The most important thing to remember about this section is to prevent the generic activities that could apply to

7. pretty much anyone. 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 am positive that there are people in the world who don't like watching movies or hanging out with friends, probably 95% or more of the folks in your area enjoy both those things too. Rather than trying to fit in, try to stand out. Try to balance your description between things most people like, so it's possible to find common ground, but also things which are uniquely you. For instance in my description above: -- Most people like being outdoors and photography. -- But very few people like learning about businesses 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 have viewed your content. In dating, you basically need the person to message you. This sounds like a no brainer, but I have found that a lot of people, both guys and girls, have been rejected so many times that they finally become discouraged from making initial contact. I have heard countless stories of women who have matched with a guy who they really like, but the man never messages them. When I ask them why they don't message first, it is said that they don't know what to say or they do not want to appear desperate. The call to action helps alleviate this problem by making it clear that you want them to message you. Butobviously you do not want everyone to message you, so make your call to action specific. On OkCupid they have an individual section that says: "You should message me if..." ← This is OkCupid's sub-heading but you can just manually add it on other online dating programs too. My CTA goes as follows: "You should message me if you are an interesting person who likes to play outdoors." Again, as with this advice, when in doubt just check it out. Try having a call to action and see whether your conversations improve. When they don't, simply delete it. The beauty of dating apps is that instead of having 1--5 opportunities to make a connection, as you would if you went to a bar for instance, you have tens of thousands of chances and"do-overs" to play with.

8. STEP 3 -- Making first talking and contact where online dating falls flat on its face compared to"in real life" dating is when it comes to the conversation. Having to talk online as your initial conversation is a huge limitation when you're trying to start a new relationship. For starters, it is a really unnatural way of communicating, because it's been proven that we receive 55% of our communication from non-verbal (or in this case non-typed) communication. It is logical then that when you take millions of people and put them in an unnatural communication environment you get some fairly unnatural conversations. While it may be fun to play around with bizarre conversation openers, if you're serious about finding a good relationship through online dating, then it's a good idea to study your results a little bit. This gave me the opportunity to start testing different conversation openers and see patterns that I simply would not have been able to see if I didn't have a high match rate. Listen to The Modern Dating Show Episode 6 I'll spare you some of the terrible ideas I had, but in the spirit of good fun, let's test how well you can judge a fantastic opener from a bad one. QUIZ Which of the following conversation starters performs the best? For bonus points, try to order them from most effective to least effective. A) "Hey! How's it going?" B) "Hey! C) "Question: Batman or Superman?" (or some other variation of this type of question). (according to a book they listed in their profile) I'll allow you to think about it for a second. (I'll add some space before the reply below. Scroll once you're ready.) Scroll for the answer Scroll for the answer Scroll for the answer Scroll for the response Scroll for the response

9. 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 replies are B, D, A, C (D being best). There are pluses and minuses to some conversation starter. While I found the absolute best conversations resulting from"Hey! How did you like X book," that clearly depends if they have put a book in their profile. You can modify this to ask about some other part of their profile, like a movie or a place in their own pictures. The reason I suspect that the book one works best though is because a) it shows you really 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 book? I'm now reading'Losing my Virginity' by Richard Branson and highly recommend it!" (This is the way I opened the dialogue with my now-long-term girlfriend). Pretty much every conversation I began with this opener felt much more natural and went beyond a few messages. The second best option,"Hey! How was your weekend?" Works nearly as well, but it's obviously limited to Sundays, Mondays, or Tuesdays. (It would be strange if you used this on a Friday). Have any fun plans for the weekend?" This worked pretty well, but not nearly as well. I suspect it's because it sounds too much like I am about to ask her on a date or it puts her on the spot to think about something interesting. The Do's & Don'ts of Online Conversation Now that you have made contact and another person has responded, it is time to have a conversation. Every dialog changes, but there are a few guidelines that I will put in here as suggestions. First, some online dating tips for guys: DON'T attempt to be interesting by being obnoxiously weird. I can't tell you the number of messages my female friends have shown me that sound objectively psychotic. The sad thing is I know that the guy 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's interested in but also add your own ideas. Among the most common complaints I have heard from female friends is they feel like they're being interviewed. Be certain that you ask questions, but that you also discuss things about yourself in equal measure. DON'T make comments about her appearance or body. Irrespective of how well intentioned you are, it will be perceived in the wrong way. Saying things like,"you're so beautiful! You've got 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've still received quite curt or standoff-ish answers. No matter how much guys pretend that they don't care about the conversation, they do. And they normally don't have any clue what they are doing, so offer them some help and guide the

10. conversation in a positive direction. DON'T answer questions without asking any of your own. If you're tired of conversations feeling like interviews, then be certain to ask the man about things he's interested in also. DON'T make judgments too soon. In my experience women have a tendency to put a good deal more thought into their text messages than guys do. If a man says something that looks 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 proposal for both parties: Attempt to move the conversation from online to in real life relatively quickly. Online dating is a great tool to meet someone, but it is just that. It is a tool, it is not actual dating. My general recommendation for moving from online to in real life is one long conversation or two short conversations. It should never take more than a week to establish a date. Thus, if you match with one another on a Monday, you should definitely have begun talking about having a date by Wednesday. So yes, use the programs, but also get off them quickly. In real life is a good deal more fun too in case you know how to set up good dates... Step 4 -- Creating a date sequence that will cause you to smile more and sweat less After I had mastered the online part of relationship, I soon realized that procuring the date is just half the battle. The second half of the battle, how well the date goes, is largely determined before you've even set out from your residence. In which you have your date decides about 50--70% of the results of the date. But first a question... Where's the worst place to have a date? As it turns out, it is actually at the most frequently selected dating location: A sit-down restaurant. At first I was taking all my dates to restaurants for dinner. Boring, I know. But bear in mind, I was totally new to dating so I was only following what I'd seen in movies. Most of them did not go well, but I wasn't sure why. After a dozen or so embarrassing (and expensive) dates, I determined that I should experiment with several other locations. What happened next was totally mind blowing. It was not that I was doing anything differently or that I was choosing better women to go on dates with, it was merely 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 begin speaking, then the waiter interrupts asking about beverages. You choose beverages. You continue to speaking. The waiter interrupts again for your food order. You're not ready to order since you have been talking. The waiter

11. provides you"another minute." You look at the menu making comments about the choices. The server comes back ten minutes later. You continue talking. 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's a singular task that depends on you linking with a complete stranger almost immediately. This problem is exacerbated by the fact that many of us are getting worse at having in-person conversations. Spending so much time online has improved our written communication skills, but it has also atrophied our in- person communication skills. So, if we are getting worse at getting in-person conversations, why would you bet your whole love life on the fact you will be able to have an remarkable in-person conversation with a complete stranger? I had been holding on to a little ledge, about the size of a golf-ball, while the rest of my body dangled 30-feet above the floor like a giant cat toy. My fingers began to sweat and I knew that I couldn't hold on to the ledge much longer. "O well," I thought,"this is going to be a great bonding experience." As I let my fingers slip off the ledge I expected the sharp jolt of the rope in my climbing harness. However, there was no jolt. I began falling for what felt like eternity. As it turns out, my climbing partner had momentarily let go of the rope just as I'd slipped off the ledge. She panicked and did not catch the rope until I had fallen 15 ft to what I was sure was my forthcoming death. Finally the rope finally stopped and I felt a huge jolt, both emotionally and physically. My entire dating career made a 180-degree turn when I began carrying my dates on fun activities instead of dinners. I'd 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 great date spot could be distilled into three classes: Walkability -- Do we have to sit together or can we walk around? When you're walking, your landscape is shifting so you can grab new conversation topics as you go. "O look at that naked guy on rollerblades!" (It is San Francisco after all). Action -- Can we both do the activity reasonably well? I've seen men get this one pretty wrong. It is fun to teach someone something that you are passionate about, but make certain it is not too hard. Taking a woman rock climbing? Make sure she is not scared of heights first. Scalability -- Would the date increase or shrink in scale as needed? Having a terrific time? Great! Let's go get dessert! No chemistry? No problem, how do we end the date sooner? Using these three criteria, I crafted a 3 date sequence which nearly doubled the amount of successful dates I went on. Now I know what you're thinking,"This man took women out to the same areas like it was some sort of regimented assembly line?"

12. No. This was my go-to order, but, depending on interests, I'd substitute different activities to keep the dates intriguing. This was merely a template which simplified my choices and reduced the cognitive load I was putting on my mind. Happy brain = Happy dates. So here's my ideal dating sequence: Date #1 -- Off the Grid: Off the Grid is a gathering of food trucks each Friday by the San Francisco bay. Why I like it: One of the problems of inviting someone out to dinner is that everybody has different food preferences. Then (if you're a guy) you have to account for cost of meals. Off the grid solves this since there are over 20 different types of (affordable) cuisine. It also lets you walk around, people watch, and get drinks. Queue the awkward white-boy dance moves. Date #2 -- Variable: This date could vary based on interests but I had a couple of go-tos, specifically: Little Italy, rock climbing, tennis, picnic on the shore. 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 could 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 catch drinks and look at exhibits. Why I like it: This date was particularly important because if a girl had made it #3, it meant I really liked her. It also meant we might take the relationship to the bedroom. The Cal Academy night fulfilled all requirements, plus it was a semi-formal event so we can both dress well for that particular night. This was also my secret test because if a girl didn't like science and facts 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 night. Listen to all the episodes of The Modern Dating Show These are merely 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 try to make your own dating sequence: 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 go to this area, 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 to not book a person's weekend for a first date). Date #2: You've broken the ice and you have both agreed to another date, so have fun with this one! Choose an activity you'll both like that isn't too difficult. Ideally choose an activity that has a cadence in which you alternate between doing something and speaking. Going on a 10 mile run is fantastic for exercise, but it does not allow for conversation. Watching a movie at a movie theater has similar limitations. Date #3: You confirmed you enjoy each other, it is time to bring it to the next level. Try to make this date a little more special than the first two. It needs to be romantic, it should test how compatible you both really are, and it should confirm whether you want to keep on seeing each other long term. Following the excitement of dates one and two, there may be a lull in date 3, so be sure whatever you select provides new intimacy to the connection. By

13. way of example, if I didn't visit the Cal Academy I'd go dancing instead. STEP 5 -- Getting your Timing Right Perhaps among the most crucial pieces of the online dating puzzle that I see men screw up again and again is time. Assuming the guy is the one forcing 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 useful. But again, depending upon your context, your culture, and your comfort your answers may vary. The main thing is to actually think about timing, rather than leaving it up to"feeling." Going from Online to Offline It is quite easy to let a great online conversation die out. You message , she messages youback and forth, forth and back. To be able to make sure I don't waste all my time with online conversations I found that it was best to ask a girl to go on a date after about 2 days of messaging or roughly 20 minutes of constant 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 very easy to waste plenty of time and momentum in the chat room. Going from Date 1 to Date 2 once I was 25, working as"the new guy" at a tech startup, my desk was placed right behind the sales staff. One thing that I discovered is that each and every time they were ending a call they would ask,"okay so what does your calendar look like for next week? Busy? Okay how about the week then? O that's no good too. Okay how about the week then?" Regardless of what the prospect said, the salesperson would always insist on at least"penciling" the next meeting into the calendar with the option of cancelling if needed. Once I took this technique and applied it to dating, it led to a pretty incredible results. This rule is somewhat contrarian, but it has 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're opening yourself up to strangers and in return you're getting a lot of uncertainty. Nobody likes uncertainty. No one likes to check their phone every hour to see if you've texted them or not. Nobody likes to wonder if you like them or not. Surprisingly, most individuals do not mind if you don't like them, they just want to know.

14. So my suggestion is to stop playing games, both with another person and on your own. If you do not, have the respect to let them know you do not. (A gentle means to do this is by telling them that you are not prepared to date at this time. I had a woman tell me this and it was the easiest let down I have ever experienced and utilized it later myself also ). I must pause here for a single caveat: Yes, you should tell them you like them, but not constantly. I see this a lot with both guys and girls who get very excited by the person they've just met and then they proceed to text them, call them, and watch them day after day after day. He told me,"Women are like shadows, the more you pursue them, the longer they run away. The more you run away, the more they pursue you." If you find someone who you would like to be with really poorly, don't scare them away by being obsessive. If they like you too, there is no need to chase them. Yes, you should consciously attempt to set up a date, but there's no reason to go on dates every single night of the week. Permit the relationship to have some breathing room. A fantastic way to judge whether a relationship is going well is if you end up missing the other person and vice versa. There's a lot of truth in the saying,"absence makes the heart grow fonder," and now there is even scientific proof for it as well. In several studies, anthropologists have discovered that many primates invest more effort into a relationships if the individuals in that connection have been forced apart. What's interesting is that researchers at the Aalto University in Finland have recently confirmed that the same is true in humans. By data mining mobile phone records and comparing telephone patterns and duration, the researchers at the university found that people may also invest more effort into relationships if there is a probability of that relationship weakening. I tried applying this research to relationship in a relatively straightforward way and, to my surprise, it worked nicely. It turns out that by simply allowing for some time to elapse between dates, ironically, makes the connection 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 -- factor

15. This sequence meant that I would spread out the first 3 dates across a 1 month period. badoo dziewczyny This allowed for enough time for the connection to mature and helped me make sure I didn't suffocate my dates, which was particularly helpful when I was really into them. Takeaways and Next Steps As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, these dating approaches helped me tremendously, but based on your context, your culture, and your comfort, your procedure may have to be different than the one above. The important takeaway here is to pull back the emotions that come out of relationship. In actuality, because relationship is such an emotional activity (like job hunting), it is vital to have a system in place that will assist you navigate the ups and downs. By engaging in online dating you are getting on a rollercoaster of emotions and, like on an actual rollercoaster, it would be foolish to just hop on and hold on. Making sure 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 whole lot 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-class investors, you need to diversify your portfolio and decrease your risk of catastrophic failure. A way of doing this is by going on dates that are not only sit-down dinners, so that no matter how your dating partner behaves, at least you will have a fantastic time doing something interesting. And, to decrease the risk, you need to build both an outreach and relationship sequence so that you reduce the cognitive load of having to think of new dates constantly. Locate a few activities you like doing and then match the dates into these activities. This is also a great way to filter out people who aren't compatible with you in the first place, which will save you time and money in the long run. Of course, irrespective of how well I did all the above items, I had my share of terrible dates. The girl who used me as a meal program being just one of many. But remember, once 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 every date as an opportunity to improve yourself. If you constantly work on yourself, improving your conversations, your dates, and your relationship with others, 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 appreciate if you hit the green hand clap button below so that more folks can find it. And, if you've any more questions about dating, listen to our podcast where you can submit your own dating questions and we'll answer them on the display.