Recently had a conversation with a good friend about dating, and it had me curious about how everyone on Beehaw approaches dating. Tell me a bit about how you date! Here’s a few prompts/thoughts I’m curious about:
- How long does it take for you to know if you’re attracted to someone (sexually, romantically, emotionally, shared interests, etc)?
- What do you like to do when you date and does it change depending on how many dates you’ve been on or how well you know the person?
- Once you start dating someone, how long does it take you to understand whether you want to date the person long term or whether it’s not going to work out?
- Do you only date people you meet in real life or do you use dating apps? How do you approach going from stranger to dating them?
- What’s most important in deciding whether you want to date someone? Do they need to have an interest in activities you enjoy, shared values, emotional intelligence, a certain kind of humor, or something else?
- Is there something you don’t understand about dating and want to share your frustration?
Since the days of IRC a lot of my dates and relationships either started on or crossed the digital realm. As young men, it was difficult to distinguish between sexual attraction and emotional connection. I ended up in a lot of weird relationships because of sex. I never counted the number of dates I had with someone before progressing things, I don’t do that kind of thing The women I was with didn’t count either. I guess we just go by what feels right. Maybe it takes a single day, maybe it takes a month. Whatever works.
Sexually attractive? Less than 5 seconds. Emotionally invested? Impossible to know, it varies tremendously.
The first thing to do would be having sex plenty of times. And that’s not just me pushing or anything, women love sex too (of course). A lot of times I would like to take things slow in that area, but it is difficult to resist. Other than that, I love cooking for them and watching TV shows. I guess I’m basic.
I never know if and how things will work out… how can anyone know? Sometimes I have emotional reasons to stick around, I’m charmed, infatuated, or in love… but I don’t have a crystal ball!
I have dated people I met on IRC, Tinder, and a whole slew of old-school or defunct platforms. Probably more people from the real world overall, but not by a huge margin.
I’m pretty good at approaching women, but I do it very rarely. Usually when I already know something about the person and know that it will probably pay off. So it is incredibly rare, but, because I am careful and have ways to check beforehand, my success rate is relatively high.
The way I approach this is through “sensible honesty”, so women always know my intentions but I don’t throw it at them at inappropriate times and circumstances. And I’m not pushy, I’ll back away at any sign of resistance or rejection. And I give them lots of chances to reject me. So I’m super obvious and clear, but never forceful or inconvenient.
Physical attributes are where it begins, but I must note that what I consider attractive is not necessarily very mainstream. Starting because, since an early age, I appreciate plus-size women very much. Also, cuteness is way more important to me than conventional “hotness” – because to me being cute is the same as being hot. When we started dating, my partner used to send me a bunch of nude pictures in stereotypical “I’m so hot” poses, a lot of cleavage, etc. That didn’t do it for me. The day she sent a picture in a cute pajama… it drove me insane!
Not really. Compared to other human activities, dating is fairly simple. There are clear rules and patterns you follow. It’s kinda like a script with some improvisation in between. Most of my socialization troubles happen in highly informal, spontaneous, “unscripted” situations. Dating is not like that. It’s a narrative – it can get complicated, but it still has a beginning, a middle, and an end.
As a relationship anarchist, I couldn’t disagree more and it’s a regular source of anxiety and tension for me because many people think this, yet differ so widely in what that script looks like. The classic low stakes example of this is when and where and how the first kiss should happen. The reality, though, is that it goes so much deeper. The unspoken rules can extend to things as simple as ‘my partner should open doors for me’ to ‘unless my partner says otherwise we will spend every birthday and important holiday together’ to ‘my partner cannot be emotionally close with a members of the genders they are attracted to’ and so much more. People often don’t even consciously know what their needs and assumptions are and it can lead to fights over acceptable behavior or a waxing/waning of sexual and romantic interest. I’ve seen countless relationships fall apart over unwritten rules that neither side realized were rules or boundaries they wanted in the relationship!
You only say that because you never dated me! lol
Just kidding.
But yeah, there are lots of unspoken rules for sure, but to be honest, when a potential partner fixates too much on that kinda thing I lose interest anyway. I don’t wanna be with someone just because I tick their mental boxes as if I there was an invisible DnD character sheet for me in their head.
When I notice someone “plays games”, I usually decide they’re not for me. I call them whenever I feel like it, I send messages whenever I feel like it. I’m not looking at the calendar just to know when to call without looking “needy”, because someone who would judge me for being “needy” is not someone I wanna be with. If I like someone, they’ll know it.
I’ve been with women who clearly counted the days and followed rules for this and other stuff. It’s exhausting.
When you asked about “dating” I thought you only meant first dates and such, long-term relationships are a different ball game. But I would say that in the stage I am in life, once a relationship starts “securing” the first year is kind of a given. Things tend to get harder after that.