Recently, I was thinking of the women I’ve known, friends and acquaintances alike who were always getting dates from dating apps. From the outside looking in, you would think that they lived a charmed life, that they were lovable, desirable, in high demand, and “better” than those who did not have such luck.
I have peeked behind the curtain and identified the commonalities I have seen across the women who had this “luck”. I have also found that some of the same commonalities can be observed in women who had such “luck” in real life. Let’s begin:
1. They are not afraid to hit on a man first- Most women still prefer for a man to initiate contact with them first. This is true of pretty much every dating app-except for bumble which is designed differently- and in real-life scenarios. The women who I’ve seen have the most “success” with dating apps are the opposite. They are not afraid to write a man first. They are not waiting for a man to notice them or sending hints to guide his attraction. Nope. They go after what they want. It is rare for men to get hit on, so when that happens, they are usually very appreciative and responsive to the women. One friend shared with me the script she used to approach men on apps. It was very flirty and massaged a man’s ego. I couldn’t see myself sending that, but let me tell you, it worked like a charm. She always had dates.
2. They are charming- Surprisingly, many of these women are not as beautiful as you would expect. They were not ugly mind you, but they were not exceptionally beautiful, drop-dead gorgeous, or outstanding in any way. One had severe hair issues and balding spots. Another had a serious mental disorder, but what they had in common was a lot of charm and confidence. They smiled easily at men and had a light energy around men. What do I mean by the latter? They always had this expectation that there was always another man around the corner, and there always was. This meant that they were never trying to hold on to men. They never got attached. Guess what, men found this very sexy.
3. They are extroverts- Watching the way these women dated made my INFJ heart shudder. They had a date lined up every day of the week. I didn’t and still don’t know how they found time to date every day, after putting in a full day of work and running other errands. Some of them were even willing to travel to surrounding states for dates. They had a lot of energy. They would drive, use trains, buses.. anything for a date. Preparing for a date takes a lot of energy from me. I can only do one or two max and these days, I want to be in my home by 9 pm. I also used to wonder how they constantly found “viable” men to date. I will discuss how they did that further down.
4. They are not enamored by men- What the hell do I mean by that? I mean that they could take or leave men. Many had been married or in long-term relationships with men previously. This meant that they had seen men in “all seasons” and they no longer had stars in their eyes when it came to men. Marriage didn’t matter to them because they had “been there and done that”. Or, they had dated a lot of men and were no longer easily impressed. They were also no longer fooled by what men said. They had a bit of cynicism concerning men, but you wouldn’t know that if you observed them with the man of the moment. They would seem so in love. How I started to understand that they were not in love with these men, was the quickness at which they dumped them. I remember one friend who every time you saw her, had a new man on her arm. For another friend, if a guy didn’t call her within several hours, she’d dump him. If she found out a guy snored? DUMPED? If a guy attempted to control her? DUMPED EXPEDITIOUSLY.
5. They have a ruthless focus when it comes to men- They don’t fall in love even though you might be forgiven to think that they are in love with the man as I just described. They see men as a means to an end. Whether it is sex, validation, company, or something else they are seeking from a man, they will be with him until he stops providing that or starts annoying them. I observed that if the men acted up in any way or started lacking in what they needed from him, it was either an immediate DUMP or an immediate search for an alternate partner. They viewed men as interchangeable commodities. They also don’t care much about titles or longevity with a man. I remember one such acquaintance confiding to me that her boyfriend at the moment had just introduced her to his family, but she was already back on the dating apps because he was not pleasing her. Her boyfriend thought they were serious, which was why he introduced her to his family. Meanwhile, she was already looking to replace him, and she did. They also don’t cry if a man breaks up with them. It’s NEXT.
6. Their standards for men are lower- Now I am basing this both on what I observed and what some of these women have shared with me so don’t @ me. One of the women told me that she only cares for 2 things in a man. Both of those things were physical characteristics. There was nothing about a man’s heart, character, soul, financial stability, family, etc. When your criteria for a man is a short list, that means that your pool of available men expands significantly. Factor in the fact that she approached men, it was like shooting man-fish in a barrel. Another woman, who is also among the number of female narcs I have encountered that inspired this article, was highly educated and held a law degree but if you looked at the types of men she engaged with, they included high school dropouts and retail shelf stockers. I asked her why she didn’t date her fellow lawyers and she said “lawyers sucked”. To me, the men she dated had no rhyme or reason, but guess what, her dating calendar was always full.
The interesting thing is that, even though they had plenty of dates, it still did not give them a charmed life. They still had problems with men. They still encountered men who stood them up, stiffed them for the bill, abused them, etc. The only major “advantage” I’d say that they had over other women was that they quickly dumped them and so minimized long-term damage.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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