Why I Stopped Online Dating

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I stopped online dating a year ago. For a long time, it was my drug of choice.

I dated men of all ages and cultures. I believe in living a life full of curiosity and diversity. I got that with online dating! The disappointment was so many men misrepresenting themselves by displaying a photo when they were 20 years younger, 40 lbs lighter, saying they wanted one thing and when meeting finding out
it was completely different.

Online is one dimensional. When you meet someone in person you get a good hit right away and they can’t misrepresent the way they look and I can pick up their energy and have a great BS detector. Online I have to work harder to pick this up and many times I don’t. I also thought if I went to paid sites I’d find better quality men, but it didn’t make a difference. I met one guy I had a relationship with on Match – a paid site, and another one on Plenty Of Fish – a free site. Go figure! There’s a ton of dating sites out there. One has to be lucky.

Introspection is what was not showing up with these men. I’m not saying all because as I said I did meet a few men that I had a relationship with. But what I found lacking from most men was lack of introspection. Most didn’t understand why they did the things they did and I guess really didn’t care and the talk was always on a superficial level. What worked for me in changing from the inside out was the introspection and meditation. It does take a lot of exertion and hard work and how many want to even bother.

I thought that if I continually worked on myself I would eventually attract a man that was similar to me, but in most cases, it never happened. Again it’s the misrepresentation of themselves that was the most disappointing. I felt they lied to themselves about their own life and that’s what they were doing with me—lying.

And I ask: what kind of a culture do we have where it’s expected that women do all of the work in a relationship? Because that’s pure bullshit and it’s also a setup to fail.

I believe another big disappointment for me was the expectation from men that they were entitled to my body without my permission. It became more than a disappointment. It became alarming. I personally began to judge myself: “did I dress too provocatively, was I too open, was I seductive, and then I said “STOP”. I like many had been so conditioned by society thinking it’s always the female but of course it isn’t. For years men have gotten a free pass on this.

I’m an optimist and I probably gave online dating a much longer shot then I should have but I had my own reasons why I couldn’t stop. I was afraid of being alone. I worked on this for a long time but nothing was happening and then around the same time I stopped online dating, the realization came to me: “I was no longer afraid of being alone.” I began to understand why people loved being with me, my fun and joy. I realized I was having a relationship with me and I truly fell in love with me.

Men and women are different in the way they express themselves. I get that. Women like me love to communicate, express my feelings that I am so connected to, and I just know what I like and don’t like. Except for the men I had relationships with from online dating, I just could not get into any decent conversations with any of the others. Any good conversations are spontaneous, interesting, exciting, but they weren’t showing up.

So now that I’ve stopped online dating, I would not walk away if a wonderful man showed up in my life. If I were to meet him now it would be doing some of the things I enjoy doing.

I also received some wonderful gifts from online dating: meeting the two men I had relationships with, having some wonderful memories, no longer afraid of being alone and loving the relationship I have with myself and some wonderful memories from the two relationships.
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