Frustrations with Internet Dating | |
Well I'd say the online dating sites don't work but I'd be a bold face liar. I have met a few girls off sites like plenty of fish. I also have met up with girls I've met in chat rooms and even World of Warcraft. I'm married now and I met my wife just walking to a store to buy smokes. I think I have a friend with a similar problem and as I advised him and how I think you might be trying to solve this is. Something like this can not be approached as say a math or science problem you cant break it down like that there are simply just to many changing variables per person to approach it that way. He took this advise to heart and now I'm not saying you do this but we went out a few nights with me and a few buddies and we had drank quite a bit but him being buzzed and just relaxed and him self instead of calculated or worrying about it was able to pick girls up with no problem. I think the lesson to learn from that is stop trying so hard and be your self and it will come. When I was single I'd have nights I'd go out where i knew single hung out and strike out constantly then when I'd say i don't care just gonna hit the store pick some stuff then go home play WoW suddenly id just notice a girl smiling at me and I'd go talk to her and boom I had a date for that night instead... less it was raid night lol. Hope that helps any. | |
Look mate unless you are 50+, bald, fat, broke, fuck ugly and your dick stopped working then dating sites are the worst possible option mainly because your socializing skills don't improve staring at text, so you are getting less appealing by the minute. Go out into the wild and mingle, I know it makes me a heathen to say this on a gaming forum but if you truly want to find girls then you need to explore the jungle. And the old "just be yourself" bullshit, that is if and only if you are already successful with the ladies, which makes it advise for people who never needed it. | |
Well what your implying that he has nothing to offer which just ins't true. Every one has something to offer some one. Statistically there is more the one person for some one regardless of interests or hobbies or life experiences. | |
I have no idea what "the deal" is. From reading your post it seems that you're not getting a lot of action on your dating site of choice. This could be due to any number of reasons. Are you messaging lots of people? If you're messaging lots of people, and no one is replying, then the likeliest culprit is that something in your profile is spooking them. If you want, I can look at your profile and let you know if there's anything shady you need to be concerned about. That's assuming I don't need to pay to look at it, because to be honest I'm not feeling THAT helpful.
And this is...terrible advice, really...don't listen to this. However, one thing you CAN take from this is that once you've met someone via a dating site, you need to take it off the internet as quickly as possible. No drawn out online flirtations. Talking to someone online can create a sense of false intimacy that becomes impossible to sustain face to face, leading to painfully awkward first meetings. If you find someone interesting, and they find YOU interesting, set up a first date ASAP. | |
Thanks, but I think I'll pass on including a direct link. I still feel like it's a little embarrassing. I actually found an old friend's ex girlfriend on there awhile back and had a nice long chat with her. She lived too far away for any sort of dating situation to take place, but she seemed to think my profile was fine (or in her words "amazing"). I feel I have it set up to attract people who would "like" me. Actually, I'll just copy and paste the body of the text in the message. For context, the pictures on my page include me doing dips on parallel bars at a public park (main profile photo), a reasonably close shot of my face, a "funny" photo of me holding a misshapen M&M, me with sun glasses, me on a tour group with my parents with a really insincere smile, and two pictures of me with my shirt off with a cutesy disclaimer warning beforehand that there will be two pictures of me with my shirt off. Also, the "My Self Summary" and "What I'm Doing with My Life" etc. are sections created by the website, not me. | |
ROFLMAO. MYSTERY SOLVED. I was going to ask if you wouldn't reconsider letting me weigh in on your photo as well, but I'm going to go ahead and say that's unnecessary. I'll let you be objective about your own looks and decide whether you're passably handsome or not. Oy, this profile. Okay, first things first. Guy, I dig self deprecating humor. It can be endearing. I'm something of a MASTER at it. And you are doing it wrong. There are brief moments in your profile where it's charming, but most of it comes off like a raging Eeyore complex. You literally open up slamming yourself in multiple paragraphs. I'm skinny! I'm poor! I'm useless with women! It doesn't matter if those things are true. There are some cards you need to keep close to your vest. This is about first impressions, and you always want to put your best foot forward. There's "being yourself" and "being yourself". You don't need to put on an act, but if you want to attract relative strangers, you do need to try and isolate your best qualities and put them on display. Let's say you had a tiny penis. You wouldn't put "Tiny Penis Seeks Love" as the headline for your profile. You'd keep that tiny penis under wraps, and only spring it after she'd had a few weeks to get won over by your many winning qualities. Make sense? You need to go back to the drawing board with this. Self deprecation is like salt. A little bit can spice up a profile and give a sense of your personality/sense of humor, too much and it's completely inedible. Leave off that you're skinny, people can look at your photos and decide if you're too skinny. Leave off your wage, people don't need to know that. That you're EMPLOYED is sufficient, you can worry about whether or not minimum wage is sufficient for dating once you've actually got someone to date. For GODS SAKE leave out that you're "not good with women" and that you sit around lonely and sad playing video games all day. There are ways to leak the fact you're a gamer into a personal ad that don't involve you saying "I never leave the basement! Ha ha!". Don't lean too hard on "top five" lists of films and games and music either. You can chat a little about what you want, but don't go too hard into it. And leave off the stuff you don't like, as once again negativity makes a bad first impression. Figure out your best qualities. You seem like you've got a good sense of humor. That can be a winning quality. Put it on display in some fashion other than running yourself down (or, god forbid, running them or their interests down). You're smart, yeah? You're probably smart. Find some way to demonstrate it (other than saying "I AM SMRT"...show, don't tell). Talk about the stuff you like to do in ways that make it sound INTERESTING and AWESOME. Think about ways to describe yourself that make you sound INTERESTING and AWESOME. If you struggle, find some people who love you who can tell you WHY they love you and talk up your good points to give you ideas. You don't need to oversell yourself ridiculously, or misrepresent yourself, but you DO need to come off as a cool guy who would be interesting to spend time with for one reason or another. This is MARKETING. Confidence is NECESSARY. There's no getting around this. If you're not confident, learn to fake it. Honesty and vulnerability and all that stuff comes later. You wear that shit on your sleeve, and no one is going to come near you. Everyone has baggage, everyone struggles with self esteem, everyone has personality warts and hurdles. The people who are successfully hooking up have learned how to keep it to a dull roar while making their first impressions. You're not trying to trick people, but you do need to be the best person you can be. Capiche? Go fix that fucking profile ASAP. Internet dating can be a GOLD MINE of romantic possibilities if you're not shooting yourself in the dick with a horrible profile from the word go. I can look at it again when you're done if you want, but you're gonna want to take your time and do it right. And don't ask your friend's ex-girlfriend for advice on your profile any more, she didn't do you any favors giving that thing the green light. | |
I still feel like being as upfront with people as possible works to my very limited advantage. I'd hate to go on a date and within five minutes of meeting seeing her realize "oh, you're poor as shit," "oh, you're a total nerd," and "oh, you have no idea what you're doing, do you?" I will rewrite it, but I am in far too depressed a state right now to come up with something that people would like. (And I've already tried everyone who lives within reasonable distance.) So far from the site, I have met some people - one of whom I got a few dates out of. She basically jumped my bones within three hours of meeting me, but on all subsequent dates she was less and less enthusiastic for one reason or another. As much as I ran myself down in that profile before hanging out, I feel like I was still somehow disappointing to her. Another facebook friend I made from this site said something to the effect of "so happy to have found another kindred spirit" on her facebook wall around the time we started talking. However, I haven't been able to secure any date from this person as of yet over the last two months. I get the impression that that ship has also sailed. | |
Well, I ran your profile past a couple of ex-girlfriends to see what they thought.
The other one, alas, was sure that your profile was not real, and that you were trolling for laughs. She found it THAT UNBELIEVABLE. I'm glad you got a couple of hits, but presumably the reason you posted this advice topic in the first place was because you were unhappy with your success rate, yeah? Advice is cheap and you're welcome not to take it, but I GUARANTEE you that profile is the source of your woes. And before you suggest we're not pursuing the same demographic...that girl up there? That's a nerdy girl. She likes vikings and european history, and was a big Diablo 2 fan. The one who thinks you're faking owns a PS3 and recently bought a collector's edition of TOR. I'd ask MY girlfriend what she thought, but there's no way she's even going to bother looking at email until later today because she's ass deep in Witcher 2. Geeky girls are still girls. They're not any more turned on by self-sabotage or the pong of desperation than anyone else. As for why girls hooked up with you but didn't like you, that's going to happen. Not every date turns into a relationship. Most, in fact, are going to fail. A couple of bad dates is not any indication that you're a failure at romance. It's just business as usual. | |
Never said he has nothing to offer, I don't even know the man. Ignorance no doubt is bliss but it is never the way forward. | |
In line what BloatedGuppy said: get rid of that "Warning" picture as well. | |
Thanks for getting some additional input. The part about "I hate myself and I'm putting this out there to show I'm a loser, but since I know it and I'm making fun of it, you can't judge me because I ALREADY KNOW" really hits home. I have no self esteem whatsoever and was bullied a lot as a kid, particularly by girls. I have this built-in mindset of being a twisted and sad little weirdo that I can't seem to shake, and getting rejected by even more women isn't helping all that much. I didn't even try to date at all until last year when I was 24. I know it's not their problem that I feel shitty about myself and I totally get why they'd be turned off by it. Believe it or not, most of that was written while I was in what I would consider to be a "good mood." So I can't imagine when I'll have the proper brain chemistry in order to make it sound not messed up (and again it wouldn't matter all that much for awhile since I've struck out with just about everyone in the area.) On an unrelated note, do any of these ex girlfriends live in Illinois? I swear I'm not this much of a miserable bastard in person. :) | |
Now that he's commented on it you might want to remove it. It's um... actually possible to find your profile by that text and if you want to keep it private it'd be good to not post that. | |
I've honestly never used a dating site, but most of the online relationships, for what they were worth, I can say I forged over social networks, not dating sites. Most specifically, a site called IMVU. Now granted, I've given up on internet dating because it really doesn't seem to work for me, though the fact I'm just now getting out of the house could have been a major factor in the past, it's not something you should just toss out of the window. Don't go LOOKING for an internet relationship is all I can say. Let it come to you. If you really want to try your luck in the online world, do online activities you find fun. Try out MMOs, and you might just get interested in a guildie [Happened to me. Still good friends with her.] or you could join a roleplaying site and a similar event occurs. Or just use a chat system and just talk to random people until you find that one. Again, this is what I did during my online dating phase. I don't suggest it as a first choice since relationships online are highly stressful and require to utmost dedication. At the same time, you need to remember that ironically, women care less for a relationship online. I don't know why or how, but men are the ones more dedicated to online relationships which is an interesting note. | |
...indeed it is. I've already started deleting chunks of it. I can also set it up so that the body of it is only visible to other members of the website, but I don't really care that much. Nice googling, though. I hope you enjoyed checking out my hot bod. | |
Your self confidence issues should be viewed as a prime culprit when it comes to the few relationships you have had not working out, as well. I had devastating confidence issues in my early 20's, and it was basically a long string of bad dates and short relationships that ended with a remorseful girl giving me my walking papers. You will need to learn to have a higher opinion of yourself, or...as earlier suggested...at least learn how to fake one...if you want to have any kind of lasting success romantically. A little self-doubt can be appealing...arrogance is not charming. Too much self-doubt is just exhausting. Having dated some girls with dangerously low self esteem, I now understand what everyone was complaining about with me. It's not a pretty picture. You can always PM me with re-writes if you want help. I usually frolic on these forums at work, so believe it or not editing your personal ad is more entertaining than the alternative. Totally up to you, though. As to the girls in question...Vancouver B.C., unfortunately.
Oh LORD I'm not suggesting he have an "online relationship". Most internet dating sites are to meet people who live in your area so you can have ACTUAL relationships. I don't want to denigrate anyone's online relationship, but with few exceptions they're an utter waste of time. | |
Setting it to "visible to members only" is really a minor inconvenience. Searchengines might be able to still spider but nonetheless, the information is going to stay there until they update. To be honest, if you know how Google's search | |
Pretty much what everyone else has said about your profile - self-aware humour about your personal weaknesses is fine, but not if it's to such an extent that you begin to reek of it - if theres one thing women almost universally love in men, it's confidence. Some self-deprecating humour = Fine, will show that you atleast have a sense of humour and aren't a narcissistic douchebag Loads of self-deprecating humour = Bad, makes you look like a confidence lacking loner who is setting himself up to fail | |
tbh i found online dating pointless and i got out of it because had i have kept going i wouldve just felt worse and worse.. in the end i got over 230 denials over just saying hi in a chat window.. so yea im glad i stopped doing it because the feelings of rejection from it just sucked and i will admit openly that its definately NOT for everyone.. people are MUCH more judgemental online imo. | |
I thought your profile was adorable but I can see why it would make most people feel a bit uncomfortable. It reeks of frantic desperation. | |
Ye gads, man. Why not spray yourself with woman repellent and wear a T-shirt with "I'm Gay" emblazoned across it, if you're so hell-bent on self-sabotage? Others have already mentioned this, but I'll say it again: your personal statement is very, very bad. At every opportunity you're being self-deprecating and selling yourself short. I get it; you're trying to prove that you're non-threatening and not an arrogant jackass and overall a "nice guy". In reality though it just makes you sound insecure, and like you're seeking sympathy rather than admiration. The only type of woman who I can imagine responding to your profile is one who is either blown away by your physical appearance, or a dominatrix, or a girl who is on the rebound and wants a nice sexless relationship with a doormat for a few months until she's ready to play with bad boys again[1]. If this sounds negative it's because there's a lot of things wrong with your profile. I'll get onto some positive advice in due course, I promise. 1 - Cut it down. It's too long. I got bored reading it; I suspect girls would too. 2 - A good start would be to nix all the negative bits. Tell us you're a graduate. Don't tell us what you earn. Tell us what you enjoy, not what you don't enjoy or aren't good at. 3 - Make yourself come across as interesting. You don't consider youself interesting? Then become interesting. Nobody, least of all attractive women, are impressed by how many hours a day you spend watching films, playing Wii or levelling up your WoW accounts. Simple rule of thumb: make efforts to become the kind of guy you would admire platonically. 4 - Wii Fit is for housewives. Join a gym and lift free weights, don't use machines. 5 - Your photos sound horrific too. Awkward family pictures? "Zany" pieces of candy? A disclaimer that you're a gigantic prude with no confidence? You'd be better with no pictures at all. Let me guess, in the pictures are you making intentionally awkward or ironic faces, probably not making eye contact with the camera, as if to say "Lol I hate photos, that's how un-egotistical I am, oh no they're taking another one now, lol". Delete all those. Dress nicely, brush your hair and teeth, don't squeeze your zits, make sure the lighting is good (set the white balance if taking a photo indoors) and pose for a nice portrait picture. Look at the camera. Smile warmly and genuinely. Keep your hands by your sides. No ironic frowning or face-hiding or bloody duckface. Also, don't have a group photo as your only (or best) profile pic; your friends might be better looking than you and you don't need competition. 6 - Everybody listens to music, ony a jackass defines themselves by their musical tastes. 7 - Sod it, just go out and meet people in real life. This dating site is intended to bring people together in face-to-face situations anyway, so cut out the middle man. Get out more. Join some clubs and societies. Go to more social events with your work colleagues. Meet more of your friends' friends. Did Romeo and Juliet meet over the internet? They didn't need it and neither do you. Get out there and get some. That's an order. [edit] You sound like a nice guy, but if you think depression is a problem, it's almost certainly more important for you to sort that out and be happy internally before you start adding external complications (i.e., women) into the mix. You mentioned changing your brain chemistry: good idea, exercise is superb at getting those endorphins flowing. Join a gym, start some martial arts, learn ballroom dancing, whatever. Many of these forms of exercise are also a great way of meeting women on a regular basis. [1] If I sound bitter it's because I've been there... | |
Thanks for the tips. The cutting of it down I think is the best strategy. It gives the individual sections considerably more snap to them. I'm also working on burying the negativity in comedy as much as I can. The photos aren't as bad as I made them sound. It's more: one muscley one, one "normal/cute" one, one old "cute" one, one "zany" one with goofy face, and the sexy topless two. I didn't attract any dominatrices (so that's what the plural of that looks like), but the thought that I hooked some girls who were "blown away" by my physical appearance is a nice little pick-me-up. Thanks for that. :) Yeah, it's really difficult to meet people in this town. I don't really have any friends (though I'm hoping an old acquaintance will be hanging out with me tonight after a couple of years of not seeing him - probably won't happen) and most of my coworkers are heavy drinkers and underage. I don't drink at all to begin with (I have my reasons) and drinking with underage people is dangerous because the state of Illinois fines/arrests adults who are near drunk kids. I've been out of school for 3 years, so clubs are out, Most local "activities" seem geared towards housewives and old women. Believe me, I've looked into it. I know, I shouldn't be a Debbie Downer. I appreciate your advice. | |
Oh sweetie, you sound just adorable. If I was into online dating, I`d respond to your message. Harry Potter did wonders for skinny white guys with glasses, as did Hermione for girls with bushy hair just like mine. My advice, get out there. Do something fun, try something new. Live a full and happy life and the girls will come to you. At the end of the day, it is not about finding a guy who has a good job and plays sports on the weekend, it is all about finding someone decent and kind and caring. There were so many good points in your profile, pick them out and present them. You are allowed to be picky about girls too. | |
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Go into IRL and look for a girl, you will probably fail miserably the first few times. It takes practice to get good at flirting and picking up girls. You really should not rely on the internet for a relationship. Its bad luck. | |
Yeah, I caught the misspelling as soon as I reposted the profile. I let out an audible "d'oh." It's been up like that for months. I did a massive overhaul on my profile with BloatedGuppy, so it doesn't really resemble the old one very much now. I did take your advice regarding being more honest about what I do with my Friday night, while also suggesting that I want to take somebody out. Believe me, I tried to move. I met a girl online who lived about six hours away and I fell in love. I applied for jobs by the dozen because I desperately wanted to be with her. I never heard one word back from any of them. In any case, she cut off contact with me last February, so I guess it's "good" I didn't move, but that still doesn't change the fact that I need to get a real job and move out of the house. Here's the sad truth of the matter though. I haven't been just applying for jobs around here related to my bachelors degree, but other retail jobs and manual labor. The only interview I've gotten since I've been out of school (almost three years now) was for working in a warehouse for a rope distributer (and I didn't get it). I sincerely doubt a masters degree would have helped me out in that situation. If anything, masters degrees just decrease your hire-ability, while simultaneously compounding your debt, making it more difficult to be mobile to move to jobs. So yeah, I wouldn't tell people to get masters degrees. It might help you out if you already have a job and could increase your income or ability to be promoted. But if you don't have a job, it just prices you out of entry level in their minds. In my case, I can't get a job unloading trucks with a four year degree and four years experience unloading trucks. | |
Hey again. Glad to hear that you found some of my suggestions useful and that you're starting to look on the bright side. However, it sounds like girl problems should probably be a secondary priority after finding a decent job. What would you say is the major problem stopping you getting a job? Is it your degree subject, or do you not perform well in interviews, or what? Also, have you considered volunteer work? Some organisations actually pay for your travel, food and temporary housing for certain projects (overseas education or humanitarian work, for example). Something like that might really stand out on your CV, and more importantly you'd see a bit more of the world and possibly find your direction in life. | |
I have no idea what's preventing me from finding work. I apply and I hear nothing back. There's not much else to say. There are very few places one can apply in person anymore, so it's just shooting my personal information into oblivion. I shouldn't say I hear "nothing" back. I often get the boilerplate rejection e-mails with a good amount of regularity. The most recent insult is that I've started applying at my old schools to do stuff like secretary work, IT, or the mailroom and being told that they go for "more qualified candidates" in their rejection e-mails. The requirement for these jobs is nothing more than a high school education, according to the postings. I do have a job, but it's dangerous, frustrating, demeaning, and it pays minimum wage after doing it for four years with no chance for a raise. It pays enough to work on my loan and keep me from being delinquent and destroying my credit, and it also gives me some spending money and savings (I live with my parents and I'm frugal.) I only work 20 hours a week, but I can't abscond off to a volunteer mission any time soon. After so many years of never trying to find someone at all and feeling like I "wasn't good enough" for a girlfriend, I figured since I did have a little bit of money I could find someone who wanted to hang out and do stuff locally to pass the time and make new friends. Believe me, there are actually people my age around here in much worse financial shape than me. (Did you hear about the economy?) By the way, my degree is a bachelors of science in Business Administration. I'm not going back to school. If I can't get anything with that, why should I assume additional higher education would help me at all? | |
I'm about to go looking through other men's dating profiles just to figure what the hell they have that I don't. Been hitting this dating site every day for a year. I mean, I can't ask the few "successes" I've had for help, since they obviously weren't terrified by the picture I painted of myself on there. I'm not hitting people up for sex, nor do I go after people who I have nothing in common with. I don't repeatedly bug people either. Just again and again - nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, and nothing.
I never had one woman on there message me that I didn't respond to in some capacity. And if I didn't think any sort of relationship would work, I straight up (and very politely) told her. I thought that men just vastly outnumbered women and any female was just inundated with messages and couldn't respond to everyone, but I don't think that's the case. I've looked at search results for guys and it's pretty much the same amount when one breaks it down by area. It just seems perplexing and somewhat rude. If you don't think we're a match, you're absolutely correct. However, I specifically asked you about something that I genuinely wanted your opinion about and you didn't say anything at all.
So what's the deal? Am I a misogynist? If I were gay, would feeling this way make me a bigot or homophobe? Must I be a twisted and mutated freak?