Problems with Finding Dates: Revelations from Online Chat
The Knight-on-a-White-Horse Syndrome
The internet is one of my favorite things. I love going on line and chatting and flirting and playing silly games on Facebook. I think it is a wonderful tool that allows us to connect with people all over the world; I now have friends in Australia. I’ve never had a connection to that mysterious place before. When I bicycled across the country with my basset hound, I was able to meet and get places to stay because of the internet. My friends and family could follow me along on the journey. Because of the internet you don’t have to be alone on such a journey anymore.
There are some bad things with the internet too. My focus is on online chat and the negative things surrounding it. I think it allows people to create someone who they want to be, but are not. So instead of pulling us together, it separates us more. I think it creates the illusion of intimate connections but keeps people in their homes alone and not making real intimate connections.
After many years chatting with guys online, I’ve noticed something. I’ve noticed that many are complaining about the difficulties of finding a boyfriend. I don’t have a boyfriend presently, and normally I’d say I’m not one to offer advice on getting a partner. But this isn’t advice this is observations, my thoughts on what is wrong and what we can do to make it better.
Side note: I said “make it better” I did not say find a boyfriend. Note the difference.
It always starts with a lament. Oh woe is me, my life is bad, I don’t have a boyfriend. Oh I’m so lonely no one wants to date me. I get these kinds of statements all the time, and the evil side of me so wants to reply with: ‘Really? No one wants to date you? I do, I love sitting around at dinner with someone who is as depressed and sad as I am, please marry me.’
But of course I don’t. I try talking to him and finding out what he is doing to get dates. I’m not going to dwell on them but I think a list with a quick reply of why it’s not a good idea is ok.
1: Chatting online. Ok this is good for pen pal relationships and some dates but you have to be able to communicate well with the written word for your personality to come out and get dates. And you have to have good readers too.
2: Going to the bars. Rare is it that we find a boyfriend at a bar. They are too loud, too dark, and people are boozing it up. These make meeting someone difficult.
3: Nothing much. Yeah well it’s raining men is a song not a weather condition.
Through discussions with these guys I’ve learned a few common things found in so many of them.
Focused on finding a boyfriend. Their entire being is focused on finding a boyfriend. So much so that everything they do is about finding a boyfriend. A normal trip to the grocery is not about food, but the excuse to perhaps by chance meet their next boyfriend in the candy section. This I fear is a mistake. And one that I’ve lived many times. There is an old saying that you never will find a man while you are looking for him. And it’s true. I believe we put out a vibe that we are desperate for a boyfriend and that is a detractor. I think it is because we are not focused on ourselves and our own happiness, but focused on the hope of happiness brought by someone else. In the end we are not happy. And no one wants to date someone unhappy. In good times and bad times; in sickness and in health: these are wedding vows made after a dating period:: these are not matting calls.
They are focused so much on finding a lover that they are forgetting themselves. I think when I meet guys like this, that all of their hopes and dreams are place on the shoulders of their future lovers. Their happiness is on the future lover, he will make me happy. That’s way to much weight for someone to carry.
So many men online have no hobbies. Hobbies are important: you got to have some. You have to have some interest in something. If you don’t have hobbies, you are missing out on so many fun things. Hobbies can change during your life too. You can try different things as you learn about them. No one is born with a hobby. Hobbies are activities and past times that help us find happiness.
I’ll ask men about their hobbies and they will say: I don’t have any. Then we’ll try to figure out what are his interests so I can direct him to a hobby, and I’ll just hit one wall after the next. I don’t like to read, I don’t garden, I don’t go to the gym, I don’t to hike, I don’t blah blah. Translation: I’m boring. Look if you want someone to be interested in you, you have to be interesting. Hobbies are a great way to do this. If you’ve always wanted to learn to do something like quilting or knitting or woodworking, then go out and find ways to learn to do these things. You’ll find your mind is distracted and you have something that you enjoy to talk about later.
But mostly you’ll not appear as a man waiting at home for a lover to improve his life.
Even if I am not interested in the same things you are, you can be an exciting person because of your excitement in your activities. You don't have to have a glamorous life to be interesting; you just have to be active.
Along with a total focusing on getting a boyfriend is the creation of what that boyfriend will be like. This is something I run into not only with men online, but in person and with women seeking men. I don’t know that I can say I’ve noticed it with straight men. What it is is this: the person creates the future husband. A fantasy is created about that person, and that is who he is looking for. But that person only exist in his head. This can be on how he looks, or as we say in on line “my type”. So you are not seeing other guys who are right in front of you.
Here is an example: I have a thing for men shorter than me. If I’m in a bar or the gym or the store, if a shorty walks by, I’ll not be able to look away. I used to check out this guy working out at the gym with his 6’ 5” friend, and I thought the short one was hot. If the tall one was working out alone, I wouldn’t notice him. He once told me he would see me on the stair master and walk by to see if I would check him out, and I never did. Well he wasn’t shorter than me and not what I was looking for. For some reason, I was introduced to him and that’s when I saw him really. We then dated for a year. I could have met him earlier, if I could have been able to see him, but he didn’t fit the fantasy I had about what I wanted my boyfriend to look like.
Stop dreaming about people who are not real and use that time to find some hobbies and make some friends. Go Volunteer!
Related to the creation of the boyfriend is creating the relationship with someone you are chatting with online. Look online is fine for meeting someone, but you must move it from online to in person quickly. There is a danger of creating a fantasy about that guy, his personality, your discussions, the perfectness of your dates etc. All this is bad because in your mind he will be perfect; in reality he will not be that guy. I chat with guys so often that say: I like to get to know someone online first and then meet them. This is what happens when you do that. In the end, you leave disappointed wondering what happened to the guy you were chatting with. Meet the guy in person! You will get to know him, and the real him, and this will improve your chatting life too.
You can fall into this trap without the help of the internet. So check your thoughts, if you find that you are day dreaming about your future husband, you are in danger of creating a perfect model that he will not be able to be.
Now that I have preached about getting some hobbies. Many of you will go out and get some hobbies. You’ll join meetup.com to find gay groups that do that hobby, and you’ll think: Ok I’m going to go to this meeting (dance, film festival etc) and I’ll find my love. Not going to happen. Why? Because you are still focused on finding a lover: not focused on making yourself happy. Go for the hobby, for the fun of doing it. Do not go looking for your lover, he’s not there.
That’s what is the biggest problem with finding dating: being too focused on the other and not yourself. All of the discussion comes down to that. Focus on yourself. Stop thinking that if you have a boyfriend you’ll be happy. That’s not going to happen. You have to be happy with yourself, you have to be happy with yourself day to day in order to be happy in a relationship. There is the big revelation that I learned from chatting with guys on line and why they are not dating. There are others, I may blog about them later too. But that is the biggest one. I call it the Knight-on-a-White-Horse Syndrome. It’s when a guy is waiting for that knight to show up and make him complete, happy and fulfilled.
That’s a bad syndrome to have.
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