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Wellness Wednesday for May 1, 2024

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

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I matched with a woman on Hinge on Friday. Talked to her for two days, then on sunday asked her out to a free live music thing at a bar for monday; cocktails at a cocktail bar, 10 minute walk to the venue. She said maybe, then the day of said she was tired. I asked her out to lunch instead since I didn't have another free evening this week. She confirmed this morning for today at 1:00. By the time I replied, she'd already unmatched with me.

Met a woman at the park yesterday. She came up to me, we had a long conversation, she spent most of it laughing and smiling. She reacted with glee when I said I also smoked weed. I asked her for her phone number, we could share a joint at lunch sometime. She said yes, shouted "Text me! :)" as I walked away.

No reply to that text message sent later that day with my #. No reply to the text I sent today asking about tomorrow. There will be no further texts.

I hate my life so much. I haven't had a date actually happen in six months.

I hate my life so much. I haven't had a date actually happen in six months.

Keep it in perspective. It could always be worse. It could be a year. It could be five years. Or a decade. Or maybe you could not date at all due I dunno, a horrible circumcision accident or something of a similar nature.

Always remember, dating for long-term relationships is one of the things where rates mean nothing, a single true success is enough. I also was struggling badly to get any positive attention whatsoever from women until I met my wife.

How can rates mean nothing? It would be harder to get a relationship if you can hardly get any dates in the first place, wouldn't it?

In the sentence construction "X means nothing, [elaboration]" , the first part is usually slight hyperbole, and the second part explains in which way it does mean something. So for example if I talk about a video game and say "HP means nothing, you're either dead or not" it tells you the important lesson that you can freely use HP as a resource, except for the very last point, which is the one that does matter.

For dating, if you meet couples in their forties or later, you'll often notice how little it matters whether they were successful daters in the past, had good conversion rates, etc. The rate only matters insofar as to get a single success. Then suddenly other things matter much more. And even if you have pretty crappy rates, you actually can compensate, by just trying more often, or trying for longer. So even that minimum rate tends to be lower than you intuitively think.

I mean, that seems like it actually does matter pretty significantly? Like if the rates are so low you don't meet someone until very late in life, I would consider that quite bad indeed.

She said maybe, then the day of said she was tired. I asked her out to lunch instead since I didn't have another free evening this week. She confirmed this morning for today at 1:00. By the time I replied, she'd already unmatched with me.

This behaviour is common with the apps. Just flakey unavailability due to juggling multiple potential options. Next time if she says maybe and doesn't suggest an alternative, she means no.

She said yes, shouted "Text me! :)" as I walked away. No reply to that text message sent later that day with my #. No reply to the text I sent today asking about tomorrow. There will be no further texts.

This is also sadly not unheard of. Don't let it get you down. If you can approach one girl IRL, you can approach more, and many will follow through on meeting you.

I should have been more specific: The above ALWAYS happens. It doesn't happen sometimes, it happens inevitably with every Hinge match.

If it happens all the time (not just on hinge), then you need to change something.

6 months is objectively grim but I had 0 dates from age 23 to 26... So all I can say is you'll get through it :P, and also increasingly the norm for the average young man. If they get laid at all that is.

I'm in a similar boat to you I've dated two women in the recent past, both from the apps, atleast they converted to dates, but my god are they boring and lack any moving parts inside their heads... It's going to be a long road lol

Shit man, I had 0 dates up until age 30. I somehow got married, much to my infinite surprise. Just goes to show that you never can really know the future for sure, I guess.