Why I Do Not Date On-Line (Or Anywhere Else)

I was listening to Fresh Air and they had on a guest talking about online dating. Having done it for years my advice to you if you are a young person is not to start and if you are older, quit. In fact if you are over 35 and still single stick with it. You, like me, are too old to start living with someone. It is a little sad that the opportunity has passed you by, but that is life. Opportunities escape us all the time. If I had been nicer, or actually nice at all, when I was younger I might have paired off with someone for the long term. Especially if I had put myself out and gone out to meet and make friends instead of drifting off into the sterile online world.

More specifically online dating is not intended to find you friends or mates. It is intended to separate you from your money and/or time. The longer and more you spend on the site the more they win. If you go online and immediately find "the one" they lose. Do not be fooled by the success stories. It is no different than accidental successes with any other placebo or scam. It is likely they they do not even know they are a scam. A hell of a lot of worthless remedies are promoted by the discoverer in the honestly mistaken belief that he or she is doing good as well as getting money.

Instead of looking for someone else out there who will make you happy you need to find the thing that will make you happy-ish. None of us are happy for long, humans are not built to be perfectly happy all the time. If you are happy-ish and have friends that is the best that can be expected out of life. If the close friendship that is a relationship happens out of this you are lucky and it is wonderful. If you do not have it, stop worrying about not having it and work at being happy-ish by yourself.