Dating: Why is it so hard to put ourselves first?

Like many of us, my social life has been completely shat on by Covid-19. If I’m being honest, it wasn’t so brilliant to begin with. Sure, I got to see my friends quite often and go for late night dinners during the week, but my dating life was pretty much non-existent.

Anyway, I did what most people do when they are alone on a Friday night and binge the best romcoms the 80’s has to offer — I downloaded Bumble. After a successful date with one match, I was later hounded with very intense, sexual messages that left me feeling rather ill and slightly violated. So, I blocked him despite a fantastic night and his above average bowling ability, and updated my Bumble profile to make it ABUNDANTLY clear that I was in fact NOT looking for hook-ups and was interested to see if I could meet anyone I could potentially find a relationship with.

I want to make it clear that there is absolutely NOTHING wrong with a casual fling, it’s just not what I was searching for after being engulfed in ‘When Harry Met Sally’.

Lo and behold, I ended up speaking to someone who I thought was not only overwhelmingly handsome, but also very spiritual, down to earth, and eager to give me his time. After speaking to this wonderful man over the app via text message for a few days, I was so excited that I did what any oversharer would do — I called my mum to update her on when I think she’d have to book time off work for her daughter’s wedding.

When I say this guy was handsome, I mean (without trying to divulge in too much detail) staring at his photos was giving me a bit of a tingle if you catch my drift. On Sunday evening whilst I was sitting on my bedroom floor painting an A2 sized canvas, I saw my phone light up at the corner of my eye, and it was a notification from Bumble informing me that my future husband was thinking of me. The message read “Hey, are you busy? I thought it would be nice to give you a call on here if you’re free”. I was instantly excited! “Yeah, sure” I replied, trying to act as cool as a cucumber. A minute later and the phone rang, AHHHH! ‘Keep cool’ I tried to tell myself, ‘just keep it casual’.

I was instantly taken back by his voice. In a nutshell, the only way I could describe it was Janice from friend’s voice in male, South London form. But I really liked what this guy had to say on text and wanted to find out more, so I really tried to put it to the back of my mind. We ended up speaking for a couple of hours and honestly, I enjoyed it. He was very pleasant, we clearly had very similar values and both cared deeply for spirituality. Saying this, as our phone calls continued over the next few days, I began to realise that there was something holding me back, and last night I had an epiphany.

We are not intellectually compatible.

And I’m not talking about academics and IQ, he’s very educated, in fact far more educated than me, but we aren’t on the same wavelength. After one conversation on the phone he had mentioned that he hasn’t spoken so deeply with someone about spirituality and relationships in a really long time, and for me it didn’t feel deep at all, it felt very, very surface level. I also noticed we had a very different sense of humour; his was very Michael Scott from The Office, who I absolutely love but it’s very obvious humour, and wasn’t used so ironically, where as I love humour that is a bit more witty. When I reflect on great relationships I have with friends and family, I love to discuss personal views around a whole bunch of ideas and issues and when I tried to introduce this into conversation, it was shut down because he wanted so much to talk about the future of whatever our phone calls were, which ironically was deteriorating any chance of that.

Feeling guilty that I wasn’t as excited about speaking to him as he evidently was with me, I reached out to a friend to ask for some advice on how to approach the topic of essentially telling him that I don’t want to pursue this. I know why we often feel guilty, because it’s (often) human nature to see the great qualities in people and honestly, it’s very stereotypically British to want to keep things rather perky, but in actuality it’s a lot kinder on myself and him to be honest if I’m not emotionally invested and can’t see this going anywhere. So my friend sends me this excellently prepared paragraph that she insists works like a charm whenever she is trying to let someone down gently. She later confessed that a guy sent this to her when they were dating and she’s been using it ever since.

Hey, I’m so sorry to do this as I really do think you’re so lovely, but I’ve had someone come back into my life recently which has completely thrown me! I would like to give things a go with this person so I’m really sorry. Good luck with everything!

Whilst I was grateful for the advice and do acknowledge that this is a very cheeky, yet effective message, it felt ingenuine to use it. I thought ‘this is common not to like someone you met on a dating app’ and that ‘honesty is the best policy’. Sometimes there isn’t another way around just ripping off a band aid. So I did it, I messaged him and told him the truth, that I’ve genuinely really enjoyed our conversations and thought he was a great guy, but if I was being honest I couldn’t see this going anywhere romantically.

I have to say I squealed when I first sent it, and refused to look at my phone for about an hour afterwards, but MY GOODNESS did it feel good to just be straight forward and bite the bullet with integrity. I did get some uncomfortable text messages back but it was reactional and people deal with rejection in many ways, it’s not on you. As long as you deal with it kindly and assure yourself you’re not in the wrong — you deserve the best and you shouldn’t have to settle or change for anyone or anything. We should all feel empowered enough to be honest with ourselves and do what’s right for us. We never know where it will lead us, but I’m excited to find out!