Dating App Hacks

Believe it or not, it is possible to have a good time using dating apps. This episode shares with you how to use dating apps and not hate it. 

Book a session with me: https://calendly.com/gerdungmelinda/coaching-session

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Find out more about my work: www.melindagerdungcoaching.com

Book a session with me: https://calendly.com/gerdungmelinda/coaching-session


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Beat Provided By https://freebeats.io
Produced By White Hot
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Transcript

0:17

Hello my friends so this week I wanted to talk about something that is a little bit outside of what we normally talk about on the podcast. But it does come up for a lot of people when they decide that they might want to consider another relationship. So we're going to talk about how to use dating apps and not hate it. So this kind of came up because I was listening to the radio the other day, and they were announcing that the next segment of their program was going to be the five words that you should use on your dating profile in order to get more hits. And I immediately recoiled. all that whole premise is just way off. I had to turn off the radio. I do hear people complain about the dating apps, all the time. And if people are optimizing for total hits, then this makes sense. Like that is a terrible strategy. I mean, it depends on what your end goal is really. Like if you just want to casually hook up with a bunch of people then yes, that is the correct thing to optimize for. But if you are looking for an actual real relationship, that is not the thing that you want to optimize for. And so if you are looking for a relationship, but you're optimizing for total hits, you're probably going to not be having a good time. So like if this is the advice that people typically follow, like the five words to put on your dating profile, it makes so much sense why people are hating the apps and having a terrible time on there. So the first thing I would say is important when using the apps is to know what you are looking for. And what I mean by that is defining for yourself if you're looking for a relationship or something more casual. Like are you looking for a relationship that is specifically going to lead to marriage or not so much? It is really important to know what it is that you're after because that's going to affect who you are attracting. And the second important thing is profile optimization. So you want to optimize for your objective. So for casual dating and hookups you want volume, right, you want lots of hits and it doesn't matter as much who they are. Right you just need someone you find attractive and vaguely interesting and like not a criminal. So you want like your hottest picture and you want like generic interests and information that's like your best foot forward kind of thing. Like if I was making a profile for casual use, I might not even put real stuff I might just try to like mirror and attract the kind of guy that I just want to have sex with. And I think the mistake a lot of people make is that they make their profile for when they're looking for something serious the same way that you would make it for something more casual. The power of the profile is that you can use it to do some of the heavy filtering for you. You want your profile to be actively repelling the men that you don't want to date, or women, whoever you're dating, right? Because who you attract is as much as who you repel. In order to attract someone who is really compatible with you, You also need to be repelling the incompatible ones. And you will get much less hits this way. But the hits you do get should be a much higher quality. And this takes a lot of the sucky out because it can be really draining to talk to a bunch of losers or people who are totally incompatible with you and constantly trying to figure out which ones are like decent and which ones aren't. but if you can get your profile to weed them out for you, then you are left with people that are a much better fit. And they're generally more fun to interact with and your whole experience of dating will just be much better. And I think part of this is honesty. Like there's so much like genericness and fakeness. The more real you can be, I think it is better. And this doesn't mean like you put your whole history on there. It just means like use a photo that isn't heavily edited. Show off your personality. Don't tame yourself down. You want who you are to be shining through. Right? Be honest with what you're looking for. If you want like marriage level commitment in your future, don't put that you're just exploring. Put what you actually want. Because not everyone is searching for the same thing and it saves you a lot of time. if you can try to weed out the people who don't want what you want. Take the time to make sure your profile is optimized. To attract who you are looking to meet. And the next hack I would offer is to use the block features liberally. the minute that something feels off, block.Just not worth spending energy on it right. Block swiftly and fiercely and it will protect your energy. Another thing that I hear people complain about a lot is messaging. They don't want to spend weeks messaging someone. If you don't like messaging for weeks, say so. If you want to meet, say so. Don't let the other person be in charge of how things go. You get to ask for what you want. In fact, it is better if you do. This way if you really want to be able to meet ,but the other person just likes to message people, you don't waste weeks messaging with someone who's never going to meet you. Just be be upfront with what you want and get rid of the people who don't want the same thing. And also it's really important to pay attention to your body. Our bodies are so good at recognizing when something is off. Like your body will tell you when something is wrong. And the problem happens when we try to start to rationalize away the warnings of our bodies. Instead, I would recommend tuning into it. Your body is your ally here. Honor that partnership. Like mind and body have to be on board. Make the commitment to yourself that mind and body are both on board or it's a no deal. And this doesn't mean you like don't get nervous or something like I always get nervous meeting someone new. But that new person nervousness feels very different from this person makes me uncomfortable. And you know that difference. You just have to pay attention to it. Your body is your North Star. If you've never read it, I recommend Gavin de Becker's book The gift of fear. It goes really in depth into tuning into your body and listening to your body's warning signs because we all have that innately built into us. We all have it. We just get conditioned to ignore it. And it can be so empowering to just reconnect with your body in that way and start having the partnership and the ally ship that offers you. and the other thing that I would say and this is probably the most important thing is to have your own back. Don't take other people's behavior personally. Right ,there are going to be people who ghost you. There are going to be people who aren't a want match with you. There will be rejection. And it doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you. Sometimes we lose sight of the fact that we don't need every guy or girl to like us and want to be with us. We are looking for one. We are looking for the right one for us. And if you are not right for one person, it doesn't mean that you aren't right for anyone. It's really important to avoid projecting one person's rejection onto everyone. It's not accurate and it's not helpful. It's emotionally draining and makes dating really not fun. And it doesn't mean that you won't be bummed out like no one likes getting rejected. Well maybe some people do, but there's a difference between feeling the disappointment and sting of rejection and going into a spiral of why am I not good enough? Very different. It's so important that you hold on to the fact that you are worthy of love you are worthy of the relationship you want. And just because one person does not want to or is not able to offer that to you does not mean that that all of the seven some billion people on this planet are also incapable or unable or unwilling to do so. And lastly I would say let yourself have fun. And this seems really silly to say, but like allowing yourself to enjoy the process is a thing. It can be really easy to get caught up in wanting a certain result. We think it will be better when we find someone. It's like thinking there is better than here and judging the starting point and kind of like resisting the reality of where we currently are. And that makes it not fun. There is so much power in just deciding you know what, I'm going to have a really good time with this. I'm going to meet a lot of people. Some of them will be great and some will just be interesting stories to tell my friends about but I'm gonna have fun with it. And like being honest about the human experience, life is 50/50 No matter what your relationship status is. A relationship status doesn't make you happy or not. Your happiness is created by your thoughts and how you think and that is not dependent on our relationship status. So those are my pointers for avoiding dating app fatigue and having fun with it. If you are having any particular sticky spot coming up with your dating or you just want someone to take a look at your dating profile, you can bring it to a session with me and we can take a look together and work through it. I've just started offering ad hoc sessions. So if you can find a time on my calendar, anyone can sign up for a session with me. You can find the scheduling link on my website, www.melindagerdungcoaching.com Alright my friends go forth and have fun with dating. Until next time, be well.