Joshua Pompey thinks that the proliferation of online dating sites in modern dating culture is making for an overly picky generation of serial daters.
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It seems like just yesterday that I was nothing more than a serial dating machine. Day after day my inbox would fill up with more emails then I could possibly respond to. With every email that came my way, an inevitable rush quickly followed.
Online dating had become an addiction. An all-consuming, not paying attention to anything else in my life addiction. As I went out with beautiful women night after night, almost no woman ever made it past the first few dates. Every now and then a few would make it past the first month, but I’d always manage to find a superficial reason why they weren’t good enough. I was simply a man with an addiction, unable to resist the urge of dating as many women as I could fit into my schedule, no matter how great the most recent girl was.
As a man who is now in a fulfilling monogamous relationship, I can’t lie and say I didn’t love this period of my life. Nor do I see anything wrong with dating as many women as a man sees fit. Every individual is entitled to live his or her life as he or she pleases. But I do sometimes wonder if online dating is creating a super breed of serial daters that are becoming a danger to single life as we know it.
The epidemic of serial daters is a natural evolution to online dating. Placing a single man or woman into a landscape of unlimited options is like unleashing a kid into a candy store without adult supervision. Its too easy to overindulge. There is simply too much temptation.
How could any single man or woman measure up to another person’s standards when there are several hundred more available singles just one click away. This is a world where women who are 4’11 refuse to engage with men who are anything less than six feet tall. A landscape where men can differentiate between wanting a woman who is curvy, a few extra pounds, or thick. A place where if the first thick girl isn’t the right amount of thick, there are seventy more variations of thick a few clicks away.
There is no longer a need for men and women to take the process of meeting up for a date seriously. Meet-ups for most online daters are now reduced to superficial encounters that consist of nothing more than a cliche drink at a bar for an hour. Not that one can blame men for arranging such a common and unoriginal date. With the amount of serial dating women out there, it would be a fools errand to waste valuable money and time planning something more creative.
Its not that online daters don’t want a first date to be a great experience. Most are actually hoping to meet someone great. But if it doesn’t work out, no big deal. One doesn’t even have to wait any longer than the walk to his or her car before whipping a smart phone out and responding to new potential dates.
From my perspective, serial dating has made online daters more judgmental then they ever were prior to signing up for the medium. Standards are increasingly becoming impossible to measure up to. Amazing connections are consistently passed up on for hypothetical connections. Few daters are truly satisfied anymore in this always wanting more society.
Don’t get me wrong, having options is a good thing. Back when I was still single, I often used to daydream how scary being single must have been prior to online dating, never knowing when the next opportunity to meet someone would arrive. Months or even years could theoretically pass by without ever meeting someone new. Especially for those in their late twenties or older. These days it could take all of five minutes, or dare I say, a swipe right.
Online dating is an amazing advancement to society. But with progress always comes a price. One must be careful not to become an overly superficial, never-satisfied version of their former self in the process. My advice for the serial dating generation is to have fun and enjoy yourself. But when dating stops becoming fun and starts to feel more like a chore, then its time to re-assess your dating habits.
Get to know others on a deeper level. Don’t make up your mind after five minutes on a date. Agree to more second dates, even if you aren’t entirely sure how you feel. Resist the urge to check your inbox throughout the day. If you connect with someone, put the rest of your potential dates on hold and disconnect from the online scene.
At the end of the day, online dating is an amazing medium and I may be one of the world’s biggest ambassadors of the medium. I’ve lived and breathed it helping others for almost a decade. Just be careful with the roads you let it take you down. With great power comes great responsibility. Use online dating wisely and let it take your life in a positive direction.
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Joshua Pompey has been helping online daters find success with online dating for over half a decade at a success rate of over 99%. For advice on what to say to women online, read this free article. Or click here for 8 reasons why Joshua’s emails have a response rate of over 80%.
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