Ok, so I have not written much recently as I have been seriously lacking inspiration and time, to be quite honest. Yet, here I am finding inspiration writing about something I am actually not very good at…. at all, but here we go anyway. What a rollercoaster we go on in my posts ‘ey!

Now, let me give you a little disclaimer here, I am not an avid dater AT ALL. I hate the things, I will decline dates because I hate the whole process (although trying to not do that as much now or I will end up alone forever). Maybe a tad on the dramatic side but in the words of our nations hero Pamelarrrrr:

Jeeeeeez, dating in general is hard work but in your twenties it seems like an actual game of snog, marry, avoid. You are sat there awkwardly over a drink in the standard ‘date drinks’ location asking mundane questions that you are not overly fussed about knowing the answer to, when all you want to ask are the hard hitting questions like; what do you think about the decline in our Earths habitats or yano, what star sign are you so I can go home and google if we are going to get married or not.

But hang on, I have skipped a big step here. Actually getting to the date, woah that is a biggie.

We live in such an amazing technological world now, so amazing that people don’t often seem to meet in person now but online. I remember when I first set my tinder account up, I was amazed, felt like I had my very own personal Argos catalogue of men that I could just swipe yes or no to?! GR8 – Will have a boyf in no time I thought……oh how wrong I was.

Now perhaps I have a faulty version of the app or I have terrible taste in men (probably the latter) but I have not found tinder a hot spot for meeting guys. Like you match with someone and you are like YAS stage 1 complete, they send you a message, WOO stage 2 complete, they send you the dreaded ‘so what are you on here for lol’ message. DAMN Stage 3 error. Now in my experience I will say something like ‘just here to meet new people’ (mainly because it is a lonely Sunday afternoon and I am not really sure why I am here on tinder) and that is when you get the age old response of…… Yeah same, here to meet nice people and have some fun (insert ambiguous sexting emoji). Yep, stage 3 has an error. This will then cause me to text all my pals and say ‘It’s happened again, I am deleting the app forever, I want to meet someone organically’ they nod along knowing I will re-download it in approx 2 days after sitting in a coffee shop awaiting Mr Right to walk through the door and fall in love with me. Then the process starts again.

So anyway, most of the people I have gone on dates with I have met organically, it is much nicer, far less pressure and concern of them thinking you are not as attractive as your very finely picked, shit hot tinder pics. The dates I have been on in my time have been… ok, I mean I am still single so they haven’t been great. My biggest problem, I turn all alpha male with my banter, start insulting them, am cold and just generally awkward. Cute and flirtatious I know, how am I single?

But dating is scary as shit for me. I have pals who go out on dates on the regs are so cool about it, they love it, meeting new people, learning about them and that’s that. I however, go a bit weird let my anxiety take over and will solidly panic for like 3 days before wondering if they will be super cool and fun or someone who has no similar interests and we will sit silently for the duration. When in fact I should just calm the fuck down and just go and enjoy myself and not worry about silly little things like; awkward hugs, going to sit down on the same chair and me sitting on him accidentally, resulting in me having to move to the other side of the world to avoid embarrassment, or something like him turning out to be like Joe from You and me having to fake my own death to avoid his avid stalking… yano casual stuff.

Dating in your twenties however, is fun and a great way to meet new people and learn about yourself and what you want in a future partner. Even though I am a disaster dater with my awkwardness, I am glad I have gone on the dates I have. I feel like I come out learning something about myself every time. As time goes on I am sure I will let my little aggressive barrier down and be a less heightened ‘banter fuelled’ person and be more successful but for now I am happy with what I have learnt from dating.

My new motto is to just go and enjoy dating, I am in my twenties, this is a great time to date and figure out what you want and enjoy yourself while doing it.

But also, if your not going on dates that is cool to – a gr8 person to date is yourself. Treat yourself, be kind to yourself, love yourself.

There was SO much more I could have written on this topic but I did not want to write a novel. Perhaps I will write a dating in your twenties part 2 another time. So for now does anybody have any dating disasters or success stories they want to share?

Read my other ‘dating’ related posts by following the links below:
Being Ghosted: https://lifeofa20somethingyearold.home.blog/2019/09/15/being-ghosted/
Being single in your twenties:
https://lifeofa20somethingyearold.home.blog/2019/07/26/being-single-in-your-twenties/

L x