You won’t get skinny by eating the same old sh*t.
An Olympic coach once told me: On days you don’t feel like going to the gym, take the pressure off yourself by going with the small goal of only stretching. Lie down on a mat and start stretching, and you’ll often be surprised at how once you start—and you’re surrounded by others working out—you’ll be motivated to hop on a treadmill or pick up a weight and then suddenly you’re working out. The same goes for dating. It can feel like a massive, almost impossible effort to get yourself out there. But once you get into a rhythm, surrounded by others doing the same thing, it gets easier.
Dating is like exercise. You dread it. You don’t feel like it. You would so much rather sit on the couch in cozy pj’s and binge-watch Gilmore Girls. That is in part because we make such a big deal out of it! We have spun the concept of dating into something so high stakes that it drains any of the fun out of it. Stop the whirling in your brain for a moment and think about it strategically.
Analyze when you are at your best. Are you good at small talk and making others feel at ease? In that case a blind date may be a good occasion to shine. Or are you freaked out by the thought of talking to a stranger with the added pressure of a friend having bigged you up beyond all recognition? In which case, ask matches if they want to go bowling, try a food and wine pairing course, take a walk, or go to a concert—dates where you have something right in front of you to discuss. To take the pressure off, try a group date with other single friends and perhaps some couples. Make a game plan that puts you at your best front and center.
Dating really can suck. It can be awkward, embarrassing, humiliating. It can turn the toughest and most confident women into giddy and insecure wrecks. It can also be fun, exciting, hopeful. And if it doesn’t lead to love, it can lead to you extending your social network. You can make great friends out of it whom you may be able to introduce to others. It’s worth it, stresses anthropologist Helen Fisher, because what you win for putting yourself out there is, in anthropological terms, a “mating partner”—regardless of whether you want children.
“Dating is not fun,” Fisher admits. “But it will lead you to life’s greatest prize. You have to make time for it.” And the more time you put in, the better your chances are of finding that partner. This is, she adds, the most important decision a woman will make in her lifetime. “She will have a lot of different jobs, holidays, and vacations, friends that come and go, and a lot of places where she lives,” Fisher explains. “But she is really only seeking one partner, and for many women, this is the person she will share her DNA with.”
Dating is the essential exercise part of your regimen. Turn it into something you do regularly. Schedule it. Kickboxing on Tuesday, JDate on Thursday, yoga Friday morning, Tinder Saturday night. Pace yourself. Try two dates a week. Mix it up. Use different apps.
Dating is the essential exercise part of your regimen. Turn it into something you do regularly.
And try to have fun.
Often when you are on a quest, it’s easy to forget that the whole point of this endeavor is to bring joy to your life. We are basically hardwired to want to find a partner—and while our cultural expectations have changed dramatically over the last few decades, the cognitive wiring is still the same. “In past generations it was our parents, priests, and friends who helped us find that person to procreate with,” Fisher explains. “That job has been taken over by the internet.”
The great news is the world has opened up and so have our dating possibilities.
In agrarian times, a woman’s mating choice was limited to those who lived within walking distance of her village or farm. That shifted in industrial times with the huge move from the countryside to heavily populated cities, where networks blossomed and strangers from all over a region would find themselves living cheek by jowl for the first time. As men went off to work in the factory, women were needed to stay at home to take care of the children and the elderly and tend to domestic life. That, too, changed as women entered the workforce. “It used to be marriage happened when you were twenty-one or twenty-two and now it’s twenty-eight, twenty-nine,” says Esther Perel. A Pew Research Center report found that just 42 percent of people ages twenty-five to twenty-nine were married in 2010 compared to 84 percent in the 1960s.
Author Rebecca Traister, whose book All the Single Ladies examines the rise in the number of financially independent and single women in the US, argues that despite their impressive educational achievements and earning power, single women between the ages of twenty-two and twenty-nine are still viewed as “pre-wives,” as if they only become full-fledged and serious citizens once they partner up. In reality, she points out, those years are not only a woman’s most fertile window for having children but also a fertile period for launching and growing her career, a vital part of her life. Perel says that for those women who do want to get married, that new decade before getting hitched is now spent developing and building an identity. “When you meet someone, you want someone who bestows upon you the recognition of your beautiful identity development,” Perel says.
As discussed in the previous rule, that’s a lot of pressure to place on one person. “The new definition of ‘the one and only’ has become the one who is going to make me want to stop swiping, who’s going to cure me from my FOMO, quiet all my inner rumblings,” says Perel. “It’s the one and only in a cacophony of competing options. How do you know there isn’t another one that is a better one and only?” It’s a bit like a hamster on a wheel, spinning in place without going anywhere. And yet, so many women get caught in this game of keeping their options open with potential partners as they continue to search for their “one and only.”
It’s a state that Perel refers to as “stable ambiguity,” where both parties lead each other on or send mixed messages to keep the other dangling on the line, because they are not yet ready to commit fully or give up entirely.
Sound familiar? I spent my twenties doing this to people and having it done to me, too. It wasn’t especially satisfying, but I thought of it as keeping my options open. “That mentality, which is now baked into the dating world, leaves people feeling disposable,” Perel says. “So you are in a relationship deeply enough that you’re not alone, but not too much so that you have closed your options.” Fisher adds that the idea of vast possibilities served up by the web leads to a kind of paralysis known as cognitive overload. “Women have so many options that they keep on looking for the right one,” she explains. “So instead of being able to close on a potential mate, they often get pickier and pickier about who that person should be.” The brain experiences decision fatigue and in the end chooses none.
Dating online is not dissimilar to shopping online, where you scroll through eighty pairs of white jeans to find the perfect pair, and when they finally arrive, you put them on and feel crushed with a disproportionate disappointment that you made the wrong choice and haunted by the ones you missed. As Perel puts it, relationships today have been commoditized. “It’s not a production economy anymore, where you need six or seven children to help on the farm,” she says. “It’s a service economy in which you want a meaningful experience.”
It’s no wonder women want to play the field, consider their options, and hold out for the perfect mate. The stakes are high. But holding out too long may only keep you from discovering whom that ideal partner may be. “On the one hand, you have maximum freedom, but because you have so much freedom, you also feel that you have no control,” Perel says. “You’re trying to control the unpredictability of life. But life does not work like that.”
Prior generations had different expectations—women knew the type of person they needed to marry, from what social class, what education, and what religion. “All those categories were mating categories and selection processes,” Perel explains. “Now the world is wide open.” You can date whomever you want, across race and religion and gender. It is an exciting time, and that in and of itself can feel overwhelming. Precisely why you must set your own criteria, and reassure yourself that this person is worth a second, third, or fourth date.
Fisher makes this task simple by suggesting you limit the number of partners you even consider. “Pick one potential partner, and get to know that person by going on more than one date,” she says. “All the data shows, the more you get to know someone, the more you like them and the more they like you.”
Besides, as mentioned in Rule #4, the idea that you will fall in love at first sight is entirely possible, but it’s really not probable. In the annual “Singles in America” study that Fisher did for Match.com, she found that 59 percent of women interviewed do not believe that they will even have chemistry on the first date and that 34 percent don’t believe they will have it on the second date. Yet the romantic idea of love at first sight still leads so many others to have such high expectations going into that first date that they thwart any real possibility. “Forget about the chemistry—romantic love is like a sleeping cat,” Fisher says. “It can be awakened anytime, and unless you give people a chance you will be forever looking. It is as simple as that.”
Stop fantasizing about the stranger who might be out there who is just right for you, and start imagining all the places someone else may be—including potentially sitting right next to you. Spend more time looking for a partner IRL than you do managing your social media. We are all prone to what I call ADDD: Attention Deficit Dating Disorder, a modern ailment triggered by the fact that you don’t need to commit because you can always find another match, and so you don’t focus on what can be hiding in plain sight. Of course, the failure to observe what’s right in front of you isn’t new. Look at the ongoing appeal and success of Jane Austen’s now two-hundred-year-old novels, dripping with the exquisite tension of will they or won’t they: “Will Emma get it together with Mr. Knightley? Will Elizabeth Bennet finally admit what we readers have known all along—that despite arguing with him constantly, she is head over heels for Mr. Darcy?” Those story lines are riveting because they mimic the real life in which our future loves are often staring right back at us.
“The same guy you thought was a complete drip two weeks ago might end up being one of the sexiest, funniest guys on the planet.”
You have to give love a chance. We never know when it will become a possibility, so it is vital to make yourself open to every and any possibility. As for how to know who you will love, that’s tricky. “We all grew up with a love map,” Fisher says. “You build an unconscious list of what appeals to you as a partner. But we don’t know all the things that turn us on and appeal to us. The same guy you thought was a complete drip two weeks ago might end up being one of the sexiest, funniest guys on the planet. You just have to give him a chance. There is no secret to this.”
There is no other way to say this than just do it.
TO DO
Make a list of all your prospects and choose three.
For each, think of interesting ways of getting to know each other better.
Suggest a bike ride, a concert, or a museum visit. Or a walk in the park. Borrow a neighbor’s dog to take the pressure off. Try a political protest or a sports lesson or a magic show.
Or you could go to a bar but maybe with live music so you don’t have to talk all the time and you can observe their reaction to the band. Doing something together will give you more opportunities to really get to know each other; it will give you something in common from the get-go and allow you to check if they have a sense of humor.
If you have a pleasant time but feel there is no chemistry, do not promptly write that person off. It’s counterintuitive, but unless you are absolutely disgusted by them, go out on another date. Love comes in all different forms. It can take time. And sometimes, it can even sneak up on you.
CASE STUDIES
Gigi*, 56, on how she never thought she’d remarry—until her longtime colleague confessed his love for her.
Gigi met her first husband when she was nineteen years old. Over the next twenty-three years, they had two children and built two successful careers as working parents. But through “the daily stresses of life,” she says, “we stopped paying attention to each other.”
The marriage faltered, and so they divorced. She was forty-two, their kids ten and fourteen, and Gigi never thought she would date again, let alone get married. “I felt like my marriage was a failure and just wanted to focus on my kids and my work,” she says. As a senior vice president for a large entertainment corporation, she was financially independent, and she had two boys to get through school. “I didn’t think that I’d meet anyone in my forties,” she says. “So I decided not to try.”
That did not stop men from approaching her. “One much younger guy asked if I wanted to have a drink while we were both on line at the grocery store,” she says. And a married colleague started flirting with her “aggressively” at a work event. When she told him it was a bad idea, he asked why. Her answer: “Because you love your wife.” Both incidents furthered her resolve to stay single.
And then one afternoon she was in a car with her boss, with whom she had worked for seven years. “We had just given a financial update to our executive team and were on our way to the airport when he turned to me and said, ‘I have to tell you something,’” she says. “I thought he was going to say, ‘Good job!’ Instead, he said, ‘You’ve become my best friend and I love you.’”
The admission stunned her. “We had never even flirted, let alone held hands, or kissed,” she says. “I was completely caught off guard.”
Plus, he was her boss, which she pointed out in the car: “I said, ‘We have hundreds of people who report to us!’”
By then, the car arrived at the airport, and Gigi jumped out and “literally ran away from him and then avoided him for the next few days,” she says. There was a lot to consider—she adored working with him, but had never thought about a romantic relationship. “He’s this larger-than-life, crazy, full of testosterone, independent-minded outdoorsman from Connecticut,” she says. “And I’m a small Asian liberal tree-hugging city girl.” Besides, he was the number one in their division; she was number two. If it did not work out, then she would be the one to leave the company, which felt like too big of a risk. She admitted all this to him, and she recalls his reply: “Isn’t our life more important than our job?” He also added, “I can get another job. I have never felt this way before. I am willing to risk it.”
Then he pointed out something she could not argue with—they had a head start on most couples because they already liked each other. Gigi did like him, immensely, and started to consider a relationship with him. After much analysis she decided that “the risk/reward ratio was worth it.”
During their first date—a walk at a state park—she realized that she did have feelings for him as well. Three months later, they decided that it was time to tell their bosses. That’s when Gigi saw a change come over him. “He went into a panic,” she says. They’d been planning a work trip, and she suggested that she not accompany him, sensing his unease. When he agreed, she said, “Okay, this is over.”
The two went back to being colleagues, though stopped being friends. “It was a bummer,” she says. Worse, he called to let her know that he had started dating someone else. When Gigi thanked him for letting her know, he said, “Aren’t you going to call me an asshole?” Gigi replied coolly, “You know exactly who and what you are. You don’t need me to tell you.” He admitted that was more brutal than if she had called him an asshole.
Another four months passed before he told her that he realized that he had made a terrible mistake. Gigi recalls that conversation: “He said, ‘I’m such an idiot,’ and I said, ‘That has been established. Now, what do you want to talk about?’”
He wanted to try again, but Gigi felt that she could not trust him—and told him so. Admitting his panic—and emphasizing that he had in the interim realized that he truly loved her—made her feel confident in giving the relationship one more try, as she still had feelings for him as well.
Slowly, the two started seeing each other again. At one point, he confessed that he was worried that she was “too nice,” and Gigi said, “Wouldn’t that be wonderful? If our relationship was built on kindness?” He agreed. And while they had already agreed not to get married again, she accepted his proposal after one of their colleagues married his partner of many years after gay marriage was legalized. “It was such a moving story,” Gigi recalls. “So moving that Shawn proposed, and I said yes.”
Gina*, 32, on meeting her husband through a one-night stand in Italy.
Gina was twenty-five and running a PR firm when one of her clients invited her and her business partner Stefanie to visit their handbag factory in Florence. The two decided to go and turn the experience into a ten-day adventure. She asked an Italian friend living in New York for recommendations in Rome and he gave her his brother Mateo’s number. Gina called Mateo their first night in Rome and met him and his cousin Luca at a restaurant that same evening. After dinner, they went to a super-exclusive speakeasy followed by dancing. “I started making out with Luca on the dance floor,” Gina says. “And slept with him that night, thinking I’d never see him again. When in Rome!”
But the following afternoon, both she and Stefanie, who had spent an equally fun night with Mateo, called “the Italians” to see if they wanted to go out again. “It was a repeat of the night before,” she says. But Mateo was headed for Milan the following day, and Luca to his beach house an hour outside of Rome.
Since it was so close, Gina texted Luca to see if he wanted to join them for dinner that third night. He did. After dinner, Gina dropped Stefanie off at the hotel and went home with Luca. “When I woke up the next morning, he was cuddling me,” she says. It was hard to say goodbye. “I had this really weird feeling that he may be the man I’d marry,” she says.
But that same day, she was leaving for Florence, where she and Stefanie continued having fun—and hooking up with different guys. Gina posted on Facebook a shot of one man kissing her cheek at a dance club, which prompted Luca to text: “Are you having fun hooking up with all these guys?”
It was fun, but nothing close to what she felt for him.
Due to a train mishap, she missed her flight back home from Rome and so texted Luca to say she wanted to have dinner and one last goodbye. They spent another night together, and this time, Gina felt really sad to leave.
That was the end of November, and he reached out soon thereafter to say he was coming to New York that December. “That weekend, we fell in love,” Gina says.
She next flew to see him in January, and then he came to New York in February. In between they Skyped (this was before FaceTime) and talked at least once—sometimes multiple times—a day. “We got to really know each other,” she says.
Then he called in April to say that he had an opportunity to invest in a restaurant that was opening in New York City and would handle his visa. That meant moving to Manhattan, but not until September, which felt like an eternity. For months, there was no news on the visa, which made Gina nervous that it might not work out. “I started to explore what else was out there,” she says. “I just did not feel like it was real.”
She still had feelings for him but wanted to be realistic. That summer, she did go spend three weeks with him in Italy. And while it was “bliss”—daily sex in a picturesque village—it also did not feel real. So they started talking in practical terms about his coming to New York. With no visa news, marriage felt like their only option to be together. “That was not the way I wanted to get married,” she says. In the end, the visa came through, and Luca moved to New York in late September, after the two had been together for almost a year. He got his own apartment to start, though spent every night with Gina. A year later, they moved in together. Roughly six months later they woke up one morning and looked at each other and said, “Let’s get married.”