Dating in the digital age is no walk in the park.
It requires that you keep your feelings at bay and your eyes wide open instead of wide shut and zeroed in too closely on the illusion of potential. Dating in the digital age means sliding into DMs instead of chance meetings on the train after work commutes, or blind set-ups from mutual friends. You rarely get the opportunity to invest before you swipe left for something shinier and more new. So many options, so little substance.
It also means time spent constantly wishing we still lived in times where someone would ask you out on a date on Friday and not wait until Saturday to say something came up. Simple things.
But, since longing for the simplicity that my grandparents once knew in their courtship is pointless, I decided that if the dating game wouldn't change, I'd just have to change. In order to better equip myself to navigate the sometimes bleak waters of dating in the digital age, I connected with a dating and relationships coach to gain some insight in the confusion of it all. Here's what I picked up:
Watch and Learn
Dating and relationship coach, and author of The Don't Before I Do, Emily Duboise says, "In the early stages, what you see is what you get. In this era, doing a soft stalk of each other's social media is part of the early stages of courtship. It's just expected, and can be quite useful in the early weeding out process. You can tell a lot from someone's page. It's a display of one's own personal brand whether we know it or not."
Social media in many ways has been both a dating blessing and a curse. While we're in this age of hyperconnectivity, it should be easy to find our Prince Charming, but no. On the one end, I'm always wondering which of the dudes sliding in my DMs like Grand Rapids have girlfriends they've been keeping below sea level. And on the other end of the spectrum, I'm on emotional standby at all times to support friends that finally come to realization that they've been kissing toads in search of their prince charming.
No one wants to find out that after months of "dating" or clinging to the potential of someone that in all actuality, you're the side chick. Or that he's just not that into you. I don't know which is worse honestly.
Communication Is Key
Whether we take heed or not, the red flags are always there. "If he's liking, sharing, expressing interest in posts that degrade or bash women (i.e. half-naked Instagram models or singing the tune 'Women only want men for ____,' he's probably not for you sis," Emily said. "If he is adamant about keeping his page private from YOU that's a red flag. A man should have nothing to hide. And if the only form of communication is through DM, and later he's deleting messages later those are red flags."
It's Not Bittersweet If You're Just Bitter
Dating can easily have you go from crushing to feeling crushed. Stalking him on social media is all fun and dating games until he posts a picture with another girl and now you're wondering where you stand. To avoid coming off bitter and broken, here are some ground rules one should set for themselves while dating in this social climate.
"I tell single women all the time: Every meme, quote, post should not scream, 'I'm single,' 'This why I ain't got no man,' 'Men ain't sh*t,' etc. Your profile should be fun, light, and exemplify that you are beautiful, you are enjoying life, and simply interesting. Men should be so intrigued by your page that they'll want to learn more, and won't think twice about hitting you up, especially whether or not you have a man."
Self-Preservation Is Everything
As an exercise, I volunteered myself for a kind of social experiment. I bought roses for myself and, a few days later, I grabbed them while dashing out the door. I spent the day giving those dozen roses to a dozen beautiful women I encountered. One to the woman working in the parking garage at my office building, another to hostess at the restaurant where I had lunch, so on and so forth.
It's too easy to forget about loving yourself when we've been made to believe we need a partner to feel whole. You should be so full of love that your cup runneth over.
We don't have to search outside of ourselves for the love we so desperately seek when we have the capacity to give love unconditionally. When it comes to social media, and looking to a potential bae's page for reference, look at the women he does post on his page, pay attention to his mannerisms and if how he displays himself to the world is aligned with your own self-expression. Is he worthy of your time and energy? Or would he leave you feeling half-full and emotionally exhausted?
"Dating [in the digital age] is all about seeing if you like the person and want to spend more time with them. It's not about changing them, and molding them into someone of your liking. YOU decide, based on the information you are gathering from his page, whether or not it's going to work for you. It's ok to say 'no' and move on. Your conversation would be: 'I'm looking for something different,' not 'Why are you posted up with all these different women?'" Emily said.
Featured image by Getty Images
- The Ultimate Guide to Dating in the Digital Age | Psychology Today ›
- 7 things to know about dating in the digital age ›
- Teen Voices: Dating in the Digital Age | Pew Research Center ›
- Dating In The Digital Age | Thought Catalog ›
- Rules for dating in the digital age - CBS News ›
- Dating in the Digital Age ›
- Love me Tinder? The struggle of dating in a digital age | Articles ... ›
- Dating in the digital age - Connecticut Post ›
- Swipe Right: Dating in the Digital Age | TechStuff ›
- Dating in the Digital Age: A Roadmap to Online Love - CNN ›
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Ding. Ding. DING.
A life coach by the name of Thomas Leonard once said that “Clarity affords focus” and, believe you me, when it comes to dealing with other human beings, if you don’t get clear on where you stand when it comes to your interactions with them, you can very easily find yourself “focusing too much” on those who don’t deserve it and too little on those who absolutely do. And y’all, this lil’ PSA couldn’t be more relevant than when it comes to what I call “casual friendships.”
Let’s dig — and for some of us, dig our way out of — what it means to have a casual friend, so that you can get clear on if you really need those in your life…and if so…why?
Article continues after the video.
It Can’t Be Said Enough: Always Remember What “Casual” Means
GiphyThere’s a reason why I decided to share two videos by mental health coach Isaiah Frizzle at the top and bottom of this article. It’s because a lot of what he shares in both of them complements a piece that I wrote for the platform last year entitled, “This Is Just What Purposeful Relationships Look Like.”
It’s the author M. Scott Peck who once said, “Until you value yourself, you won't value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it” and please believe that the older (and hopefully more mature) you get, the more you tend to see just how valuable — and fleeting — time is; and that is what plays a huge role in motivating you want to only involve yourself with people, places, things and ideas that will honor your time — and when something is casual? In my opinion, it’s highly debatable that it’s worth much of your months, days, hours, or even too many of your minutes.
The main reason why is addressed in an article that I wrote back in the day entitled, “We Should Really Rethink The Term 'Casual Sex.'” The gist? When it comes to relationships, “casual” is certainly not a favorite word of mine because I know what it means. Have mercy — why would you want to invest your time, energy, and emotions into something that is, by definition, apathetic, indifferent, careless, lacking emotional intimacy, and/or is without purpose?
I don’t know about y’all but that sounds like a complete and total crap shoot to me — especially if you are going to go so far as to consider this type of dynamic a true friendship (check out “Ever Wonder If A Friend Is Just...Not That Into You?,” “6 Signs You're About To Make A Huge Mistake In Making Them A Close Friend,” “5 Signs Of A Toxic Friendship That Is Secretly Poisoning Your Life,” “12 Friend Facts That Might Cause You To Rethink (Some Of) Your Own,” and “Less & Less Of Us Have Close Friends These Days. Why Is That?” ).
To me, when you decide to call someone “friend,” it means that they are loyal, reliable, consistent, trustworthy and willing to be there to support you to the very best of their ability — even if it’s inconvenient to do so sometimes (check out “Life Taught Me That True Friendships Are 'Inconvenient'”). How in the world can you expect that from something that has the word “casual” in it?
And you know what? That actually segues into my next point about casual friendships pretty darn well.
Ponder the Purpose “Casual Friends” Serve in Your Life
GiphyA couple of years ago, Verywell Mind published an article entitled, “How the 4 Types of Friendship Fit Into Your Life.” The four that it listed were acquaintances (which I actually don’t consider to be friends; check out “6 Differences Between A Close Acquaintance And An Actual Friend”), casual friends, close friends, and lifelong friends. After reading the piece, I think they consider casual friends to be the “pleasure” friends that I mentioned in the article, “According To Aristotle, We Need ‘Utility’, ‘Pleasure’ & ‘Good’ Friends.”
And although I certainly get that, I think my “cause for pause” is calling those people “friends” when they probably should be called something like an associate or possibly even a buddy instead. Why do I feel this way? Well, I’ve shared in other articles that I think social media has jacked up vocabulary words and their true meaning on a billion different levels.
Take “friend,” for example. Facebook had us out here calling everyone we connected to on their platform “friends” when some of them, we’ve never even spoken to before — and I personally think that influenced, affected and perhaps even infected our psyche to the point where we will call folks, both online and off, “friend” even when they haven’t earned it and/or who possibly don’t deserve it.
That said, do I think that we all could use lighthearted interactions that don’t go very deep and are filled with not much more than fun? Sure. However, if we were to move this over into a sexual thing — those types of people would probably be called a sneaky link, and there is nothing significant or substantial about ‘em. In fact, if anything pretty much automatically comes with an expiration date, sneaky links would have to be it.
And that’s kind of the point that I’m trying to make about a casual friend — so long as you know that the word “casual” is being used to describe them, while you may enjoy the people who fit that bill, they aren’t really anything that you can or even should fully rely on. Instead, take them for what they are and don’t really expect much more than that. Otherwise, you could be in for some profound levels of disappointment. And who wants that?
Final point.
How a Casual Friend Can Become a Huge Red Flag
GiphyI’m telling you, y’all gonna quit clowning Tubi. LOL. To me, the best way to describe it is it’s the Cricket of current streaming apps. What I mean by that is, back when Cricket (the cell phone service) first came out, people, like me, who used it service got incessantly clowned because it was seen as a bootleg provider. Now it’s owned by AT&T, and as someone who has rocked with them since I was in my 20s, I don’t have one regret for doing so. Cricket has always been good to me, chile.
And Tubi? Well, when you get a chance, check out CNBC’s article, “CEO at 33, Tubi’s Anjali Sud on success hacks she learned at Amazon, IAC on way to top of Fox streaming” — take note of the moves the streaming app is making and the quality of programming that is transpiring in real time.
Anyway, I find myself bringing up Tubi more and more in my content because it helps to amplify some of the points that I like to make. This time, it’s a movie that’s (currently) on there calledRight Man, Wrong Woman. If you haven’t seen it before, I don’t want to give too much of the film away. What I will say is that the main female character, she had a casual friend and then she had a close friend.
That casual friend—the one who liked to kick it all of the time—was a lot of fun; however, dealing with her came with a ton of semi-unforeseen consequences. Meanwhile, the close friend? She’s what the Aristotle article (that I mentioned earlier) would call the “good friend” because she tried her best to hold her friend accountable.
And really, it shouldn’t be a shock that the casual friend turned out to be a plum trip because if someone is loads of entertainment and pleasure and yet they are indifferent towards you, they make careless decisions around you and/or they don’t really make known the purpose for you being in their life other than to pass some time — where really do you and that person have to go past drinks after work or dinner on a rooftop restaurant from time to time? And if that is all that the two of you are doing, again, why are they deserving of the word “friend”?
Hmph and don’t get me started on the lack of reciprocity that typically transpires when it comes to dealing with people like this because, while they won’t mind you spending your coins on them, taking their calls in the middle of the night or listening to all of their issues — when it comes time for them to show up for you, they very well may gaslight you into thinking that you are being dramatic, clingy or “doing the most.” Why? Well, it’s mostly because the two of you never really established what the hell the both of you are to one another.
And so, while you’re somewhere taking them seriously, they are out here seeing you casually, and as much as it might hurt to hear, that doesn’t automatically or necessarily make them a bad person. You shouldn’t expect much where no clarity is involved. After all, casual is just that: CASUAL.
____
I’m hoping that you can now see why I entitled this piece in the way that I did. It’s because a red flag is pretty much a warning, and to me, a casual friend is about as big of an oxymoron (again, to me) as casual sex is. Friends and sex are both too intimate to be seen or treated casually. Oh, but if you step out and take that risk, you could find yourself getting far more involved than the other individual ever wanted to go, because casual is how things have always been. “Friend” was simply to get you more mentally and emotionally invested. SMDH.
American columnist Walter Winchell once said, “A real friend is one who walks in when the rest of the world walks out.” A wise person once said, “One good friendship will outlive forty average loves." Former President Ulysses S. Grant once said, “The friend in my adversity I shall always cherish most. I can better trust those who helped to relieve the gloom of my dark hours than those who are so ready to enjoy with me the sunshine of my prosperity.” Does any of this sound casual to you? Yeah, me neither.
Again, I’m not saying that you shouldn’t have people in your life who aren’t on deep levels. I’m just saying that you might want to consider putting them into another category than friend, because what friends do for people? There ain’t nothin’ even remotely casual about it, sis. Not even a lil’ bit.
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