By Crystal Cansdale at The Inner Circle
Relationships on Female First
We all know that moment in Nottinghill when a clumsy Hugh Grant spills orange juice on Julia Roberts and 45 mins later she’s all “I'm just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her.” and then they live happily ever after.
That’s how I saw things going for me. Well, before dating apps happened.
The thing is, although I romantice an old school rom-com meet-cute, I still use dating apps because that’s what everyone else does. It has become the norm and anything else feels a little strange, or is at least met with a “you actually met in real life?” cry.
Take the cute guy I make eyes with on the bus in the mornings. Rather than pluck up the coverage to say hello in person, I think it’s more likely I’ll see him on a dating app and we’ll start talking that way. At least then I’ll know he’s single and has ‘liked’ me and I won’t embarrass myself.
A new report from The Inner Circle says online dating overtook meeting in real life as the most popular way to find a relationship roughly 4.6 years ago. Only 3 in 10 single people said they’d been approached by someone in the last three months and only approach someone they fancy every 2.4 years. So, it’s no surprise I think I have a better chance of finding love online rather than on the bus.
The reasons we fear approaching someone we fancy - feeling anxious, being scared of rejection, getting embarrassed - haven’t changed. The difference is, before we had no other choice than to overcome our anxiety or stay single, whereas now, we can hide behind our phones. Hence the decline in IRL forms of dating and the dramatic spike in online dating.
But if so many of us actually want to meet some in real life (The Inner Circle says 3 in 4 people want an IRL meet-cute), we have to do something about it. It’s time to put down our phones and step away from swiping.
tagged in dating