How Online Dating Is a Great Lesson in Self-Love

You can’t swipe left on your insecurities

So I did it. I took the leap. I’m dating now.

Okay, okay, that’s not entirely accurate. I have not gone on a single date, and in a pandemic, I don’t know if I’ll go anywhere beyond Zoom.

But this is a big step for me, so just let me have this, okay? I need the boost of confidence.

So…yes. I’m dating now.

This isn’t the first time I’ve tried this since my ex left. But for some reason, it feels more significant this time around. After a year in pandemic isolation, I’m not fucking around anymore. I need someone to touch me. Like yesterday. (Which is unhelpful because it’s very unlikely that I’ll feel comfortable intimately engaging with anyone until this pandemic starts to ease up.)

And yet, at the same time, I’m really struggling to fully dive in. I feel like I keep plunging my foot into the water and then yanking it out over and over again.

I am fucking terrified.

After a lifetime of dating men, I feel no closer to understanding them, no closer to having even the most basic skills at dating them. And I sure as hell don’t know how to date women.

I am also finding that old programming is trying really hard to operate this ship and no matter how many times I think I’ve cleared the outdated codes, they spring up somewhere else.

You must earn other people’s love, it says. Especially a man’s.

You are too emotional, too passionate, too enthusiastic. You want too much. You need too much.

Underneath it all, the virus that is throwing all these toxic codes is: You are not lovable.

It’s funny how I used to find myself even less lovable just for having these beliefs. It was like some kind of mental ouroboros: You are not lovable because you don’t even have the mental fortitude to believe you’re lovable, and you don’t have the mental fortitude to believe you are lovable because you aren’t lovable.

It’s a really clever emotional trap that’s ridiculously easy to get caught in.

I haven’t figured out how to fully believe in my lovability, but at least I’m old enough now to stop blaming myself for having these thoughts and fears. For one thing, I know that we all do. We all struggle with feelings of worthlessness, of not being lovable, of worrying that no one out there will ever desire us.

Secondly, I spent my adult life with boyfriends who reinforced this belief, largely, I suspect, because they couldn’t face their own feelings of low self-worth.

So I’m letting myself off the hook for this one. This is the last thing I need to be blaming myself for.

But it is my job to clean this up. I mean, no one else can do it. Men can help along the way, if they’re so inclined. But I won’t even get that far unless I can believe I’m lovable enough for someone — a male partner, in particular — to deign to pay attention to me.

As I flip through people’s profiles on these dating apps, I’m trying to teach myself to focus on my feelings, my preferences, my desires. In the past, I would have scrolled through and wondered if they would have liked me, if they would want me in their life, if they would be able to “tolerate” me.

Every visit to these dating apps requires me to rewrite the codes that keep reappearing.

I have to remind myself that I genuinely deserve to be able to do what men are so free to do: to put my needs out into the world without apology, to speak plainly about what I want, and to expect that other people can make adjustments for me as much as I make adjustments for them.

I have to remind myself that there is nothing wrong with me the way that I am right now. That it’s okay to be emotional and passionate and enthusiastic and afraid of goddamn everything. Sure, it’s been my personal experience that men don’t tend to like that — like, at all — but so what? I’ve spent my whole life trying to submit to the cool, rational, dispassionate ideal so coveted by our culture, and at this point, I’d rather love my deep and mercurial personality all by myself than to spend another second constantly turning down my volume. Either someone will love me just as I am…or not.

And most of all, I have to try to remind myself that despite all my flaws of which I’m so hyper aware, I’m also a fucking amazing person. If I could feel overwhelming love for the men who have been in my life, despite how badly they treated me, despite their dishonesty and selfish behavior, then goddammit, someone out there can get it up to love me in my tireless efforts to be a better person.

Anyone, I keep telling myself, would be so fucking lucky to have me in their life, just as I’ve always felt lucky to have partners in my life. They aren’t doing me a favor by loving me or even paying attention to me, despite what my exes told me. I am a gift.

Now I just have to learn how to believe that.

I have this funny reaction to men who “like” my photos on these dating apps. For one thing, I’ve decided to ask for more than a like. Send me a note, too. Make an effort. I know it’s scary, but show me you’re not just flinging spaghetti at a wall to see what sticks.

And instead of inspiring a thrill in me (Ooo, someone likes me!), I’m at an age where I feel something between ennui and suspicion. What’s this “like”? What does this mean? You think I look pretty in this photo? Did you even read my profile or did you just look at the pictures? Are you actually interested in getting to know me, or do I just look fuckable to you?

What’s really funny, however, is how quickly my feelings can change once I start chatting with someone. We can be two or three emails in and suddenly, he ghosts me, and I feel like garbage.

Oh my god, why am I doing this? There is no possible way anyone could love me. I’m too emotional. I’m too old. I’ll never be pretty or skinny enough.

Thankfully, I’ve examined my “coding issues” enough that I’m learning how to short-circuit this. I’ll remind myself that five or ten days ago, I was really happy with my life. I was feeling good about myself. The only thing that changed is that some guy I barely know decided he didn’t want me and ran for the hills.

I didn’t need him or his approval last week, so why should I need it today?

And from there, I remember that it’s a good thing to be ghosted right out of the gate. I’d rather him show his true personality now rather than later. I was once ghosted seven years in — seven minutes in is a blessing.

And thus, life goes on, still feeling pretty good about myself.

Sometimes, I think that dating is less about romance and sex and more an advanced level course in self-love. It’s going to bring out every insecurity, every old pattern, every bit of your baggage from the past.

In this culture, we’re taught to believe that the “right person” will magically heal all these issues. That once we fall in love, we’ll feel worthy, lovable, beautiful, desirable. We won’t have problems like this in the future.

Then you get to your forties and realize everything is always going to be a little bit of a shitshow and it’s just our job to do our best to manage ourselves and minimize our own contributions to said shitshow.

In other words: Falling in love, having sex, finding a partner…none of these things is going to magically fix us and/or make life beautiful, organized, and cooperative.

For one thing, we (and the world) aren’t broken to begin with. Believing we are is just part of the problem.

Secondly, the person we fall in love (or lust) with is a human being, too, which means they are also having these problems. They are also sometimes struggling with feelings of insecurity and uncertainty. They are also having lots of old patterns come up when they start a new relationship. They’re as busy trying to save themselves as we are.

We’re all a little shipwrecked, floating around this vast ocean of life, trying to keep our heads above water. We want to help each other, but there’s not much we can do unless we are each working at keeping hold of our own life preservers. If we let go of that and try to grab onto someone else to keep from drowning, it won’t end well for either party.

So I’m doing my best to hold on to my life preserver. To remain as buoyant as possible. To drop as much baggage as I can. Because the people I meet are in the same situation. They can’t save me any more than I can save them.

But we can be there for one another, if we’re doing our own work and taking care of ourselves. We can help each other by giving each other strength and companionship.

And honestly, I would love more of that. After a year being more isolated than I’ve ever been, I long to have someone (or someones?) in my life who are there for me emotionally, who walk alongside me, who put their arms around me. (And the sex. Yes, the sex.)

I might not find this through online dating, but I can see how helpful it is to be forced to confront my past, my patterns, my insecurities, even after all the years of work I’ve already put in.

In the end, it won’t matter if I find a partner or not. What matters to me is that I learn to believe that yes, I am lovable.

© Yael Wolfe 2021

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