Hello Everybody,
I am sure that you know Tinder. The platform to meet new people, find dates, and maybe even love. One colleague of my best friend Julia, for example, met a woman on Tinder, and now they are married, expecting their first child, and have both a tattoo of the Tinder symbol on their bodies. Do you use Tinder or any similar dating platform such as Bumble or Lovoo? I used them a while ago. I even have been in a relationship for almost three years after meeting someone from Tinder. Now I am not interested anymore in using these kinds of apps and I will tell you the reasons for that in this blog post.
First of all, I do not have much time as I am studying and bouldering most of my time. Therefore, time is very precious to me. I want to spend my time with people I know and that I love or that are worth it. I do not know the people on Tinder or Bumble, so I do not know if they are worth my time. Maybe I will spend hours writing with some stranger just to find out that he is a jerk. I realized that I have no motivation to write people on such platforms as I prefer to spend my time with people I know. I also prefer to get to know people in real life. When I go bouldering I meet so many people. They are always friendly and we already have something in common: our passion for bouldering. So even when I downloaded Tinder just for fun some months ago, I did not have an interest in responding to any messages or in matching.
The second reason why I do not want to use Tinder anymore is that I am somehow too romantic. I know how that sounds and I am not believing in faith or something. But using Tinder to find a boyfriend just feels like dating people until the first “best one” is found. I mean it is wonderful when you meet somebody great you are falling in love with. But I keep thinking that if you did not match with this person, it would have been someone else you would have liked the most. Maybe, maybe not. I have this strange belief that the more coincidental the existence of your relationship is, the more it is as if it should have been. So when there were many coincidental incidents necessary to meet your partner, I feel as if it had to be. I know that sounds like faith, but I just like this idea. So on Tinder, it was not coincidental that you met, but you were looking for someone, swiping right several times, chatting to several guys, and maybe even going out with several people until you chose the first person you liked the most. You can not know if it is the person you should be with. But then you do not know when you met in real life either. I do not believe that there is this one person that is made for you, but that there are multiple that could be right. I also do not believe that the right person has to be perfect, but that you should love this person with his/her faults and that you could live with him or her without changing anything. I think that you should not be with somebody if you want to change him/her from the beginning. People change if they want to, but you can not force them.
The third reason against using Tinder to meet somebody is that when you meet somebody in real life, you have a better story to tell. Imagine your grandparents asking where you met and your answer is Tinder?
Of course, there are positive arguments for such platforms. For example, when you are older, it is more difficult to meet someone. Many are already married and you might meet less new people than when you are still at school or university. It also helps when you move somewhere new. You can find new friends or even learn new languages. Also, if you are just looking to find someone for something loose, it is the perfect platform to do it.
Please do not think that I want to say that if you are in a relationship with somebody you met on Tinder means it is not the right person for you. It can be the perfect fit, as it was for the colleague of Julia. I just wanted to share my romantic point of view on this topic and the reasons why I, for example, do not use these platforms anymore (besides that I am in a relationship 😉 ). I am also very interested in your opinions so please feel free to leave comments.
Love, Eileen