Why You Feel Incapable of a Love Relationship

In many countries of the world, for example, in the USA, the number of singles is increasing.

Many would see this alone as proof that our society is becoming increasingly incapable of relationships, but we should not make it so easy for ourselves.

Nowadays, it is merely more justifiable that one is not yet looking for a relationship. In the past, especially hundreds of years ago, it was unthinkable.

People had no choice, and sometimes got forced into married, because being married and having children was an integral part of survival.

There was simply no room for extra wishes, such as an extensive and relaxed partner search.

Instead, the inability to enter into a relationship today is due to an entirely new attitude towards life and a completely new attitude.

Inability is a harsh word, but it is undoubtedly about claims, ideas, and practices that prevent the finding of a real relationship. Or even the search for one already.

So in this article, we can distinguish between the inability to find a good relationship and the inability to dare to search for a relationship and to meet it with all one’s heart.

Online dating is no real help

Dating today is mainly via the internet.

Tinder, Badoo, and Lovoo make it easy to find and meet new people.

Many people in my generation think that it is probably the only remaining possibility to find a date.

I would disagree with that, because you can still ask someone for a date anytime, anywhere, but online dating admittedly makes it much more convenient and efficient.

What we fear the most when it comes to dating is rejection.

To get around this, apps like Tinder offer systems that ensure that people find each other attractive, at least at first glance. This creates at least an absolute security.

The problem with dating platforms on the internet is that they reduce people to dates. Because of the vast selection, all dates are squeezed into a narrow range for the first time. If it doesn’t fit on the first date, then it’s over — there are plenty of alternatives.

Especially the idea of pre-sorting people is particularly naive. The idea is that we only have dates with people who meet our standards. But who knows already what they could like about a person, they never met?

After all, you always discover new qualities that you learn to appreciate in other people, yet we filter with our somewhat limited experience.

Of course, it is not wrong that we can pre-sort. I can well understand that as a man, you don’t want to have a date with a woman who is taller than you are, and the woman usually won’t like that either.

I am mainly concerned with personal characteristics — although many people on dating platforms keep their descriptions very short, so we evaluate what’s there even more.

In my opinion, the idea is absurd. Looking for a partner who is as similar as possible to us does not guarantee a happy relationship.

And that brings us to the next point. Once you start with Tinder or another dating platform, you sink directly into a frenzy of dopamine — So much choice, so many possibilities, and so much potential. Knowing that something better could always come along leads to a need that cannot be satisfied.

Digital communication is not suitable for our relationships

We were already talking about dating apps.

But other apps and digital communication, in general, don’t make it easy for us either. We all have a need for communication on different levels.

Body language, voice, body contact, and speech are incredibly important. Still, in the modern media, all communication is reduced to chats and, at most, voice messages, and that often leads to conflicts.

With digital communication, we can think about how we want to answer; the rhetoric is eliminated, which helps us to see what our counterpart might mean.

Who hasn’t been massively annoyed when your counterpart took forever to answer a simple WhatsApp message, and we started to doubt the relationship — whether it was friendship or a real relationship.

I’ve also noticed that there are different types of communication in the digital space — these can lead to conflicts, even though people get along really well face to face.

Short messages are sensitive to interpretation and misunderstandings — based on how detailed, with which emojis and mainly when a person answers. And whether they respond at all. Especially when dating, this can cause problems, as wrong interpretations can quickly arise.

Social media like Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, but also other media like YouTube or Netflix, draw a wrong picture of relationships and of what we should expect and strive for.

The idea of self-optimization is everywhere.

Around the clock, we compare ourselves with others, directly or indirectly. Millions of impulses come rushing in on us, and we see an overall picture of the life of other people — which has been cut together according to their needs.

In this way, we associate different things with each other, which perhaps have nothing to do with each other.

Couples who consistently show pictures of expensive holidays, food, their wealth, their good looks, and of course, of themselves, as they are at least happy, dominate Instagram.

We believe that they are happy and that this happiness is related to other things in their lives.

By constantly optimizing and comparing, we never feel ready enough to try other things — for example, a long-term love relationship.

As a result, relationships and love degenerate into possession that one deserves if one has created the appropriate framework.

The ideals presented to us in social media, in series, movies, magazines, and stories seem like the only right way to lead a relationship.

What’s really dangerous is all the information we receive on this subject.

Some absurd articles on topics like 4 signs that her partner is cheating on her dominate the fast world of the internet without anyone being interested in the exact background.

In the end, every relationship is different, and most of this information is far too general — the editors only live from stirring up fear.

Our society is designed for childlessness

Couples who have never had children, or who do not want to, are no longer unusual.

Our society has generally become very unfriendly to children — not only because children are no longer necessary for our own long-term survival.

Children pose an enormous risk, no question.

They cost time, energy and above all money, while at the same time making them inflexible and bringing with them new demands, whether it is the search for a larger home or dealing with the child’s nutrition, leisure, and education.

Especially in today’s career thinking of many people, this does not fit into the plan at all. On top of that, our generation is plagued by economic fears; nothing is as static as it used to be, occupational fields, social problems, and personal goals are continually changing.

These financial fears are, of course, not a reasonable basis for war and raising children.

Where we are already struggling to find the best-suited partner for the relationship or even marriage, it becomes even more complicated concerning having children.

This means that we are taking on much higher and long-term responsibility. As a result, we are more perfectionist in our choice of a partner, and many relationships fail because of this.

Not least because the interest in having children is sometimes only on one side, today’s ideals make us feel even more unwilling to have children, but the biological clock is still ticking.

These ideals, as already mentioned, also apply above all to our career, to which we also subject our educational path. On average, we enter professional life much later today than we did back then and therefore feel even younger and more unfinished.

Life is complex — and our partner should fit into it

Our freedom has increased dramatically. And that is, of course, a good thing, there are countless possibilities today for self-realization.

Anyone can do virtually anything, go with whomever, whenever and wherever they want.

But that is why our reality of life, at least as we feel it, becomes more complicated.

Today we have so much information and possibilities at our disposal, and we try to realize ourselves according to our ideas — and the partner should fit in if possible.

The “classic” way is hardly available today. Transparent allocation of roles and responsibilities in most relationships is also no longer possible.

Self-realization can also be at the expense of our relationships.

In the past, work used to end when we left the office. Thanks to the internet and telephones, we can continue to work on ourselves and our career around the clock to become who we want to be.

However, we are all limited in time. That’s why a healthy relationship and a lot of time spent on other things can’t always be well combined — we simply lack attention and closeness for our partner and ourselves.

What you can do

Stop online dating for now

There are many different online dating platforms. Not all of them are as superficial and fast-moving as Tinder, for example.

Still, I would try it in real life first and foremost. Talk to someone you like, even if it costs overcoming — in the end, you will be proud of yourself that you have done what many did not dare to do.

There will also always be a certain magic between you, which is the romantic counterpart to the planned dating and getting people together through platforms like Tinder.

Second, there will never be a feeling that something better is so much more tangible than platforms like Tinder suggest it.

Realize what a relationship should be

For many, it is just the icing on the cake for personal happiness, the reward for having created specific framework structures.

But there is a deep dissatisfaction attached to it and a misconception.

A relationship can and should be the perfect framework to grow together and work on yourself. Inevitably you go through highs and lows, but you always have someone at your side — for every situation in life.

Even if you are a man working very hard on your career, the right woman at your side can be a support. And may inspire you to change your priorities.

Similarity does not need to be attractive

It is an absurd idea to look only at the similarities when looking for a partner, but this can be easily achieved by online dating.

Our fear is stirred up that our relationship will go down the drain if we do not at least have similar interests and characteristics. But that doesn’t have to be exact — and the pool of potential partners only gets smaller as a result.

Instead, it can be refreshing to have someone at your side who may be ticking in a completely different way, and different interests also offer the space for doing something without the partner, which can be very important sometimes.

Don’t waste your time with the wrong people

“Either you’re dating to get married or to get heartbroken,” is a quote I once heard somewhere that made perfect sense.

What sounds demotivating is a very sensible approach, in my opinion.

Rather marriage than a broken heart.

Dating, just for sex or with a partner who doesn’t fit your ideas and goals from the start, is a waste of time.

Therefore, I would talk relatively early on about whether there are concrete goals that your partner is pursuing, e.g., marriage, children, and a house with a garden, or just a casual partnership for a certain period of your life — and whether your goals fit.

Dating a person whose goals don’t match yours at all sometimes makes itself felt between the lines.

It’s tragic when your date has already noticed this and then leaves you without you having understood that you simply have different ideas — rejection without understanding the background usually hurts your self-confidence.

Most importantly, you should keep dating in the real world — the problems that can occur when two people get to know each other are communicative misunderstandings, which are possible thanks to digital communication. Keep it real.

The original version of this article was published by me on another platform: https://medium.com/hello-love/why-you-feel-incapable-of-a-love-relationship-8c6fe3537d71