Where did it go?
Why have we lost it?
I don’t know, I just know it has fucking left the proverbial building.
And I have noticed it in the dating world, but apparently, some great minds, much greater than mine, have found this is a pervasive characteristic of modern society. We have lost our curiosity about each other. I am sure social media is partly to blame, allowing us to only very casually scratch the surface and have that satisfy us so that we can now feel good about moving onto the next thing. We are all in such a hurry to do more, see more, go more that we have stopped really inquiring about how much we really know about a thing, an idea or a person.
Life is moving at super sonic speed. All the time and we are not really equipped for this and our relationships are suffering because of it.
I don’t know about the larger societal implications, I will leave that to the NYU professors and other similarly situated individuals. But I will speak about what I have experienced in the dating venue.
And just so we are clear, I am including myself to a certain degree. I am not above the fray. I am in the fray for sure. But I also believe, perhaps erroneously, that I am also observing the fray and reflecting so perhaps that means that I am not subsumed by the fray.
And by “fray” I mean the lack of real interest that is occurring in the dating world.
So first off, we can scroll through hundreds of people in minutes. Never before in the history of the world, have we been able to shift through humanity so quickly, deliberately and superficially. Think back to 100 years ago, you dated and married people you had access to and the numbers of possible options were small, geographically limited and largely structured by your parents or family.
Today, we are free to roam about the world. Free to choose whomever we want. And just like most things with a plethora of choices, we do not find much freedom there. The more options we have, the less choice we feel able to make. I mean, why should you commit to that person when there are hundreds of other possibilities at the ready?
So our pool is endless, like the infinity pools in high income homes. It just goes on and on and on. You have to be very dedicated in order to get to the end of the tinder scroll...and I think only the highly compulsive and obsessive actually make it there. And I believe those people are the ones just looking to get laid. I mean, that is a pretty high motivation.
What I have noticed is that we aren’t all that curious about each other anymore. We want to know name, rank and serial number and then appear to just fill in all the other blanks all by ourselves. We decide who you are and what you are all about because it is easier than asking. And then we are constantly disappointed when you turn out to be something other than what we thought you were...and then also, we place our trust and bodies and hearts in harm’s way when we fail to really get to know you and you turn out to be a louse.
I think I am a pretty well rounded person. And I put this fucking blog out there every single day. And few, if any, of my possible suitors ever read it. And I don’t get it. I mean if there was a man I was interested in and he wrote a fucking blog and put out there his heart, mind and soul every fucking day, I would read that shit religiously. I would want to talk to him about what he wrote, ask questions, and find out why he felt the way he did. I would be curious. Hell, I would be obsessed, let's be honest.
And I would also be afraid. I would be afraid I would read something I didn’t like. Afraid that I would find out something that didn’t mesh with my version of him. I would be afraid that he might not be all that I wanted him to be. And I get that fear is a large and in charge motivator to not do things.
But I would fucking read it anyway. I wouldn’t be able to help myself. When I like someone, I want to know how they feel, what they think. I want to know how their mind work. I want to lie in bed and drink coffee with them every morning and learn about them, what makes them tick and what doesn’t. I want to know more...all the time. They are like a book I have just opened and they sucked me in on the first page, and now I am reading instead of working or eating or anything else because I just want to know more!
But I don’t find this tendency of mine to be reciprocated much. If anyone I date reads the blog, it is an initial thing, and they most often don’t even mention it. Occasionally I can see they’ve read it from the website but most of the time I have no fucking idea who is reading it and who is not. But rarely, does anyone ask me about anything I write. My mom, she brings up stuff to me all the time and I so appreciate that! But she is my mom. Not someone I am dating and she knows me pretty fucking well at this point. The good, the bad and the weird.
So why isn’t anyone I date more interested?
I have wrecked my brain attempting to figure it out. And I am pretty sure it is because of three reasons:
People aren’t interested in reading stuff that doesn’t directly relate to them.
People are afraid to come to know people more deeply than the superficial.
People don’t read anymore. Everything has been reduced to podcasts and instagram reels. Reading is something that people do only in small bursts and not all that often unless required for their job or because they need to come to know something but they have only a very small amount of time and effort they are going to expend to gain this knowledge.
I think we are all so busy in our lives that we have become consumed with self. What do I want? What do I need? Let’s talk about me for awhile. Wait, actually I want to talk about me all the time. And in so doing, we have lost the bubble with others. We have killed off our curiosity about other people, who they are and how they work. And this has hurt not only them and us but our whole manner of relating to each other.
How is love supposed to grow if curiosity and interest dies off after the initial blush?
It can’t. So it just becomes this maintenance kind of thing. We are maintaining relationships we aren’t even all that invested or interested in. We are not coming to know each other better, we are instead doing the bare minimum to keep shit moving. It is like we have become sorting machines whose sole purpose in this life is to sort through the vagaries of life so that we can shelve it all and keep moving forward. Friend here, lover there, employee over there. Sort, sort, sort. For fuck’s sake, keep fucking moving! Meet. See what you want. Acquire. Move the fuck on.
And then the all encompassing fear. Fear that we might learn something we don’t like, fear that we will have to start over again, fear that what we want and crave and desire doesn’t exist. Fear that we will be let down. Fear that we will be hurt. Fear that we will be disappointed. And the way to manage this pervasive and ever expanding fear, is to stop asking questions. Ok, you over there, I see you, I mean I see you a little, and that is passable. So we are good. I don’t hate you and I am not totally afraid of you, so you will do, for now...until I decide to go looking elsewhere.
It feels as if we have all just given up finding our person. We have just come to settle into this idea that that is too much to ask, too big of an ask so we will just settle for what lands that doesn’t make us immediately miserable. And yes, I am in this camp too. I keep getting asked “what are you looking for...” Which is a fucking hard question to answer. Partly because it is such an opening for judgment. But really because I tend to want to capitulate the answer to the audience I am entertaining.
Where I am in all of this is pretty apathetic. I am fine alone. And should I remain this way forever, cool. But I also feel like my advancing age is going to put a damper on sex and dating and love and the possibilities of shit. Perhaps this is a shitty and limited idea of elder life, but it is how I think. I hear the fucking clock ticking on my sexiness factor and it is fucking loud! I know, I know, people can fuck their brains out and fall madly, passionately in love at 90. I get it. But how many people really do that? Most people I know that are over the age of 70 aren’t all that interested in fucking anymore and even if they are, they have lost some purchase over in the ability department.
So yeah fear kills curiosity, dead.
And I will save my rant for why people not reading will be the end of society and all that is good in the world for another day. But I reiterate that this also has something to do with people not really being all that curious anymore. It is way better to just pop in an audiobook and go for a hike. Two things, same time for the win!
I feel like I am doing my part holding on to that part of me that remains engaged and interested. Who is this person in front of me? What do they think? What do they feel? What are their interests? What are they afraid of? But I will also own that I too have a tendency to think too much about me and not enough about you. I work at NOT being this way but I seem too to default to this place of apathetic fear based self centeredness.
Where has our curiosity gone? Can we please for the love of all that is good and holy please work to get it back?
I am trying. I am trying to remain engaged in this whole dating endeavor. I am trying to be honest and show up as I am without a lot of fanfare or bullshit. But somedays I will own that it feels like it is all a grand waste of time. I am putting myself out there, but no one is really paying attention. Or perhaps worse, intermittent attention which is really not attention at all.
I guess I will just continue to develop my curiosity about the men in front of me and engage. I am no longer looking for “him” because I am pretty sure I am just not a “him” woman. If I look at my life, there has just been an ever evolving series of hims and that is not likely to change given my history, trauma and attachment style. I will continue to work on me so that I am always evolving to my best, higher self but I am not sure how much progress really can be made...
I remain curious about myself, why do I think the things I do, why do I feel this way or that, and I think the act of being self curious can pave the way for being more curious about others. I think the same things about them. I am interested. I am engaged. I am just not sure how much bandwidth others have in this regard, in life, but also in the dating realm.
If I am talking to you, fucking you, dating you or otherwise engaged with you, I am interested. I want to know more! That is why I am still fucking here. So tell me more. Allow me access and for fuck’s sake, engage with me. I want to know and I want to tell. We are never, ever going to find someone who makes our life and living more worthwhile mindlessly scrolling through Tinder forever. The infinity dating pool will always be there. Always.
If we want to swim to deeper levels we are going to have to leave the safety of the shallow end and take a deeper dive. Withstanding the discomfort of curiosity sometimes leading us to places we would rather not go.
Again...still.
Comments