Isn't the answer to this question ultimately no if we're not in successful, established relationships? What answers could be legitimately expected?

What I am doing is working... cause I'm not looking.

Yeah, I've gone on a few dates the past month but nothing has come from it because... I don't really care. Making something work and fitting someone into my life just isn't interesting to me right now. I like staying home and watching firefly, or rereading the hobbit (my night last night!). Getting trussed up for dinner so I can rush home and jump in bed just to go to work the next morning is... bluh. Between my full time job, my 8 hours of volunteering a week and my fitness schedule I like saving what time I do have for my existing friends or for ME time.

So... yeah. It's working out just fine

EDIT: For the record, if mister right does find his way into my life, awesome. But I'm not taking any real steps to get there other than my usual weekly karaoke or weekend adventures.

Also, I think that you need to keep on trying something (even though I don't know what that something might be).

I often hear people say, "you always meet your partner when you aren't looking." That has not worked AT ALL in my experience. Whenever I didn't put myself out there to meet new people.. I never met anyone.

So keep looking, digging, and trying. We got your back. :drinker:

Online dating frustrated me. Was on and off for a few years then quit it altogether. I'm of the mindset now that I will live my life and do my thing (I do stay pretty busy). If someone crosses my path, great! And if they don't, well then that's okay too. While I feel like I'm open to opportunity, I also feel a bit jaded by the whole dating process. Right now, I just don't have it in me to go searching...maybe that will change one day. Who knows?

I realize this isn't helpful in your quest for something new and different. And will most likely result in me being a crazy animal lady, bitter and alone until I'm thrown in an old folks home.

Isn't the answer to this question ultimately no if we're not in successful, established relationships? What answers could be legitimately expected?

Wow...You never cease to amaze me with your condescending *kitten* attitude. It is not surprising to me at all that you are single, with the way you speak to others on this forum.

I want someone I can go to the gym with on the regs, someone who takes massive amounts of pride in their body and their life and especially in improving and evolving and leveling up. Someone who doesnt think inside the box all the time, someone educated and motivated and smart and charming and hilarious and at least 6'3" whom I can hang from.

So I wrote that in my profile and changed out half of my superfeminine pics to a lifting picture and some action shots.

if the lifting picture and references dont attract the right person and scare off the wrong people, then I dont know what will. I also always make sure I have a full body shot so I dont ever have that worry before meeting them that they are going to be turned off by the full package once I meet them. Im not getting dressed up to go meet them if they dont already know exactly what they ordered.

Im i-heart-rocknroll on plenty of fish :P

Have you noticed different type of men sending you e-mails when you have a picture of yourself flexing with a Superman tank top on as opposed to pictures of you in a dress, etc?

Isn't the answer to this question ultimately no if we're not in successful, established relationships? What answers could be legitimately expected?

Wow...You never cease to amaze me with your condescending *kitten* attitude. It is not surprising to me at all that you are single, with the way you speak to others on this forum.

Ouch thats a little harsh dont you think... Did he hit a nerve or something. This is his responce to her question its not an attack on anyone. He also has a point a moajority of us would like to be in relationships and arent so then the answer would be no. Of course there are some on here who have started dating or are in ralstionships but stick around cause they love us. Relax he wasnt being douchy

Is it fair to say yes and no at the same time?

Most of 2012 for me was about talking to and meeting new guys to date. Since I had been in a relationship for so long I had no clue how to date or even who was out there. Now that I've been through that step, I think I'm ready for the next logical one, which for me is to see someone exclusively (doesn't mean someone I will marry - although that would be wonderful) and watch how that next phase of dating goes and what it feels like to be invested in someone again.

Oh and this might sound crazy, but sometimes I wish I could find someone here on MFP! I guess I'm drawn to the fact that we'd already have similar interests or goals and it wouldn't feel like the same pressure as a dating site. If any of you know single guys from the Boston area on MFP, please send them my way! So, NC, if nothing else, making this plea IS doing something different, thanks for the prompt :laugh:

I'm not sure I really like this question. The idea of evaluating whether it is "working" is difficult. For one, what is considered a success? I imagine you are only looking for one ideal match. If there is a 1 in 100 probability of meeting that match, when is your approach a failure? Is it when you've gone on 30 first dates that haven't panned out? How about 40 dates? What about 100? Is it a failure when guys look at you online and say "she isn't even worth killing time with until someone better comes along?" You'd get attention but you may very well miss out on the right person.

In poker jargon, there is a lot of temptation to apply Results Oriented Thinking (ROT). ROT is not a good thing. You make bad decisions when you say "the last two times I had kings, my opponent had aces and I lost. Therefore I should not try to get all my money in the pot as soon as possible with kings." The correct thought should be "the last two times I had kings, I ran into an opponent with aces. I got my money in the pot quickly and lost. What are the probabilities that opponents with weaker hands are willing to go all in preflop? What are the probabilites of my hand holding up when they do? What is the expected value of this approach? Is there a better approach that yields a higher expected payout?"

Here are a few probabilites for you:

If the probability of success is 1% then it takes 230 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 10%

If the probability of success is 1% then it takes 459 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 1%

If the probability of success is 5% then it takes 45 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 10%

If the probability of success is 5% then it takes 90 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 1%

Do you know what your chances of success are?




edit: my calculations of probabilities is: Given a probability of success of x, the probability of no success is 1-x. Assuming each event (in this case meeting a guy or girl that is ideal) is independent, the probability of no successes in N events is (1-x)^N.

Isn't the answer to this question ultimately no if we're not in successful, established relationships? What answers could be legitimately expected?

Well, for one, not everyone has that same objective, I would assume. But I'm thinking more as in progress than have you achieved your final result?! There are PLENTY of people on Single Peeps dating and in relationships... clearly someone is doing something right or different than those of us still working on it...

Plus truthfully, I meant it a little to help provoke thoughts on it for others since I'm still mulling it over myself....

Excellent point. I think that one could be single but have met interesting people and learned a lot about themselves and relationships in general. I'm not sure that the "ultimate goal" is merely ending up in an established relationship. Personally, I think it is important to grow as a person and accumulate enough life experience to be able to be successful in an established relationship once I find that the time is right to be there. For me, that might come from casual dating.

I always get a weird feeling from people who are specifically looking to get into a committed relationship and therefore decide to make each encounter in the dating world fit into this goal-shape. "Goal-shape" is not a real word but I couldn't figure out a way to end that sentence. I hope I made some sort of sense.

Now, I am off to insult a disabled person to balance myself out from this post.

I think so. I'm meeting guys while out and guys online. The more dates I go on, the more I'm figuring out what I want or don't want.

Granted, lately I've been thinking whether multi dating is working if I am looking for someone. It's hard to focus on 1 person when 3 days later, I meet someone new. So I might be changing that.

I've also noticed I'm more quick to say next... As soon as I feel "eh" about him. So this is good.

Last night I hid my POF profile. Like I said, I've been unable to really focus on someone. So for now, I'm focusing on a fella met over the weekend at a show. POF overwhelmed me so it's break time.

I'm not sure I really like this question. The idea of evaluating whether it is "working" is difficult. For one, what is considered a success? I imagine you are only looking for one ideal match. If there is a 1 in 100 probability of meeting that match, when is your approach a failure? Is it when you've gone on 30 first dates that haven't panned out? How about 40 dates? What about 100? Is it a failure when guys look at you online and say "she isn't even worth killing time with until someone better comes along?" You'd get attention but you may very well miss out on the right person.

In poker jargon, there is a lot of temptation to apply Results Oriented Thinking (ROT). ROT is not a good thing. You make bad decisions when you say "the last two times I had kings, my opponent had aces and I lost. Therefore I should not try to get all my money in the pot as soon as possible with kings." The correct thought should be "the last two times I had kings, I ran into an opponent with aces. I got my money in the pot quickly and lost. What are the probabilities that opponents with weaker hands are willing to go all in preflop? What are the probabilites of my hand holding up when they do? What is the expected value of this approach? Is there a better approach that yields a higher expected payout?"

Here are a few probabilites for you:

If the probability of success is 1% then it takes 230 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 10%

If the probability of success is 1% then it takes 459 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 1%

If the probability of success is 5% then it takes 45 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 10%

If the probability of success is 5% then it takes 90 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 1%

Do you know what your chances of success are?

If the probability of success is 5% then it takes 45 attempts to reach the point where the probaility of failure is less than 10%

This would all be gravy if we were dating robots with no whimsy, moods or spontaneous surges of courage or cowardice.

My chances of success are how interesting I am + how funny I am + my personality x his personality - the difference between our respective brands of crazy + mutual attraction x 10 + hygeine + game + charm + body type + X factor - bad timing + good timing / chance meeting

once you plug in all the numbers in your formaula if it comes to 1% or 5%, then you have an idea of how many trials you could expect until the probability that no dates met them was less than 10% and less than 1%.

More importantly, the point is that with all the randomness how do you now that your approach is working or isn't working versus it being the right approach and you are just getting unlucky or that it was a bad approach and you happened to get lucky? Focusing on the results may not be enough to tell.