By Isabella Blu Ptito-Echeverria
Voices Editor
How to get a partner?
from a hopeless romantic
—
Dearest hopeless romantic, do not fret.
I know how it feels to see opportunities for love everywhere you go. That is the curse of being a loving person; we have so much love within us. We have love burning and writhing and pulsating so hard in our chests, so desperate to escape, and we can’t just give that love away to ourselves… Maybe we don’t feel worthy of it. Maybe we need others to feel fulfilled. Or maybe we watch too many romantic movies or have too many friends in relationships. In any case, there’s just something easier about loving others. Believing the best in people. Scanning every new face and the body that accompanies it, wondering what it would be like, seeing them drunk in a dimly lit bar laughing at your jokes, or naked and entangled in your bedsheets.
Hopeless romantic, I’d like to ask you...Where does your hopelessness come from?
Attraction is a two-way street. If you see someone from afar and hope and dream for their love as if it's only attainable in your dreams, that’s detectable; you’re assuming you’re incapable of attracting them. To be attractive, you need to believe you can attract. As cliché as this sounds, you have to be confident in your romantic and sexual appeal to be appealing to others. Austin Powers has 3D glasses with no lenses in them and teeth built for eating bricks, yet it’s his mojo that gets him all the babes. It’s all confidence. Confidence is attractive.
Think of it from a marketing perspective; if a salesman is unconfident in their product and uses evident recycled gimmicks as a sales tactic, few will buy it.
Obviously, confidence in your attractiveness and value doesn’t come overnight. And I hate to say, there is no one-size-fits-all answer to coming to terms with your personal value. You just have to have faith in your attractiveness, your strong suits, and display them when you can. Fake it till you make it, like a salesperson. Showcase and market your positive traits as much as you can in your day to day life, and I promise, love will find you. With this, I guarantee another hopeless romantic will be gazing at you from afar, daydreaming about you standing in a dimly lit bar laughing at their jokes, and entangled in their sheets later that night. Know you have the value later on to accept or reject their longing. Repeat as needed. Love comes the moment you stop looking. Have faith in others to love you, and they will.
Now, for some more concrete advice on how to engage in potentially romantic encounters, here are some rules of thumb:
→ Preserve your dignity and mystery; let people in slowly. Dumping your entire life story onto someone in one night isn’t giving your life the delicacy it deserves. Treat yourself with the value you want others to treat you with. Treat the other person as an equal, not like they are on a pedestal looking down on you.
→Don’t smother. Preserve the value of compliments by using them sparingly, and by tailoring them specifically to the person you’re addressing. This makes the person feel appreciated without making you seem desperate. Tip: If you can recycle the compliment on anyone else, it’s not specific enough. Drop it.
→ Don’t neg— that is, “negate” someone, or put them down so that the group can have a laugh. You need to build a strong relationship with a person before you can jump on ahead to teasing them, even if you believe it’s playful. It can be a real turn-off.
The best and final tip I can offer is this: Don’t constantly hang out in the same place. Broaden your hang out areas. If you surround yourself with the same people in the same place, your dating pool is limited to a specific geographic location. If money allows it, take a workshop, a cooking class, a dance class, go to a concert, a gig, someplace that aligns with your hobbies. If you’re short on cash but have the time, apply for jobs that encourage social interaction; being a waiter, a barista, a salesperson. Ste-Catherine is booming with these types of job opportunities. Try to expose yourself to as many opportunities to meet people as possible. Even if you don’t end up meeting anyone worth dating there, developing hobbies and skills builds character and will give you stories to tell and knowledge to share, which will contribute to your attractiveness as a whole.
Hopeless romantic, I am wishing you utmost hope and success. Remember, your endeavours are never hopeless. Always remember that, stud.
Peace, love, and cheers-
The Plant