For me, I couldn't date until I fully moved on from my last relationship. I thought I did all the "right" things after breaking up: took a couple months off websites, worked on myself, and did some new things. I reactivated my profiles later, and while I talked to and met girls, something felt off. I talked to a friend about this, and he had a similar experience moving on. Not sure when/how things turned around for both of us but it's different for everyone.
So while it may be burnout or a string of bad luck, it may also be you. But it seems like other parts of your life are looking up, so stay positive.
Ironically after I wrote that post, I got a few new Tinder matches/messages going, 2 numbers----one of which is a girl who's been throwing me sexual innuendos left and right in which she's clearly DTF so my dry spell might be coming to an end in the next week; have been messaging back and forth with a girl on OKC; and another on Bumble.
The funniest thing is one of the girls that I messaged said it was the best message she's ever gotten; it the was the cat tipping its hat GIF. The Tinder fish are biting left and right so I'm bouncing back.
That being said, I heard an art podcast recently in which the artist interviewed said that one of the best quotes he lives by is "Failure and rejection should be worn like a badge of honor because it means you actually tried" which was said by the guy who wrote
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I do think it's me to some degree so I need to continue volunteering and doing stuff I like as well as improving myself/finances. My therapist said I have a hard time relating to women, expressing sexual interest, and wants me to ask girls out for second dates so he wants me to do that more often.
I noticed that you are in New York City, so I have to ask, is it really that difficult in NYC? I thought that city was supposed to be a paradise for men because of the ratio of women to men.
It's really not but as I've mentioned in the past, being a minority makes it much harder as you know despite being 6''3, in shape, and in good health. On Bumble, I've been having a really hard time getting getting matches lately since girls who do match up with me, let the 24 hours expire whereas on Tinder, it's the complete opposite since I've been occasionally getting matches for every 200-300 swipes. CMB is non-existent since girls have disappeared and I haven't gotten any mutual likes in about 2 weeks.
I think each platform comes with its own set of pictures and information to put on it. I have the same pictures on all 4 platforms down to the main picture but on Tinder and OKC, it's yielding me results with unsolicited messages about my hair with the latter.
The funniest thing is that if that the same girls on those on platforms would probably be damn near hard to approach in bars since most people would be swiping for dates on their phone. The great thing about living about living in NYC is that there are endless avenues to meet women/new people either for free or for a price. It's overwhelming and the diversity helps.
I like to think that the women that I've dated fall into the camp that has seen
Girls (young professionals living with roommates in gentrifying areas of the city, high expectations/standars) or
Broad City (happy-go-lucky, have big dreams, smoke pot). The former camp, I tend to find boring since there's only so much 9-5 at a start up/non-profit/company, hang out with friends, go to bars, and have pets (a bit of a turn off for me) that I can take. Taking new pics will be a must especially with a bodega cat since I don't have any pets.
