This problem is interesting to me both as someone who was successfully matchmade, and as a therapist. In my personal experience, a friend texted me "I never do this, but you should really meet my friend x" and x is now my wife. But with clients who are highly eligible but struggling to meet a partner, I share your sense that there's something inner that's getting in the way of their meeting the right person, rather than something outward and logistical. Personally, I did do a lot inner work before I met my match.
Everyone I dated I met in a shared context with spaced-out repetition, you met your girlfriend through your blog. Only insane person would keep going on coffee dates for the time it takes me to develop a crush, so instead I expand my surface area of luck by showing up in more contexts.
Just host things and invite your friends who don’t all know each other and see what happens. Christine has written it takes her friends meeting about 8 times to get a buy-in and become friends, I imagine it’s more for a spouse.
I like this. Hmm, spaced-out repetition ... this fits with a personal strategy I use when meeting new people in general. After the 1st meet, and assuming the meet was sufficiently good, quickly arrange the next time to meet.
I'm curious if this goes deeper for you, if think about it more rigorously, if it's something you have noticed from your natural behaviour etc.
Over 30 men reached out, including founders of companies you’ve heard of and people with Wikipedia pages.
But… she only went on dates with four of them ¿
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Wait, isn't that an amazing success rate? You helped someone get four dates who were preselected to be likely good matches! I'm not sure what more you expected.
Every pipeline is a funnel, and there are lots of reasons to expect the jump from "send a three line interest email" (requires 30 seconds of "that sounds nice" impulsiveness) to "meet someone in real life" (requires clearing actual time in the calendar, logistics) to be a strong filter.
> Again, lots of interest from men who seemed promising… but, somehow, nothing came from it?
Most guys aren't good at presenting themselves well offline, online is even worse. Ideally as a matchmaker you would help the male side improve their wardrobe/haircut/grooming/etc, then take some better pics (if its online matchmaking), then finally present their "application". Maybe you already do, just something I'd do myself if I was a matchmaker :-)
What does getting ready to get married look like, from your perspective? I'm married, but I'm not sure I did much to prepare other than babysit for a year to make sure I liked kids and telling my 4 boyfriends at the time that I wanted to get married in the next couple years.
I think it’s possible a lot of people don’t even think about whether they are ready in that sense before doing it. Babysitting for a year seems like a non-trivial bit of preparation and a good strategy to boot.
I’ve found the same thing with many friends and acquaintances who want to be set up or advertise themselves with “date me docs”.
The thing I’ve found most predictive on whether a single friend who proclaims to want a relationship soon will find a relationship soon is whether they’ve been in long term relationships before.
I have two friends who both married young and got divorced. They were open to being set up by our friends, and soon enough were both in serious relationships again (one is now married).
Fantastic cliffhanger. Presumably the unpacking of being ready to get married will tie back to doing the inner work to become secure, getting unstuck, and figuring out what you really want. Can't wait for a part 2 (please).
The "not readiness" is, unluckily, something deeply subconscious. I've seen enough Bert-Hellinger-style family constellations to believe that in some cases, the root is in previous generations, e.g. a greatgrandmother's true love died young in war and the person struggling to find a partner is subconsciously reliving that greatgrandmother's experience of going through life alone. The "solution" would be to find ways to honour the love and the struggles of one's ancestors, but that's hard to do if you don't know where your problem is coming from.
Hmm, still trying to see the take-away/moral of the story ... is this a framing issue where "match making" raises the stakes? polarizes how people view what's actually going on? (eg. marriage-focused, dating-focused)
Intriguing. I was just researching and pondering why online dating apps suck so much and why there are no more substantial alternatives that actually give you better matches. It’s a complex subject matter. So cool that you actually went ahead and tried it. A bit confused by the results.
This problem is interesting to me both as someone who was successfully matchmade, and as a therapist. In my personal experience, a friend texted me "I never do this, but you should really meet my friend x" and x is now my wife. But with clients who are highly eligible but struggling to meet a partner, I share your sense that there's something inner that's getting in the way of their meeting the right person, rather than something outward and logistical. Personally, I did do a lot inner work before I met my match.
Everyone I dated I met in a shared context with spaced-out repetition, you met your girlfriend through your blog. Only insane person would keep going on coffee dates for the time it takes me to develop a crush, so instead I expand my surface area of luck by showing up in more contexts.
Just host things and invite your friends who don’t all know each other and see what happens. Christine has written it takes her friends meeting about 8 times to get a buy-in and become friends, I imagine it’s more for a spouse.
I like this. Hmm, spaced-out repetition ... this fits with a personal strategy I use when meeting new people in general. After the 1st meet, and assuming the meet was sufficiently good, quickly arrange the next time to meet.
I'm curious if this goes deeper for you, if think about it more rigorously, if it's something you have noticed from your natural behaviour etc.
> Christine has written it takes her friends meeting about 8 times
That’s a very interesting stat. Who’s Christine/do you have a link to this?
*7 times and yes: https://x.com/christineist/status/1868579636726419745
You write:
-----
Over 30 men reached out, including founders of companies you’ve heard of and people with Wikipedia pages.
But… she only went on dates with four of them ¿
-----
Wait, isn't that an amazing success rate? You helped someone get four dates who were preselected to be likely good matches! I'm not sure what more you expected.
Every pipeline is a funnel, and there are lots of reasons to expect the jump from "send a three line interest email" (requires 30 seconds of "that sounds nice" impulsiveness) to "meet someone in real life" (requires clearing actual time in the calendar, logistics) to be a strong filter.
It sounds to me like you did awesome.
> Again, lots of interest from men who seemed promising… but, somehow, nothing came from it?
Most guys aren't good at presenting themselves well offline, online is even worse. Ideally as a matchmaker you would help the male side improve their wardrobe/haircut/grooming/etc, then take some better pics (if its online matchmaking), then finally present their "application". Maybe you already do, just something I'd do myself if I was a matchmaker :-)
What does getting ready to get married look like, from your perspective? I'm married, but I'm not sure I did much to prepare other than babysit for a year to make sure I liked kids and telling my 4 boyfriends at the time that I wanted to get married in the next couple years.
I think it’s possible a lot of people don’t even think about whether they are ready in that sense before doing it. Babysitting for a year seems like a non-trivial bit of preparation and a good strategy to boot.
I’m thinking more of trying to resolve whatever’s stopping a person from telling her boyfriend she’s ready to get married.
I’ve found the same thing with many friends and acquaintances who want to be set up or advertise themselves with “date me docs”.
The thing I’ve found most predictive on whether a single friend who proclaims to want a relationship soon will find a relationship soon is whether they’ve been in long term relationships before.
I have two friends who both married young and got divorced. They were open to being set up by our friends, and soon enough were both in serious relationships again (one is now married).
Fantastic cliffhanger. Presumably the unpacking of being ready to get married will tie back to doing the inner work to become secure, getting unstuck, and figuring out what you really want. Can't wait for a part 2 (please).
imagine having 74 friends
This is why parents used to arrange marriages.
This is why your Nonna and Nonno’s marriage was arranged! Without that marriage, you wouldn’t exist, Chris!
Because who else knows you better than your family?
This is fascinating, and props to you for actively trying to bring more happiness into the world or whatever.
Also SEVENTY FOUR FRIENDS?! I don’t know anyone who has that many by any measure
The "not readiness" is, unluckily, something deeply subconscious. I've seen enough Bert-Hellinger-style family constellations to believe that in some cases, the root is in previous generations, e.g. a greatgrandmother's true love died young in war and the person struggling to find a partner is subconsciously reliving that greatgrandmother's experience of going through life alone. The "solution" would be to find ways to honour the love and the struggles of one's ancestors, but that's hard to do if you don't know where your problem is coming from.
Hmm, still trying to see the take-away/moral of the story ... is this a framing issue where "match making" raises the stakes? polarizes how people view what's actually going on? (eg. marriage-focused, dating-focused)
I'm going to reflect more on this.
Intriguing. I was just researching and pondering why online dating apps suck so much and why there are no more substantial alternatives that actually give you better matches. It’s a complex subject matter. So cool that you actually went ahead and tried it. A bit confused by the results.