The Endeavor #2

If I remember correctly, last time, I simply talked about which dating sites I was considering using, and why I chose the way I did. Getting back to following up on that, I should talk about a few of the major things I encountered when I first got started.

First of all, you’ll never know how difficult it was for me to give away any sort of personal information outside of my name and e-mail address. I suppose it is from all of these years of practicing internet safety, but it was really difficult. Despite that, I did finally manage to force myself to do it. Once I finally put in all of the information it was asking me for, I needed to upload a picture to my profile. I finally managed to choose a good one that came from a photo shoot a few years back. Still, up until this point, I guess I never really realized how few decent pictures of myself I actually have.

For those that never read some of my previous blog posts (I believe I've mentioned it several times), I am notoriously unphotogenic. Basically, I look horrible in all of the pictures taken of me, unless they are done and edited by a photographer. Now, that doesn't mean that I think I’m bad looking or anything. I just look terrible in pictures. I’m not sure… it’s like, whenever a camera is around, I always find a way to look my worst. Even worse, is the fact that I’m going to need more than just one picture in order to actually make my profile worth looking at. Not to mention, multiple pictures add to the credibility of any profile. I mean, it makes it a lot less likely that you’re a scammer or something when you have multiple pictures of yourself in various situations uploaded to your profile.

And yes, a lot of these are things that the website itself told me. But I can definitely understand what it is saying and why.

Of course, it also asked me for all kinds of additional personal info. It also gave me a series of questions to answer about myself. There were certainly more than a few of them too. It was actually really entertaining going through and answering as many of them as I could. They certainly asked some rather deep questions about relationships and my opinions on various matters pertaining to them. If only I had a list of those questions, I could probably go through all of them on here… though that might be a bit much.

Returning to the present, I should mention that they have made several changes since I originally joined the website. This included streamlining the interface, and changing/adding several features. I would say the most important section is the “settings” panel. On it, you can adjust several different settings relating to your matches, or who gets matched with you. I figure I’ll cover each of them in more detail as they pertain to me in upcoming posts. The general setting feature simply dictates how matches appear, and whether they appear at all.

Of course, there are a lot of other features besides the settings pertaining to your matches. Various tools let you view matches in general, or edit your profile. They also offer several other services and articles relating to online dating and dating advice. I’ll have to check those out at a future date.

I should probably take this opportunity to mention that I am not actually subscribed to the online dating service at this time. So I can’t communicate with other people via the website. I can’t look at other profiles either. This is a bit of a drag, but I want to be sure I’m ready before beginning to pay money in order to use the service. I also want my profile to be ready, depicting the most accurate representation of me as possible.

In addition to wanting my profile to look its best before broadcasting it to the world, I also want to feel as though I’m ready. There is no going back for me now though. I already have one foot in the water. I just need to feel like I’m ready to take the final step. This is a bit more difficult than some might imagine. There is a lot on my mind, and a lot that worries me. I think, most of all, I’m afraid of being judged. I know I shouldn’t be so worried about it, but I can’t help it. Maybe it is just human nature.

In any case, my journey is only just beginning…

The Endeavor #1

Ok, so my journey has just barely begun, and already I am overwhelmed with too many things to write about. This particular post will be about many of the things that have already occurred. Many of them are not recent.

I suppose you could technically say that I began this journey about a year ago when I created my online dating profile. For the sake of honesty, I can’t claim that I've been on this journey for that long. When I actually started it, it was really only a halfhearted thing, not really meant to be taken seriously. I was curious about what these sites had to offer, so I needed to sign up for one and create a profile. I’ll admit, I was hoping to break down how they determined compatibility between people based on the questions they asked. I did discover a few things, but many of them slip my mind because of how long ago this was.

Before all of that, I needed to decide on one dating site to use.

This was not nearly as much of a challenge as it might seem at first. I broke down the sites based on a lot of different criteria. However, I primarily wanted to use a website that focused on quality, not quantity. Anyone can throw together a website that pairs single people with other single people. It isn't that difficult. However, there are a lot of different variables that determine whether or not any subsequent dates will be worth each persons’ time, or will be a waste of time. That is where the whole “compatibility” aspect comes in.

I looked at a bunch of free dating sites first. Websites like PlentyOfFish seemed like I viable option at first. However, after looking into them a little bit, I realized how hopeless that would be. First of all, without the income from subscriptions, these websites obviously couldn't afford to design any sort of decent compatibility algorithms. So essentially, they were mostly just mediums for people to meet one another. Not bad in that aspect, but not quite what I was looking for.

After reading some reviews about them, I also realized that many of the people on these websites suffered from certain forms of delusion. Basically, the people looking to be matched by these websites were INCREDIBLY picky about who they would even consider being paired with. If you looked like anything less than a god or goddess, you would probably be ignored by the majority of the community on these sites.

Also, being free sites, anyone could join without reason. Based on the way that the internet works, this hardly makes for a healthy community. It didn't take me long to deduce that these sites were probably filled with all sorts of spambots and trolls. That isn't mentioning the security aspect. The risk of being trapped by a “catfish,” or someone who lies about who they are on the internet in order to trick someone else into a false relationship, was just too great. And yes, these people do exist. I've discovered them before. They do this for all kinds of reasons. Some of them do it looking to scam money. Others do it in order to obtain some form of good feeling about themselves. Still others do it just because it is fun. No matter what way you look at it, it is incredibly reprehensible. And unfortunately, because they have to pay nothing in order to access these sites, they tend to be everywhere.

Needless to say, the free sites are out of the question.

So, I decided to take a look at the subscription-based sites. There are certainly plenty of them out there. You have Match.com, Eharmony, and ChristianMingle.com... I could go on with the list for a while. I ruled out Match.com almost right away. They are a good site, don’t get me wrong. I was simply looking for one that favored the quality of your matches over the quantity of matches (or dates). And while the prospect of having the biggest user base of any site out there was definitely intriguing, I ultimately ended up deciding against it.

I also looked at ChristianMingle.com as a potential site to use. It would seem like a good match, as I am a devout Christian myself, and I would really prefer to be matched with someone of my faith. However, I ultimately decided that it wasn't one-hundred percent necessary that the other person share my exact faith. I would definitely consider someone of a different faith, or no faith at all, as long as they were able to respect and understand my faith and why I am a part of it, and why other people are as well. I was also unable to get a good reading on how big the user base actually was. This did worry me a little bit, as I didn't want to be matched with just a few people and have that be the end of it. And keep in mind, this was before they began their aggressive advertising campaign, so it was probably even smaller back then. I did decide to keep it in mind as a second option, however, in case my final decision ended up falling through.

I took a look at several dating sites and apps on Facebook as well. However, none of these got good reviews, and would all want access to all of your personal information on Facebook and such. I even got word that several of them had the tendency to access your account and post random stuff once they got access to your information. So sites like Zoosk were definitely out.

In case you don’t have it figured out yet, I eventually ended up choosing Eharmony.com as the site that I will be using for this undertaking. It just seemed like the right combination of a large user base, many different customizable options to determine who you are matched with, and that focus on quality over quantity that I mentioned before. So, it is here that my journey will begin.

On a side note, I have to admit that it is rather awkward to be talking about choosing dating sites. For whatever reason, this often feels to me like something deeply personal. And perhaps it is. It just feels rather difficult to talk about. Hopefully I’ll have even more insight as to why eventually.

The Endeavor Prologue

So, where to begin…? It has certainly been a while since I last used this blog. And I've had my reasons – mostly a lack of inspiration – that have made it rather difficult to continue posting on a regular basis. However, recent events have brought back a little of my original inspiration, and I've decided to release a new series of posts on here based on my experiences.

For those of you who have been with me for a while, I should probably throw out there that my situation has not changed one bit. I thought by now it might have, but you needn't worry. I’m still essentially in the same place I was over a year ago when I last posted in this blog. I've certainly been through my usual share of ups and downs. I gain hope, and then I lose it just as quickly.

That is the main reason I have decided to launch this new series in order to coincide with the effort that I will be undertaking over the next few months

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Basically, these next several posts will cover what I will refer to as my “last chance” or “last effort” at finding what I’m looking for. Now, I know that if I don’t find it here, it isn't necessarily my last chance at finding love. However, based on the dream I always had about it, which I will cover in more detail later, this might very well be my last chance to find what I’m looking for without having to let go of my original dream and find a new one. And aside from that, if I don’t find it here, I doubt I will make another concerted effort at finding something. I’m simply tired of searching and coming up empty all the time, so I refuse to continue making an effort when all I get for it is pain. If after this I am still all alone, I will have to simply let go and allow fate to take over. If I find something after this, it will be entirely by chance, and not based on a huge amount of effort on my own part.

With that said, I feel comfortable diving into the real gist of what I’ll be trying to do.

Essentially, I am going to make one last attempt to search the world, using all the resources I can find, to see if I can find my heart’s other half. I’m searching for that love that has so eluded me for the entirety of my life.

I decided to chronicle that journey with the use of this blog. That was its original purpose anyway; to chronicle my journey through life, and my search for love. Besides, a blog name like “Notions of the Heart” is far too original and amazing to let it go to waste. Either way, I decided that this particular journey might be one of the most interesting I've had to date, so I figured it might be worth saving and sharing.

While I have yet to decide on an exact timeline for this particular endeavor, I figured that the warm weather presents a great guideline. Basically, with spring on its way in, my hope has been strengthened just a bit. If I don’t find what I’m looking for by next winter, I’ll probably have given up hope by then anyways. And if I won’t have lost hope by then, it probably won’t take long for the cold and dark days and overall dreary feeling to suck what is left of that hope away. I figure that winter is probably an appropriate deadline.

The real question in all of this is: how exactly will I be doing all of this? Essentially, I will be utilizing every tool at my disposal, including many I have not tried before for various reasons. In addition, I will be focusing on improving several aspects of myself, which will hopefully help to fuel my confidence and keep that hope alive for as long as I need it to be.

First, I will be attempting something that I have always thought about, but never had the courage to attempt for various reasons. That is… Online dating. Yes, you read that right. I might have released a post about my feelings about online dating a while back. Even if I didn't, I will give a short rundown as to why I've never tried this before. Basically, the concept of it frightened me. There are so many unknowns when it comes to online dating, not to mention several aspects that, in my own personal opinion, take more courage than standard dating. I’ll get to those later. However, the main reason I avoided it was because I was caught up in the stigma that it was a last-ditch method. I thought it was for people who couldn't find love any other way. And I didn't want to be one of those people that needed help to find what I was looking for.

My opinions from before have become more and more laughable by the day. Not necessarily because they were untrue, but because I fall perfectly into the category of people that I always stereotyped as the group that needed so much help to find love. I avoided it because I was afraid of what it might mean for me if I decided to use it. What I failed to realize was that I was exactly the type of person for whom these systems have been created, and that continues to sustain these systems until this very day. Is there anything wrong with that? I used to believe that there might be, but as I continue to think about it more and more, I am realizing that there truly isn't.

Are there not plenty of people out there in my situation? It seems as though their hearts are created to love that of another, but they remain invisible. Perhaps having a system in place to facilitate connections between these people isn't so bad after all. Even more intriguing, is the fact that many of these systems, such as the one I will be using, attempt to match people up based on certain other dimensions of compatibility. This is incredibly valuable in cutting time wasted on people who ultimately do not share certain aspects of personality that make them compatible with another person.

Either way, I continue to have various hesitations about this whole online thing. There are too many to list and detail here, so hopefully I will be able to tackle them one at a time in later posts. But I figure that it is important to point out that I am still a bit wary of all this, though I am finally of the opinion that it is potentially worth the risk.

In addition, my mind keeps asking myself one question in particular: What if I already know the person that I am supposed to end up with? I mean, I am taking that quite liberally. Is there really any one person that I am “supposed” to end up with? I often believe so, but it can be very difficult to say for sure. What would happen if this whole endeavor ends up chasing away someone who really does care for me? I can think of several people who might be in that category, although none of them have shown any obvious signs that they would potentially think of me as anything more than a friend. Then again, who knows? It is certainly eating me up inside wondering about this.

In the end though, I figure that I should keep a record of what could be the most important undertaking in my entire life. And even though some of it might seem rather commonplace and ordinary for some people, it is not to me. Each person’s life journey is unique in many ways, particularly in the way that they perceive it. So, like I said, I will be chronicling this endeavor with the help of this blog. Hopefully everyone can enjoy my journey along with me, and can take something away from it. And hopefully, as usual, writing about it will help me to better understand myself.

The Depths of Sadness

It seems lately, my misery has taken a new turn for the worst. While I am usually sad and alone as it is, for some reason, it has become much more intense lately. I've spent a lot of time thinking about it, and why it has suddenly seemed to cut me so deeply. I've had several people tell me that, even though they knew I was sad, they've never seen it quite this intense. And I've had the same feeling myself.

I use this blog to explore other things about the heart, so why not use it to uncover why my sadness has become so much more pointed as of late? I sat down in a peaceful location with my favorite music, and just thought for a while, taking my thoughts down on paper as I went. They might be a bit scattered, or not as orderly as they usually are, but I think they still helped me understand a lot.

For me, searching for love has been like grasping at smoke. It seems possible at first, it soon becomes clear just how impossible it really is. Every time I've had some possibility within my reach, as soon as I reached out to grab it, it would vanish like smoke.

My heart seemed comparable to the pavement on a road. The cracks in that pavement began to appear after the only person I could ever say I might have loved put more pressure on it than it could stand. And since then, they have only grown. The hope that fills them every now and again is like water. At first, it is wonderful to have something filling them, perhaps even believing that it might one day help mend those cracks. But then, that hope dies, and the water freezes, enlarging the cracks. In doing so, that hope leaves my heart more damaged than before. And so, the cycle continues, and every time I am let down, those rifts grow, paining my heart more and more.

It is because of this vicious cycle that my heart seems to be rejecting new hope. Everyone I talk to wants me to keep some kind of hope. But because I've been let down by that same feeling of hope so many times, I always push it away.

The loneliness is damaging in its own right. It is like the sun beating down on that same patch of road. Not particularly bad at first, but over time, it becomes more and more damaging. As I well know, being apart is not a particularly bad thing. But after a while, not being able to find someone can take its toll.

I probably shouldn't speak like I am entirely alone. There are many whom I have talked to that have sympathized with me, and have given me encouragement. I am very thankful for that, and I appreciate every one of them.

However, there are a few things that I've been hearing that tend to bother me a bit. For instance, I always feel a bit hesitant when they tell me that they know how I feel, or that I should trust that things will get better eventually.

When it comes to knowing how I feel, perhaps they do know a similar level of pain or despair. I'm sure things have happened in their lives, which may have had a similar effect. But, when it comes to knowing exactly how I feel, I'm a bit skeptical. Each person I have heard talk about this has come close to finding true love at least once. They have a reason to keep hoping, because even if their previous relationships failed, they can take hope in the fact that there are people out there that will love them.

As for me, I've never been a part of anything resembling a close relationship. Somehow, I find it harder to believe that they know exactly how I feel, when each of their hearts has felt what its like to be loved by another, and mine has not. I have seen no reason to believe that anyone out there is willing to love me that way. And so, I get to the heart of the issue.

The other thing that I always hear as encouragement, is that my family and friends are all I need, and that I should be more thankful and happy because of them. Now don't get me wrong in all of this, I am extremely happy because of my family, and some of my friends. So, on that count, they are right. I'm probably being a bit selfish by not appreciating them, and letting them contribute to my happiness more.

However, I still think I'm right too. I've come to accept the fact that my heart was made to have a connection with another person, one that goes far beyond friends and family. To me, friends and family are two important pieces to the puzzle, but not the only ones. The rest of the world wants me to believe that those are the only pieces necessary to complete the puzzle, while my heart is telling me that there is still one more piece missing, and that piece just might be the most important one.

I can't help but compare my heart to some of the recent weather. It has been cloudy and cold, with a heavy blanket of fog that would not lift. My heart has gone from being more of an average temperature, to being cold, rainy, and blanketed by uncertainty. It reminds me of the change from early to late fall. If only I could find summer.

I even had someone tell me that they thought I should get over it. That person didn't mean it in a bad way, but was just being brutally honest. Who would want to spend time with a person so depressed, let alone fall for them? And I see her point entirely. I've given it a lot of thought though, and come to several of my own conclusions about it.

First of all, in a situation like this, it is rarely as simple as just getting over it. Especially when one is talking about my biggest hopes and dreams. That's right, you heard me. My biggest dream is to find that one person who completes me. It also seems to me that this sadness that I'm experiencing is showing an important part of who I am. I wouldn't be me if I was able to just brush all of this aside like it didn't matter to me, because it does. More than anything. Moreover, I think that my sensitivity regarding this issue is more proof of how much my heart would value a relationship, should I ever find someone. For me, that set of values is what truly sets me apart from a lot of other people.

For me, one of the main hurdles to finding hope, is the state of relationships today. That can be broken into several parts. First off is getting into a relationship. It seems far too complicated for me. Lets face it, getting into a relationship requires someone else to be attracted to you, as well as you to them. Then, you have to be ever so cautious as to not move too fast, or too slow. Your moves all have to be timed just right. And just bringing up the topic to someone you like is difficult enough. I've been told several times that the best way to meet people is to let go of my shyness and just go all out. But I feel like doing that would be the wrong course of action. My shyness is a part of me. Sure, it hampers me at times, but it is an important part of who I am, and it makes those people that I do meet and make friends with all that much more special. Not to mention, doing so would paint a very false picture of who I really am.

Just finding anyone able to love me for who I am is a challenge. Most of those that I've seen with good hearts are already in a relationship. To top it off, that relationship is usually a bad one (though there are plenty of exceptions). Can I really say that a person has a good heart if they are in a bad relationship? I suppose it is possible, but I would expect someone like that to know better, and to be able to see the difference between a person with a good heart, and one with a bad heart. But perhaps that is setting my expectations too high.

And even staying in a relationship can be incredibly tough. I know because I've read about a lot of different relationships lately, and there is usually something that sticks out that would really worry me if it occurred in my relationship. So is it possible to find a happy relationship at all? I would like to believe so, but even if it is possible, would it even be possible to find someone who is able to respect that relationship? I know that nobody is perfect, but sometimes I wonder if there are any people out there who actually value a relationship as highly as I would.

All in all, I feel as though I've been sinking into the depths of my sadness more and more recently. Every day becomes more and more of a challenge to stay positive. I hide my sadness well, but I wonder how long I can continue to do so. I'm always told there is a plan, but I can't help but feel that I may be left out of that plan. Or perhaps it is my destiny to remain alone? Whatever the case, moving forward with a heart that seems to be made to connect with another heart never gets easier. The sadness seems like it is everywhere, always finding ways to seep into my mind. I find things that remind me of my aloneness everywhere.

In the end, I suppose there is some flame of hope left somewhere inside me. But it is burning out very quickly. I'm not really sure what I'll do then. But one thing is certain. My heart, however sad, still guides me.