The Private Man

Attraction and dating information for all men

Distance and Online Dating

I am fortunate in that I live in a metropolitan area with over 5 million people. I have certain guidelines regarding my preferences for women and their geographical location. If the woman meets all of my preferences, I am willing to travel further to see her. The more preferences that are not met, the closer she must be. This is all part of the online dating process that I use.

For typical men living in smaller cities or rural areas, the distance factor becomes quite the challenge. There are simply fewer available women and so he must search in a much bigger geographical area. Once a date is set up, it’s likely that the man will do most of the driving to meet the woman. With all the additional driving, it can get expensive and very time consuming. As well, if there are kids on both sides of equation, scheduling can become something of a nightmare. Logically, a  typical man is faced with building rapport with a potential first date through other means – emails, texts, phone calls, etc – in order to determine if a connection exists.

Sadly, logic in the dating game doesn’t work particularly well. Unless a man is 100% preselected by a woman, every email, text, phone call is an opportunity for rejection. It’s important to remember that without that preselection, a woman is looking for reasons to reject a man, not accept him. It’s the whole mystery thing that a man is expected to project. Such mystery forces the woman to build a mental narrative with the guy as part of the story. Too many words from the guy and the mystery evaporates.

Here is the dilemma that the typical man faces when he must cast his net in a large geographical area to find dates. Too little communication means too much driving to a first date that will never result in a second date. Too much communication means that there will be far fewer first dates. Ironically, this could result in an even larger geographical area being searched and even greater driving distances.

The ultimate fix for that dilemma is to make her do the driving to the first date. This requires an online dating profile of stunning alphaness to get their attention and then having superb communication skills combined with solid Game (text, email, phone) to ensure enough preselection so they come to you. This is the solution for the atypical man. Typical is beta, atypical is alpha.

Fortunately, the profile, communication skills, and Game can all be improved. As a single man works on these things, he still might have to do some driving to those first dates but every date should be considered an opportunity for practice and learning. A good measure of a man’s success is the percentage of dates where the woman drives to meet him. There is also the home turf advantage and that’s a confidence builder.

Of course, if the man is looking for a long term relationship and his dating endeavors are ultimately successful, this could lead to the long distance relationship, a true challenge.

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10 thoughts on “Distance and Online Dating

  1. Interesting thought process on the distance vs requirements issue.

    I’ve noticed another relationship: distance and time spent chatting on instant messenger before meeting. The closer a woman is to me, the faster I would make definite plans to meet.

    Before I met my current girlfriend for the first time we must have chatted on messenger for about 3-4 hours day for TWO WEEKS before I took the five hour train journey to see her.

    • Hughman on said:

      It’s a bigger committment, plus the whole subconscious opposition to meeting someone not from the ‘tribe’.

  2. Hughman on said:

    I don’t drive, and as the online dating scene blows ass in the UK before 25 (actually it blows ass in general), I have to be prepared to travel. To be fair, every date I’ve had so far has involved the girl also travelling (typically because she’s on London’s South Bank, and has to take a 30 min train to the centre to meet me)

    • “I don’t drive, and as the online dating scene blows ass in the UK before 25 (actually it blows ass in general)”

      LOL.

      • Hughman on said:

        It’s true. There’s a good female writer who must have at least a bit of the red pill in her that I read. A great post: http://itsnotokcupid.wordpress.com/2010/12/16/why-brits-dont-date/

        There is no culture of dating in the UK. Professionals in London and maybe a few other cities may emulate America, but that’s all. If you’re a prole, you’ll meet your partner whilst out on the town, maybe from work or a friend of a friend of a friend. For the elites, your partner comes from mutual friends, social circles and work. End of.

  3. I bought my husband the plane tickets to come see me in the city I was living in. I was working had a bit of savings, while he was soon to be a grad student and still living with his dad. I also bought the tickets to see him in his city.

    At that time we were emailing, texting and calling each other daily. But we didn’t meet on a dating site, and we were “exclusive” immediately. We were in a long-distance relationship for two months when I quit my job and moved across the country to be with him. We were both 25 and had no kids, and so the logistics were a lot easier.

  4. tpm,

    slwerner and I are having a discussion about online dating at the Badger Hut pursuant to the Single in the Suburbs kerfuffle, we’d love some input from you.

    http://badgerhut.wordpress.com/2011/02/26/is-match-com-peddling-divorce-fantasy/

  5. Stephenie Rowling on said:

    My husband and I talked for six months daily over the mail, phone messages..he traveled 12 hours, two planes and 3000 miles to meet me for the first time. I offered to pay for food and transportation and all this visits before we got married we shared 50/50 even though I was making sixth time less than him.

    • When there is a connection, it’s amazing what love can wrought. But I have to ask, why didn’t you first visit him?

      • I’m not her, but oftentimes it’s logistics. If I recall correctly she was in a Latin American country, and it tends to be much easier for an American to go abroad than for a foreigner to get into the U.S.

        In my case, my husband was living in his dad’s basement, while I had my own apartment. So he came to visit me first.

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