If I hear ‘it’ll happen when you least expect it’ one more time, I’m going to scream.

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Hera, I need your help abandoning the pursuit of romantic love. As I edge closer to 30 (a personal victory), still unpartnered, I feel the need to put aside my hunt for romantic relationships in order to protect my sanity. I love love, and I would love that for me, but I have been terribly unsuccessful so far and it’s driving me insane.

I’m currently in a toxic relationship with Hinge (download/delete/repeat) and as a deeply sensitive big softie, I find dating apps in general soul-destroying. In a cruel twist of fate, they do also feel like the only option for meeting new (and available) prospects in 2025.  I live a great life filled with love and companionship, and I genuinely enjoy my own company. I believe I can build a good life for myself by myself, and yet I am plagued by constant doubts and yearning for a knock-your-socks-off pash partner.

Even when I join a fun new hobby, I’m always thinking ooh, maybe I’ll meet someone there, instead of just enjoying the activity. It’s so beyond my control and yet it regularly has me down in the dumps. If I hear “it’ll happen when you least expect it/when you stop looking” one more time, I shall scream.  I would really appreciate any practical advice on how to move on and focus on my future with me. If love comes along, fabulous; but if it doesn’t, I do indeed need to keep on living. 

Thanks, 

Reluctantly Single

Dear Reluctantly Single,

Sure, love may come when you least expect it, but so do many debilitating neurological diseases and industrial accidents involving corn silos. 

What people usually mean when they say “love will find you when you least expect it” is some combination of “people tend to be attracted to those with rich and fulfilling inner lives rather than those who are pathologically fixated on romance” and that statistics are on your side. As in, if you eventually go to enough barn dances and village fetes, you’ll meet someone you have a connection with. 

The people who still dispense this sort of advice grew up on a distant planet, and their dating customs come from an era when flirting was largely napkin-based, and you might realistically meet your future wife at a Tool concert or a model train convention. But those halcyon barn dance days are behind us. I can sense the growing frustration of a younger generation whose dating customs have been privatised and gamified by hook-up apps, and there are fewer opportunities to meet people organically. 

I think it’s difficult for people who haven’t been single in the past decade (guilty) to understand how profoundly alien the new romantic landscape is. Over the last few years, so many people have written in saying it feels impossible to find love. It’s tempting to blame the problem on a generational lack of gumption, because it makes the rest of us who had it easy feel intrepid and superior, like the last neanderthals before the invention of agriculture. But this isn’t just a problem affecting the young, as anyone who finds themselves unexpectedly single in middle age can probably attest to. Everyone wants to give up on the apps, which are dehumanising and unromantic, but there are few viable alternatives.

Older generations (who were last single around the time of Bush’s presidency) find this hard to believe. After all, there are still village pubs and attractive strangers on public transport. How hard is it to strike up a conversation? But while there may still be pockets of spontaneous romance flourishing, it’s obvious that social etiquette has changed, and those still clinging to the fantasy of the old-fashioned meet-cute are out of touch with the reality of people’s lives. The traditional advice to join running clubs and volunteer groups now has the stale ring of “churn your own butter” and “why don’t you send your CV to that nice Mr Gates and ask him for a job?” 

Dating is broken, and it’s not your fault. The apps, which promised novelty and ease, have wizened everyone’s flirting abilities and romantically demoralised a generation. I can completely understand wanting to wash your hands of the entire business. 

But you’re not asking how to give up the apps. You’re asking how to give up on wanting love. And that’s something nobody can help you with. 

Usually if someone wrote in with a version of your question, I’d say being in a relationship isn’t always a good thing, and if you need a reminder, you could periodically check any online relationship advice discussion forum and feel profoundly thankful you’re single, and not married to someone who gives you the silent treatment when you buy the wrong brand of yoghurt. I’d say there are plenty of compensations for being single, and that you should try and appreciate your freedom to make life-changing executive decisions alone, like painting your kitchen cabinets green, or fucking off to Spain for the summer. If you needed inspiration, I’d suggest you read some of the biographies of unmarried bohemians and mad spinster aunts, who rode camels across Egypt and created great works of art, while many of their married contemporaries were stuck at home, brainstorming new ways to serve mutton. I’d say that if there are things you’re putting off until you meet someone, you should find a way to do them now. Have that candlelit steak dinner and go to Bon Jovi alone. Take a friend to Splash Planet. I would say that romantic love isn’t the only meaningful kind of love, and you should lavish affection on your friends and family, and strengthen those platonic connections, which are likely to endure longer. I would tell you to get a cat or a dog, one of the true good solutions for loneliness. 

But to be honest, it doesn’t sound like you need help knowing how to live. It sounds like you have a happy and fulfilling existence, and simply can’t help feeling a little bummed about this one aspect of your life, which is outside of your control. 

I think it’s absolutely fine to give up on internet dating if it’s only causing you stress and heartache. How to give up hope is a different problem, because as you’ve discovered, it’s not something you can force. You can’t simply eradicate desire for something you still secretly want. I think that over time, you can learn to feel more at peace with your single life. But sometimes the only way out is through. 

I don’t think there is any stale aphorism or cliche I could give that would make this an easier pill to swallow. Maybe things do happen when you least expect them (in which case you should take care to steer clear of corn silos). Maybe acceptance will come overnight, like a bolt of lightning, and you’ll wake up one morning, feeling glad to be alone, instead of resigned. Maybe you will always feel slightly sad about it. That doesn’t mean you have the wrong attitude. Some feelings will quietly haunt you for the rest of your life, and THAT’S 👏 VALID 👏

It’s entirely possible to have a rich, interesting and emotionally fulfilling life without romantic relationships. But maybe the most honest thing to say is that there will always be aspects of our lives which are painful and beyond our control. Some feelings cannot be conquered with a positive attitude, and I-based statements. They simply have to be endured, with all the intelligence and wit and patience at our disposal. It’s fine to be sad about something that makes you sad. A lot of beautiful things have come out of frustrated longing, like Dickinson’s poems and Newton’s laws of motion. It’s ultimately better to be honest with yourself about your true feelings than burden yourself with the chore of having to pretend to be cheerful about things that bring you pain. Some feelings we can shrug off, and others we must drag through life, like a glazed ham on a chain. To live is to suffer. 

I hope that one day the dating app industry will die off altogether, and we’ll invent a new system for meeting people. But don’t be too hard on yourself. You may be single, but you’re definitely not alone.