文章探讨了如何通过改变对约会的态度来减轻焦虑，核心在于接受“不确定性”和“不强求”。作者认为，约会不是说服对方喜欢自己，而是筛选与自己契合的人。这种心态转变使得“善于调情”、“出糗”和“成功”等概念变得不再重要。文章分享了作者自身的经验，强调了安全感的重要性，即接受单身的可能性。当一个人能够坦然接受所有结果时，反而会变得更有吸引力，从而更容易建立关系。

💖 核心观点：约会是筛选，而非说服。作者认为，约会的本质是发现与自己契合的人，而不是努力说服对方喜欢自己。这种心态的转变可以减轻约会带来的焦虑感。

😌 转变过程：作者通过接纳“不在一起”的可能性，获得了安全感。这种安全感来自于与引导者的合作，学会信任自己的直觉和感受，以及发展自己的“解学”理论。

✨ 结果与吸引力：当一个人能够坦然接受所有结果，包括单身，反而会变得更有吸引力。这种安全感减少了需求感，使人更具魅力。文章认为，约会更像一个新康姆问题，强调了在关系中“接受”的重要性。

Published on July 11, 2025 9:31 PM GMT

A mindset that resolved a lot of my personal anxiety for dating: I'm not trying to convince anyone to like me… I'm filtering for people who are already a good match.^[1]

When this mindset is accessible, the concepts of “flirting well”, “fumbling”, and “success” start to feel funny and even meaningless. 

When my girlfriend and I got together, I felt extremely attracted to her but I wasn’t anxious about whether or not she liked me back. I had no pull to “convince” her to be with me. Instead, it felt like: “Are we in the timeline where we work out? Let’s see!” It felt really, really relaxed.

Put another way:

I’d prefer to flirt with and attract people who are charmed by my most relaxed self, and less with everyone else. 

“But what if my relaxed self isn’t a good fit with anyone???”

SO this is what I ultimately needed to feel secure with: the possibility of ending up alone. Once I felt secure with that, dating became much easier!

To be clear, I wasn’t always like this! 

What changed was that I found a way to feel secure with all possibilities of not dating her (or anyone), ending up alone, etc. This involved working with a decent facilitator, learning to trust my intuitions/feelings, and ultimately developing my own theories of unlearning.

Ironically, when you feel secure with outcomes, you become more attractive. People who feel secure with the possibility of not dating are less needy! Dating is a Newcomb Problem:

1. ^{^}

   I don’t actually know if long-term romantic compatibility is fixed — this is basically a debate about free will — but it’s useful!

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