Tinder, Bumble, Hinge, and why I keep going back.

Hope this thread becomes more of a discussion.

I've written in my journal a lot about these apps. Not about anything specific, but I notice that they keep getting brought up, and I keep going back.

I feel like these apps to me in my head are like... "justifiable porn" or something like that. I'm looking at different threads about this subject on NF and it seems like it can be fairly split. For me I just keep going back because in my head I'm like "Well dating is normal and dating apps are normal now, so being on proactive on them is a healthy step right?" or something like that. While a lot of that is true, I don't think they're healthy for me right now.

My behavior on these apps are download, make my profile, swipe on whatever, run out, and then I find myself constantly deleting and re-downloading these apps all the time. Starving for interaction. It's not even like I don't talk to women, I have really close friends who are girls, but I feel like these apps fuck me up because (like porn) they're a quick (potential) dopamine fix because of the fantasy about meeting to hook-up or something like that.

Besides THAT aspect of dating apps, the other aspect is that I kind of don't like them in general...? It's not some blind hate like "Oh I'm ugly and women are blah blah", I just never went to the internet to make real connections with people, man or woman. Like, I play games a lot and I can have fun interacting with strangers online, but I never add them and start becoming their friends, inviting to a discord, etc. No problem with people that do this obviously, but I never do that it was just never appealing to me. With dating apps, I usually feel no incentive to keep talking to people cause more often than not is meaningless small talk where you can't get a sense of who they are at all? It's a weird dance where you have to talk for a little bit cause you can't just be like "what's up? nothin much you? yeah just chilling anyway wanna meet up?" Idk, putting emotional investment in people is a lot of work and can really stressful. Then there's weird shit where if too much time passes do you feel weird about messaging them, are you ghosting them / vice versa, etc.

Anyways, I just feel like right now avoiding PMO is going well, but these apps to me are like if you were an alcoholic, and as a pastime you just went to a bar alone to hang out...secretly hoping that you'll be offered a free drink. On paper it's "fine" but it's a dangerous environment to be in during this process.

 

Thanks for the reply, it's good to hear some perspective that doesn't have a bias. I just deleted all my accounts (Tinder, Hinge, Bumble) before. I've done this before, but I haven't in a while. I need to be aware that these aren't helpful for me right now and rather focus on myself and personal goals.