When you put those things out there, the things that might polarize people, that might turn a lot of people off, that you are actually helping the people who would like those things about you to find you.
Welcome to Making Polyamory Work. Hi, I'm Libby Sinback and I want to thank you for being with me today. I am a queer polyamorous mom and an Integrative Relationship Transformation Guide. And I am committed through my work to helping people who live and love outside the status quo have extraordinary relationships. Because, this relationships are at the core of our well-being as humans. I think love is why we're here and how we heal.
So one of my friends was just kind of cheekily sharing in an online community that we're both a part of. And he was sharing this screenshot from a dating app where he had shared this kind of like maybe slightly overshary or maybe like overly deep and thoughtful chat with a person that he'd been chatting up in the dating app.
And the person, you know, they showed the person's response to and the person responded, I don't really know what to do with that. And then kind of a brownie face kind of emoji. And he was like, maybe I need to work on my flirting skill, but it got me thinking because to me, I don't see anything wrong with that interaction. I mean, yes, he was chatting up a potential partners slash lovers, slash new friend, whatever. And that person was turned off by something that he said.
But does that mean that he shouldn't have said it? Does that mean he should have like clamped down on this part of himself that was whimsical and thoughtful and deep just because it might turn someone off? I recognize that in sort of a more marketplace, monogamy kind of scarcity mindset, there's only so many fish in the sea, you've got to catch one and you're going to try to lock it down.
That maybe the mindset there might be, yeah, I need to like hide aspects of myself that might make me less attractive in the dating marketplace until I've caught a good fish or whatever. And then I can kind of start to let things hang out and let things show and then we'll see how it goes. But hopefully I think the mindset is that like, I'm going to hide some things that might be unattractive about me, but with the hope that the person will start to like me.
And then I can start showing those things that might make me more unattractive, but they'll like me so much that they're willing to like put up with that. I've actually talked about this in a way, way, previous episode called full disclosure. And so I highly recommend checking that out where I'm mostly just talking about when should you tell somebody whether your polyamorous or not when you're, you know, on the dating apps and in the market for partners.
And of course I say like as soon as possible, it's a good filtering mechanism, but I still see it all the time that people don't want to disclose anything about themselves to a new potential partner that might turn that partner off. And I see this especially no offense, y'all I don't mean to come pick on you, but I see this especially with cis straight men. And so I want to talk about this because I think it is so the wrong approach.
At the same time, I just want to say before I tell you about how wrong I think you are. I want to say I get it. Like I totally I do get it. You may not think that I get it because I am not a cisgender straight man on dating apps, but I have put myself in y'alls shoes. And also even though I'm not a cisgender straight man, I am a 40-something cis white lady on the asexual spectrum. And I'm awkward AF and I'm not I'm not joking. I'm super awkward.
It's funny because when my friend shared the screenshot of his messaging back and forth with this potential partner or potential date, I guess. And I thought like that that would be me. I would be the one to post the weird awkward overly wordy, overly thoughtful thing and turn somebody off. I dating actually isn't easy for me either. And not because I'm this hot, you know thing that is just getting so many messages from dudes that I'm just overwhelmed.
It's it's because like I'm what I put exactly who I am out on my profile and a lot of people don't know what to do with that. And yet I really believe that there are an abundance of people that I could connect with. And I think for every person who might be feeling a sense of scarcity or a feeling a sense of, oh, I don't know who's ever going to like me or who's ever going to date me.
There are a lot of people out there for you too. And I want to offer up the possibility that maybe you want to find people who not only are willing to put up with whatever is weird or awkward or unattractive, quote unquote unattractive about you. But rather you might want to find people who are excited about who you are and are not like tolerant, but like actually excited who actually think that the things about you that other people might reject are actually like features and not bugs.
And that when you put those things out there, the things that might polarize people that might turn a lot of people off that you are actually helping the people who would like those things about you to find you. Yes, you're probably going to go through a lot of knows, but the yes is that you're going to find are going to be extremely high quality individuals for you to date and connect with. So instead of thinking about I'm going to make myself as generic as possible as attractive as possible.
I'm going to cast a white net and try to see who I will catch really think about instead to use looking annoying marketing term consider niching way, way, way, way down. And actually I want to say that like in marketing, this is the advice for anybody who's running a small business. If you're running a small business, unless you're selling toilet paper, everybody is not your customer.
And if everybody was your customer, you would need a huge operation that if you're a small business, you don't want to have if you're like me, like a solo printer, basically all you need to find are the people who want to hire you. And when I'm thinking about dating, all you need to find are the people who want to date you and there are not that many people that any one person can date at a given time.
So let's say max in the place that you are living or maybe if you're open to long distance, maybe not even in the place that you're living, but max, you probably need like what? One to four people to really think you're awesome enough to go out with.
Out of a sea of however many depending on where you live, like I can understand the feeling of scarcity and living in like a small town. But even then I think you might just have to expand your radius to find your people, the people who are going to really connect with you and be excited about you.
But then how do those people actually find you? How do the people who are going to be your people who are going to think you're amazing? How are they going to find you? They definitely aren't going to find you if you are trying to make yourself as generic and conventionally attractive as possible. If you are polyamorous, if you are non monogamous, you're probably some brand of weird and so you're probably going to be a really good fit with someone else who is some brand of weird.
And what I say is shine your weirdo light really brightly and as clearly as you can so that people can find you. And then on the apps really look for the people who are also doing the same thing. It does mean you're going to probably actually swipe left a whole lot more or click no thanks on more people. And it probably means you're going to match with fewer people and it probably means there are going to be some people who will match with you and then unmatched with you.
And my invitation here is to reframe this not as rejection, but as filtering. So if you're presenting who you are, like I was thinking about this friend of mine and sharing that, you know, the him showing up as authentically as himself. And this person saying that's not for me. What I see that as is not rejection. I mean, I guess it is. But what I see it really as is that person saying, I'm not your customer. I'm not for you. And so it's not like that person was ever his to begin with.
It was that this person is saying, I am not a fit for who you are. And I think that that's like a bullet dodge to like you showed who you are. This person said, no, that doesn't mean there's something wrong with you. It means that person isn't a fit. There are going to be other people where you send an awkward AF message like that like I would and the person will go, oh my gosh. Finally, someone I can be awkward AF with.
How wonderful is that. And then you'll be being all deep and intense and gooey and stuff with each other. And before you know it, you'll have found a new friend or a new partner or a new lover. But you won't find that person at least not as easily if you're hiding yourself or cutting parts of yourself off to appear more acceptable.
And I know some of you listening to this might think to yourself, no, no, no, no, Libby, you don't understand how weird I am or you don't understand how long I've been looking or how many times I've been turned down. And if you're saying that I believe you, I totally do. And I still believe with every fiber in my being that every person has a person or multiple people out there for them.
I really believe that I have never met a person where I have gone, oh, there is literally nobody that would be a good fit for you. Instead, what happens to me is I meet so many people who I'm like, oh my gosh, you would be such a catch as long as people could find you as long as people could see who you are. And so all it takes is just the confidence to be who you are. And then people will find you.
And again, the apps can be tricky because of all the swiping. So I encourage you if you're if the apps are like discouraging you, I would encourage you to try going another route to meeting partners like my top piece of advice for anybody who's having trouble with the apps, but especially cis men is to go to community events, show up in online community spaces.
And just be a person without an agenda, just show up, connect, be yourself. I know that's like such cliche advice, but there's a reason why it's cliche advice y'all be yourself and just connect with other humans and see what you enjoy and see who's enjoying you and who's vibing off of you.
It's a whole lot harder to try to package yourself if you're showing up in person. And also there is, I think, more opportunity for chemistry, for just that intangible feeling that you get with other people when you're just around them, when you're around their energy with your, which is none of that is translatable in an app.
And I also think that if you're a specifically assist straight man, one of the things that does work against you on the apps if you're interested in mostly women is that most women who are on apps are getting a bunch of like really useless annoying messages from some cis men who are also hiding themselves and not being genuine and not me authentic and not putting themselves forward and instead trying some, I don't even know what they're doing.
But like if you show up at an event, first of all, you put your skin in the game right away. Second of all, if you just show up and are your friendly sweet charming self or even your weird awkward AF introvert itself, if you just kind of keep showing up, it's harder to write you off as a dirt bag.
It's harder to write you off as one of the C of many people who just aren't trying and just don't get it and are playing some kind of game. Instead you get to be a real human being in the flesh and most of the guys that I know who do that usually end up having more partners and they know what to do with.
A thing I really need everyone, man, woman, trans, non-binary, all of the different types of people, the thing that I really want you to hear and I think some of you already will be nodding your head and know this is that when you take away that scarcity, everybody's trying to pair off, mono mindset and instead there's this abundance mindset of lots of different opportunities and configurations and ways that we could partner with each other.
You stop having this hierarchy of attractiveness that can happen and I'm not just talking about physical attractiveness, there are all these different things that I think people would rate themselves on in terms of attractiveness. Do I have a good job? Do I have lots of money? Do I have a nice house? Do I wear nice clothes? All of these sort of attribute based ways of like rating a person.
And what I love about polyamory is that those things, because you're not just looking for one person to like be or everything, those things matter less because you're not trying to find the best of all of the possibilities. Instead, you're just trying to find your people and I think that really, really changes the game. So I'm actually going to wrap it up here, but I'll just recap again.
If you have that scarcity mindset, if you have that idea that I need to pair myself down and make myself as generic and appealing and widely appealing as possible, I want to invite you to do the opposite. Be as specifically who you are, shine your unique light as bright as you can. And yes, that is going to turn some people way off of you.
But that is a gift, my love. That is a gift because if you are spending time on people who are ultimately not going to be a fit for you, that's a waste of your time and theirs. And it's probably not going to feel any better to be rejected after you've been together for months after they finally seen your real self than it is to be rejected by just a swipe to the left.
So be yourself. And I promise you, if you shine your light bright and be fully show yourself to be fully who you are, the people who are going to go, oh my God, you, I've been looking for you. We'll be able to find you. So happy dating. Thank you so much for joining me today. If you have any thoughts about what I've said today or a question for the show, I'd love to hear from you.
You can find me on Instagram as that PolyM mom or you can go to the shows website making polyamorywork.com and submit a question there. I'll also say that if you're loving my podcasts, but you are looking for more support, I do this for a living. I am an integrated relationship guide. So I help individuals, couples and groups have amazing relationships. You can find out more about my offerings on my website.
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