Dating : The Alive Ghosts of Human Assholes

“Heyy you. I haven’t heard from you in a bit and was wondering if everything is okay?”

Is this the message you typed and erased a million times? Over my podcast worthy discussion with a friend, we spoke about the subject of ghosting. For the loving couples that are unaware of this concept, ghosting is defined as “the practice of ending a personal relationship with someone by suddenly and without explanation withdrawing from all communication.” For a while I’ll admit that I have been a participant in this culture. I have been in both places, the ghostee and the ghoster and I am not proud of either. While I may have evolved and now believe in taking responsibility of my feelings and emotions and dealing with them better than I used to, I understand that a bunch of people still feel like they are “victims” of this culture. A lot of people are also afraid of online dating for this very reason.

For a moment though, let’s take a pause and get the ghostee out of the victim role and the ghoster out of the asshole role and see them as human beings dealing with emotions. It can be really difficult turning someone down or knowing exactly what to do. Not as difficult as feeling stranded while you stare at the phone, wait for a notification and lose your mind over it, but still difficult. In such a situation the first and the most important thing to take care of is your self esteem. Know that rejecting someone doesn’t uplift your value and if someone rejects you that is not a reflection on your self worth either.

To the ghostee- This is a subject that bothered me for the longest time. Past Jayanti in her unhealthy states of mind would probably just text a different person (who she knew will definitely reply) just to get the satisfaction. However, after I got to a mentally healthier place, I heard this in one of the Mindvalley talks, when Vishen said something along the lines of having a big end goal in life. He gave this very example of someone not texting you back as a petty thing that people would worry about when their goals in life aren’t big enough. I know it is easy to say forget it, don’t think about it and focus on your big goal of getting the world rid of poverty or saving the planet, but in the moment you will still want to stare at your phone. Well if you are staring at the phone, then might as well pick it up and text the ghoster. Have the courage to take in whatever they say or don’t say if they still wouldn’t reply. But get the burden off your chest. You deserve to be happy. Don’t let a random stranger from the internet take that away from you.

To the ghoster- Well, to begin with, a lot of times the ghoster is probably not even aware that they are or were a ghoster. So to anyone reading this thought I ever ghosted them- I sincerely apologize. I am sure you are a wonderful human being and you deserve the best. I truly believe that there are no assholes, just human beings who don’t know how to deal with their emotions (the title was just to make it sound cool). The quote “Hurt people hurt people” always helps with any forgiveness exercise, but in this instance if you do believe that you have caused any hurt, ask yourself, “In what way am I hurt?” Don’t walk away, ignore people, use them for validation and waste their valuable emotions. Heal yourself instead of passing on the hurt. Few times in my life, after a first date, I have been in situations where people asked me if they wanted a second date because they weren’t sure of the signs and signals I gave them (apparently that is a thing). Some may perceive this as a brutal thing, but to me, this is honesty. This is to save damage and therefore I did end up saying “Sorry, I don’t really see this going anywhere in the future”. They were not particularly bad people, they are/were wonderful and I know that some of them are now dating other people, I just wasn’t attracted to them and that is okay. Just as okay as someone else may not find me attractive.

As far as online dating is concerned, in a conventional sense I cannot ever be labelled as a “winner” of any kind. I spend my Friday evenings with my cat at home and I’ll occasionally browse through profiles when I feel like I could be open to something romantic. However, I can tell you that some wonderful things have happened as a result of non-ghosting. I am still in touch with people I matched with years ago and I am building collaborations based on it. I am not awkward about reaching out to them and neither are they!

I know dating is confusing, ghosting and self pity are easier, but for a change and for experiment sake, I urge you to try non-ghosting. I urge you to take a few seconds and reply to that text saying “Hey I had a great time with you, but I think we are looking for different things”. I urge you to stop seeing yourself as a victim and reach out and tell the other person and say “Hey you are not a ghost. It is okay if you are seeing someone else or don’t think I am your type. I understand”. We are all going to die and probably be ghosts someday, but until then I urge you to be humans with open hearts and honest communication. Do you think you can try?