Recently I've come across a 'dilemma' so to speak. I as a young, 20-year-old, confident woman, I have a dilemma. I sadly and unfortunately have grown up in a generation that has created possibly the worst dating regime and way of thinking.

Although I have not recently been dumped or had a bad experience on a date, I have known and thought about this for quite some time now, but I have recently come to understand how this form of dating ultimately affects me. I now recognize how insecure people have become. We have been shaped and groomed by social media and the societal 'norms' around us making it difficult to let people in. At least, not right away of course. We have indirectly and directly been told to keep our guards up- no matter how long you’ve known the person. Don’t be too vulnerable, don't show that you *gasp* might like them and have feelings for them.

For many of us, we go to our close friends for advice about possible future dates we might go on and people we are interested in. However, all too often we let our friends become the decision-makers and the voices in our head. Now, sometimes that isn't always a bad thing; our friends are able to see it from an outside view and are able to help guide us when it comes to sticky situations. Unfortunately, though, this tends to add too many different thoughts and opinions into one scenario that should be between two people. I will willingly admit that I am totally guilty of doing this. When I meet a new guy, I am already texting my girlfriends and receiving the expected and overly excited responses. I, as many other people I can assume, want to update my friends on what's going on in my romantic life and we always need advice, even if we technically made up our minds on something already.

My point is, our generation tends to overanalyze interactions which can ultimately lead to misinterpretation. We constantly ask ourselves and our friends, What did he mean by this text?! Does he only want a hookup? Should I keep texting him for another week or meet up with him? This is what I mean when I say we are insecure. It is not completely in the sense of being insecure about our looks or personalities- we are insecure about how the other person will react to anything we say or do. We feel the need to second-guess everything we want to text or even say in person. I find myself and many other people saying words such as “Well nowadays it’s hard to know what someone wants out of this.” This uncertainty manifests from a lack of communication. It frequently occurs where one person interprets a situation one way, while the other person could have an entirely different idea. Not just women, but men too, are constantly confused and tangled around the mystery question of “What does this all mean?” And not to mention the infamous dating app, called Tinder. One can only imagine how this leads to even more uncertainty, and the questions just continue to pile up.

For many young adults and those in their 20-somethings, we don't actually know what dating is or should be like. We like to blame it on texting and social media and not always having face-to-face conversations- which I will say is partial to blame, but it isn’t the only culprit. We were never taught how to show true feelings, or to show interest in a person, without it possibly being backhanded or 'creepy'. Why? Because we talk ourselves into those situations. A guy comes up to you to flirt with you at a bar? We label it as potentially creepy. A girl tries to get to know you through mutual friends because she thinks you're cute. We label it as potentially creepy, or 'stalker-ish'.

As I stated above, I view myself as a relatively confident young woman, who knows not to take any bulls*** from men or people in general. I respect myself and I believe I make mature and thought-out decisions. If that’s the case, though, then why do I still find myself second-guessing the things I want to say or the way I act around a guy who I’m going on a date with? It’s most definitely not because I want to seem unlike myself. Or that I do not want to be assertive in my choices. I suppose it all circles back to what I have been discussing, insecurity. We subconsciously decide that we are not yet ‘good enough’ for this other person and that if we appear that way, they will reject us. Which is SO stupid. Right? We should have enough self-awareness to ourselves to tell our minds to stop allowing these silly games to keep playing. Yet we continue this cycle over and over again.

So how can we change this vicious pattern? How can we eradicate this and possibly shed some positive light on a new wave of dating? I’m not a dating expert, but if I were to offer my advice, I would say to lessen the amount of overanalyzing ourselves and recognize that many of these issues stem from our insecurities.