Should You Take A Dating Break?

Swipe, Match, Meet. Swipe, Match, Meet. Dating Fatigue Is Real—and a Common Problem. To Reboot Your Search for Love, Consider Tapping Out for a While.

- Esther Perel

There’s no denying that dating can be exhilarating. But from endless swiping to meeting to rejecting (or being rejected by) dozens of matches, it can also be profoundly exhausting. When you haven’t found success, and you’ve become reliant on your smartphone to try to find the person you want to be with longterm, it’s easy to grow disillusioned and resent the entire experience. I see this among my clients. People who are normally friendly, warm, and upbeat grow cold, defeated, and cynical. They’ve been through so many deceitful, “I’m just going out with you so I can sleep with you” letdowns. They tell me that they don’t believe in love anymore and question whether their expectations are stratospherically high or catastrophically low. Clearly frustrated, they even start to doubt their own self-worth.

In cases like these, I recommend taking a deliberate break from dating and treating it like a cleanse. That may sound drastic, but it works wonders for your self-care and sets you up for a more fruitful dating future. Here are your ground rules for pressing pause.

MAKE SURE THE TIME IS RIGHT