Online dating

The speaker discusses their experiences with dating apps, particularly a Muslim dating site. They express their interest in Muslim women and their struggles with finding a partner. They mention their reluctance to pay for the app and their difficulty in answering the profile questions. The speaker emphasizes the importance of getting to know someone beyond physical attraction and mentions their preference for companionship and friendship. They also mention their love for food and desire for a partner who can cook. They express their belief that relationships should happen naturally and that everything is as it should be. Someone once asked me many many years ago have you ever tried a dating app? and it so happened that I did dabble with it for a moment I don't believe anything came of it but I went down that route and every so often I've done that again the most recent one was a Muslim site I have always been interested in Muslim women and I wondered what would it be like for an ex-Jew to sort of look for a partner who was I didn't really get anywhere because I guess I wasn't really serious and also I'm reluctant to pay for if it becomes a point where I can do it without having to pay but maybe I don't get to read the messages which has been on something then it sort of becomes pointless and I realised I'm not serious I just wonder I just have a go at filling out some profile and see what happens see if it produces any interest but I find the whole experience on the whole too much and I suppose if I paid for it then I'd have to get my money's worth so I'd have to be really ready to sort of accept the possibilities of in that kind of thing and I'm constantly adjusting my profile and what it is I say, what my answers are it's so complicated for me it takes over my life almost instantly I have to get out it's just too much I'm sure it can work and works for some but it can't work for me I can't answer those questions properly it doesn't matter what answers I put I'm never happy with them and they are going to create an issue for me very quickly and I'm not looking for something I realise I just have an idea of something those things can't go anywhere but I suppose it makes sense that if the aim is I must have a partner I must have a girlfriend I must have opportunities to date which I've never done actually I've never really dated I've had several relationships but I've never dated it's all happened, it's all come about in the present spontaneously people I know, people I work with it just happens, I can't, I don't go looking for it I don't go to clubs and pubs on the pull never done it been once or twice with people who took me so that I could see what it was like from the inside and never wanted to go back never liked it I respect those who can use it and do who want something and can find it or who are I guess not picky they're just looking for something that will work they've had it, married, divorced, maybe kids so on, different parts of the world obviously as well it becomes a major thing but it all stems out of the idea of companionship want and then what are your preferences well tall or short or coloured eyes and hair I can't answer those questions because it's not just about that obviously it has to be about that on some level but it's all about who the person is who are you inside you have to get to know somebody so I can't have all these preferences that are essential I try to be as vague as possible as wide a catchment I don't know how to describe it as profile as possible so I don't but of course there will be some and I have very specific ideas about these things and this is the place to put those into practice in life while of course attraction does play a big part there's more to be attracted to than just the physical and for me that is usually what I look for or that stands out for me first I don't see the most attractive person as ever being the one I could be with even though I am attracted and in the past would have loved to but it would just overwhelm me I couldn't function through the desire that that attraction produces so it's not that I need plain people or normal looking or less attractive people but I suppose it does help although I still find those people beautiful to me so it's a strange thing to actually talk about while there are some really gorgeous women who are also lovely to be around there are also many gorgeous women who are so used to having attention and always being hit on or always being, you know made to feel that they are gorgeous that it affects their personality structure how they actually develop and they could also be more superficial more vain and I can't be around that so I don't get to experience those who are seemingly so attractive but for me, like I said, attraction comes out of the person the spirit, the soul, the mind and we're going to all change physically anyway we're all going to get old and change exactly so in a sense that part isn't relevant maybe that part is only a good indicator of marriage, parenting part bringing children, I've already done that I'm not looking to bring more children and do that again so now I'm interested in even less interested in or recognise what is attractive or more open to things that are attractive that maybe I wasn't open to when I was younger they always were attractive but I just wasn't able to see it properly but I'm still not those moments when I've reached out because I could just open a laptop type in, go to a site, try that, try a few I'm bored, I'm feeling lonely I'm at a vulnerable point and that seems to be the answer it certainly gives me a lot to do in order to feel like I can put myself out there and then I very quickly usually within a week or ten days completely close the account just that's it, I'm done, I can't cope with what takes place, how much I feel like I have to check what happens when somebody does send me a message and then I've got to either decide do I pay to go further because I'd need to this is obviously after all a business they're not giving it away for free and then I realise that well actually I don't well why not, it's not a fortune because I guess I don't really want to have to if I pay I'll want to make it work I'll want to use it and then I realise nope that's really complicated anything that I come up with this way will not be what I'm looking for I just get that feeling and I'm only, I don't know how to say it like playing with the idea that it could work for me when the reality is none of it does none of it works every time I've had intentions to make something happen I might have achieved them certainly when I was younger I might have achieved those intentions but I always came to realise that there was a price to pay and I always ended up suffering as a result of that specific intention not of having the relationship per se but of my intentions of it, for it, about it what I wanted, what I imagined can come up with things when I'm not looking for it to and it can tempt me into following it and has often may, comes to be as a result almost always in many ways, in some form as I've evolved, grown up I've learnt to let go of a lot and allow it to happen the universe can do things in ways that I can't but back in the day I used to be very intentional and very patient and ended up with something but by the time I did care for what you wish for it wasn't what I wanted and I realised it really quickly the obsessiveness that overtook me made it seem like I did but it was only in my mind it was only an idea, it was only a feeling something that the brain was putting out that would eventually, could eventually allow me to couple, procreate, pass on the genes which is what the physical part of us just needs us to do and has been doing ever since we've been human ever since we've been alive, whatever that means in order to be, continue, we have to be able to procreate and we've done it ever since we've been able to I guess what I was looking for in many ways was like a companion, a pen pal, a friend and yet there doesn't seem to be any way to really differentiate between friendship, because it can include physical things and then it becomes something else just by default but yes, friendship, connection needs to be there first for me that I've always known if I simply end up with someone because of attractiveness it becomes a problem trying to do it in reverse but yeah, I suppose the women I found on the sites that I looked at they were looking for more they were divorced they were wanting something that was missing from their life and I, being, the way to a man's heart is through his stomach know that the Muslim food I love and if she cooked a traditional wife I like the idea of it we would still have to be friends, partners we would still have to have lots in common but tradition, that sort of traditional stuff seemed like something I might like and I couldn't really do my own ancestral cultural tradition so I had the idea that maybe I could, you know, be that, go that way I've always had great respect for the Muslim people and I find them to be good, honourable people but like all, you know, with their own issues but then I suppose I could do the same with an Indian woman I love curry and those who can actually cook the kind of food I would eat every day all the time I mean, blimey, that would be a keeper but I'm trivialising kind of like traditional roles only if that's what she wanted to be and liked to do it but I guess that any woman who would be able to deal with me wouldn't be a traditional woman anyway and so that's pipe dream stuff I just love to eat food, spicy foods, well cooked foods I love women who can cook I can cook but I can't be bothered and I'm good at certain things but I don't want to do recipes I'm good at being creative, spontaneous I can make things with all kinds of things but I like the proper stuff and I don't want to pay for it, it's too expensive I want someone to be able to cook it and I've never really been with anyone who can cook my first wife, partner, learnt to cook actually and she was really good at sort of certain foods she had no confidence and became confident through being able to cook and by enjoying her food but I've never been with someone who can cook Asian food as they've grown up with it and so on Traditional wife, yeah, I don't know I'm not living a traditional life and it would be a kind of bit of a gender filled I don't know, wrong for me to be looking because I want someone who can cook nice curry but if she was able to that would be a blinding bonus that's for sure but then here you go in like, well, so who do you want? Well I want her to do this, she must be able to cook I can't do any of those things I can barely deal with finding somebody who I'm interested in and then how do I do it? What do I say? How much do I reveal? How do I show it? How do I commit it? How do I bring it? I just, all of those things I have always found difficult to do yet they have, I've been in relationships I've had partners and wives so something has worked but I can't decide in that way it just has to happen and if it's not happening then it isn't something I can try to change because I think it's missing I have to see things as nothing is missing and everything is exactly as it's supposed to be and that makes much more sense to me.