The other benefit of vulnerability is that by showing who you truly are, it filters out the options that actually want somebody with a different set of qualities. If you pretend to be outgoing and social while dating, it makes it hard to transition later to your true introvert self with that person, whereas if you are honest about who you are from... See more

The critical question is what happens after you’ve figured out what you really need and want. If you put that out there in the world, it opens you up to criticism for being too picky or demanding. Worse, it reduces the number of options available, putting you in a situation where you might get rejected by the option you’ve set your heart on.

On the... See more

One reason is that much of the time, we don’t actually know what we want. Checking out our options lets us figure out what matters and what doesn’t to us. Most of us start dating anybody who will go out with us; we might have a list of “requirements”, but over time as we meet people, we figure out what we actually need, and what is more of a... See more