Dating and Making Friends in 2020

Hey people.

Just spending some time in this thread, and I wanted to make a short top of apps that helped me during lockdown to make friends and also date. Not just in lockdown, but previous to that as well.

Recently, I moved to London, with my job, so having no friends over there, it was and still is pretty tough for me.

Dating Apps I use

Tinder – although still kinda of dodgy sometimes, it is still one of the best out there if you can navigate through it, people are pretty decent on engagement

Happn – sometimes, you see someone on the street, but you don't approach that person because who knows what. Happn solves this challenge, by matching you with people you crossed paths with. Sure, they need to have the app downloaded as well.

This is what I use for dating pretty much, there's also OkCupid and Bumble but never tried them.

Let's move on to friendship. What is happening today, when we are so connected by digital, but many of us still feel lonely.

There is a combination of factors probably to this issue, I am not a psychologist to answer this, but I can tell what worked for me when I just moved out to a new city and constantly got lost here.

– Facebook Groups – dodgy, true, but still you can spark some conversations there, so try to look up for Groups in your area and see what's up inside, see some of the members, how legit they look, how engaged

– Serendip – although relatively new in the market, I was surprised with funny ice-breakers, interesting people, good engagement and overall a good experience. Have not met yet with any of them outside of the app due to Covid-19, but planning to do so soon.

There is a lot of buzz when it comes to dating/friendship, but if we follow a few general rules, we can all have meaningful connections in our day to day life, which is very important for our happiness.

1. Engage with friends weekly or daily, go out, see a movie, chill in the park
2. Don't force a friendship, if they don't want you close, don't push it
3. Stand on their side when things get tough
4. Don't judge, use empathy instead and come up with solutions or advice
5. Be honest, even if they are your friends, they make mistakes sometimes, so don't tell them what they want to hear, but tell them what they need to hear
6. Chill out, life is actually good.

Hope this helps. If not, just label me as another douchebag and buy a bag of Lays, watch some Netflix or buy a dog.

PS – if nothing works, really, buy a dog, they can be way better friends than humans sometimes