Single people are most likely looking for a mate. Loneliness is a thing, and it’s everything it’s cracked up to be. If people weren’t seeking companionship, there wouldn’t be dating apps, bars, meetup groups, co-ed sports, and public fitness gyms.
But the single greatest, and formerly most common way to people is in the workplace. Why?
At work, you’re placed in this environment with dozens, if not hundreds, of other adults who were also randomly placed there. You and the others have four important things in common:
You were hired without meeting or experiencing many of your coworkers
You’re all unified (to some extent) by the mission of the company
You’re all human with physical, mental, and chemical attractions
Everyone is physically present, together, in the same environment for eight hours a day
When you take a job, it’s an exciting adventure into the unknown. You can only imagine what you’ll get to do, and who you’ll get to do it with. Will the people be friendly? Will the boss be a jackass? What kinds of people work here?
The only thing you can count on is that everyone there went through exactly what you’re going through. They had no idea what or who they would find. But you can guarantee a portion of them had their eye out for potential relationships. Let’s face it, there’s a reason we go out with co-workers now and again, and it’s not just the share experiences.
Speaking of shared experiences, as a company, you’re all in it together. Most workplaces have their own little territorial disputes, disagreements, and infighting. But in general, you’re all united by the mission of the company, and everyone is working toward the same goal. In fact, it’s deliberate acknowledgement of this fact that defuses many workplace disputes.
And while all of you are united by the company mission, a smaller fraction of you are united by your physical or mental attractions–specifically, those who are deliberately seeking a long-term partner. Everyone is human, so unfortunately, even those in committed relationships can stray, but by and large, those who are available often connect romantically.
This is the way it’s been since women joined the workforce en masse. Men and women were matched not only by the company mission, but by their economic, educational, and social strata. Factory workers met other factory workers. Accountants met other accountants. Physicists met other physicists.
It’s not a hard and fast rule, but your direct co-workers are the first people you’d meet. Until COVID.
As soon as the government turned the workforce upside down with remote work, the ability to physically meet and work with someone largely disappeared. This was catastrophic for healthy, natural, and chance meetings.
The reason the workplace is such a great place, and way, to meet people is because you get to observe each other. You can see how a potential match interacts with other people, whether they’re on the same team, in the department, just in the company, or even clients and customers. You can see how they naturally behave.
You get to experience their sense of humor. If you get to know them personally, you learn about their background, likes, dislikes, and thoughts on things not work-related. All without the pressure of whether or not it will result in a relationship. You get to see how caring they are with others. Perhaps nurturing, good-natured, easy-going, methodical, whimsical, high-energy, introverted.
When you work with someone, your first inclination is to work with them. But once you get to know them, they may become more attractive. And if the chemistry is there, these things can happen fairly naturally.
But with remote work becoming the norm, we’re not meeting our co-workers like we used to. And whether you like it or not, Zoom is not a great way to learn about another. And it’s a non-starter when that person is eight states away.
So we turn to dating apps. And the natural progression is gone. We don’t get to observe someone first. We don’t get to observe them in the context of work with the naturally-occurring attraction coming later.
With dating apps, the pressure is on. We don’t get to ease into the relationship. If we connect on a dating app and meet, sure, it can go well. And successful marriages ensue. But for most dates, there’s a pressure that goes with that first meeting that a natural workplace meeting just doesn’t feature. And so it twists and spoils the entire dating experience.
When comparing meeting naturally at work or meeting on a dating app, there’s no comparison. One is a natural, pressure-free way to connect, while the other is a high-stakes, pressure-packed venture into the unknown where your unrealistic expectations must be met in the first ten minutes or this thing is over.
Remote work caused so much destruction to our functional society, and human relations, relationships, partnerships, and marriages are chief among them.