the new rules i’m setting for love, sex, and dating

basically, it's all coming down to my energy

Confession: I did something gross last week. Something I didn’t think I’d ever do.

I was swiping for men on Hinge like it was my job.

Swipe left, swipe right. Swipe right again.

Twenty minutes went by. Then almost an hour.

Swipe left. Swipe right. Swipe left.

I felt like I was playing some sort of video game — and in a way, I was.

I was either chasing a dopamine fix or searching for my soulmate. Maybe both. It’s confusing these days on the apps.

Finally, I took a beat and asked myself, Brianne, what the hell are you doing?

This is coming from a woman who swore off apps and didn’t download them again until last year — and even then, I did it kicking and screaming.

While my attitude toward dating apps has softened (I do see them as useful tools in our weird modern landscape), the way I was using them was not cute. I was swiping like my love life depended on it.

More importantly, I was swiping from a very needy energy.

I could feel it right away — the anxiety rising in my chest, the thoughts swirling in my head: What if I never date again? What if no one wants to be with me? What if I end up alone?

Who was this Brianne? The same woman who’s comfortable being single, who advocates for women to love their single lives? Sure, we all get wobbly or lonely sometimes, but this felt different.

This was I don’t trust the Universe energy.
This was I don’t trust myself energy.

So I deleted Hinge that night.

I know enough about the so-called “woo woo” world — quantum leaps, manifestation, neural pathways, all of it — to know that when it comes to creating the life you want, energy is everything. It radiates through the words you write, the photos you post, the space you occupy.

And I knew that from this needy, chaotic energy, I wasn’t going to attract the right person for me — or any person for me.

So I decided I needed to shift my energy instead.

shifting my energy to find my rich Richard Gere without becoming a hooker

This extended beyond feeling centred, doing a few grounding breaths, or taking a short meditation break. No — this came from knowing that from a deeper place within me, there is a subconscious pattern that runs my dating life, insidiously, even after all the work I’ve done on myself.

It’s this pattern that whispers, “You’re not enough.” It’s the pattern that not only has me choosing the wrong men, but keeps me fixated on one fucking wrong man for weeks — sometimes months — as if I have to prove my worth, or make it work, or maybe because I think there’s no one else out there and I’ve got to wring romance out of this one.

It’s the same pattern that makes me overexert and overextend my energy toward a potential match — the one who messages first. I think I’m opening the door for them to walk through, sending up a flare like Daisy Buchanan across the pond. But really? I don’t trust that they’ll Gatsby me. I don’t trust that they’ll make their move, fill in the space, or notice that I even exist, so I do it for them: I ask about the first date, I ask where we’re going.

I don’t do it because I feel particularly masculine — though, let’s be real, I’d rather rock pants than a skirt any day (RIP Diane Keaton) — no, I do it because at the root of it all is one thing: “I’m not enough.”

Again, this is alllll subconscious. I’m not walking around thinking, I’m not enough. I’m not thinking that men don’t want to date me or won’t make the first move. But my programming is telling me otherwise. It’s like I’m living in Clockwork Orange: some chip inside me defaults to making first moves, pushing harder with the men I like, assuming they won’t show up, that I have to make it obvious for them.

Honestly? It’s a lot of fucking work. It’s not the energy I want to bring into my dating life, and it’s certainly not the precedent I want to set for future relationships.

So. I’m switching up my energy when it comes to dating, hoping to delete this subconscious programming for good. Here’s how I’m doing that.

I acknowledged my feelings

I identified why I was feeling why I was swiping like a crazy woman — why I was feeling so anxious and needy. And when I got still with myself, I knew the truth: it’s because I want a date. I want to meet my person.

Acknowledging that was really important for me. As someone who’s been mostly single for most of her adult life, admitting that I want to meet someone is huge for me.

And I’m 42. While I don’t think there’s an expiration date on love, I do feel my age sometimes. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that — I think that’s normal. After all, that’s my age. But I realized that since I’m 42, I’m basically midlife, and at this point… I mean, I’d be lucky to live well into my 80s or 90s. The reality is I could be single for most of my life. And the last part of my life may or may not include a partner. That made me sad. Thinking that maybe I won’t meet somebody, or maybe I’ll only have five good years with someone instead of a lifetime together — that also made me sad.

Acknowledging why I was in that state, acknowledging my feelings, acknowledging that I was sad — that was really important for me. Instead of trying to cover it up, instead of swiping for men like I was ordering a pizza, and emotionally bypassing my emotions, I validated them. As hard as it was, it was necessary.

What kind of energy do I want to feel?

Another thing I got clear on is: what do I want to attract in a man? What is the energy I want to attract, and what is the energy I want to embody? Both. Basically, what is the energy of my ideal partnership and our energy exchange?

For me, it really comes down to attraction, resonance, and reciprocity. Because I have a history of overextending myself and over-investing, I know the energy I want in a partnership is one of mutual exchange — both of us giving and receiving.