With all the online dating and finding a mate through the internet, you are constantly hearing about compatibility. Everywhere you turn there are compatibility tests. Most all of these sites give tests, and are supposed to find your perfect mate through, yep, compatibility comparison. Relationship coaches talk about, yep, compatibility. When a relationship breaks up, what do you hear? “We were not compatible.”
While these tests may be fun, I believe that compatibility tests should only be used to help you learn about, and understand the other person better, not as a basis for determining if you are compatible. It’s an outline of who you will be spending the rest of your life with, and how to expect them to behave, and react in certain instances. As a chance to know each others strengths and weakness, and to be able to use them to compliment and/or fill in where yours may be lacking. It would be nice to sit down with your lover, and take these tests together, and discuss your answers. But there is more to compatibility than whether or not you both share the same religion, political views, or the same music…you get the idea.
No two people are alike. You will never find someone that has all the same tastes, likes, dislikes, perspectives, values, views, habits, etc., as you. Not to mention that after all, you are not looking for a clone of yourself, and if you are, I think that if you could find it, you would certainly become bored, or even extremely angry with them, if not bordering on loathing.
While there are some factors of compatibility they may, or may not be important to you, like how you each handle money for instance. It would be hard to keep from having constant resentment, anger, and frustration if you are a saver, and the other is a careless spender, for example.
What ever happened to nature’s courting dance, of meeting people, and taking the time, to learn these things about one another. What is the big rush? It all has the feel to me as the equivalent of a job interview. You take in all the applications, throw this one in the reject file, this one in the maybe, that one in the sounds very good pile. Then you set about the face to face interviews. I personally find it very impersonal, not natural, and cheap. Not to mention desperate.
I’m sure I’m pissing a lot of people off, but that is just the way I see it. We go about this process anyway, in a sense, but in the natural way. It’s all about learning about each other from our smell, the feel of the touch, the expressions and observations through our eyes, the sound and tone of their voice, not by checking an answer on a multiple choice questionnaire. What is this, the SATs?
You have to be able to know yourself well enough to know whether or not someone has a trait that you can or can not live with, and that may depend largely on the situation at hand. A machine can not determine that for you.
Compatibility is the ability to exist and live together in harmony. The largest problem of “compatibility”, in my view, is good old fashion, face to face, eyeball to eyeball…communication. Communication is the key to a good relationship, along with the ability to compromise, trust, and trust ability, or in other words integrity and honesty. Your ability to trust and be trusted enough for vulnerability to be present, between you two. A questionnaire just can not determine that for you. It’s just a short cut, and again, what the hell is the rush? Besides, there are programs, and company after company making loads of money, just to teach you the do’s and don’ts on how to prepare an excellent profile, and photograph for these online sites. It’s the equivalent of a well organized and major “pick up line.”
Don’t you want to look into their eyes, and see the expressions on their face, and the body language they exhibit, when you are finding out these answers? Is there not enough deception in a face to face meeting, where at least you have a chance of intuitively knowing, through the use of expressions and body language, whether or not they are sincere, rather than relying on pictures that may be 20 years old, or not even them to begin with, of someone hiding behind a computer screen. Bloggers should be some of the first ones to know how differently people are capable of behaving, relaying, and displaying, behind the anonym ability of our computers.
Maybe it all boils down to the fact that divorce rates are rising as each year passes, and more and more of us are finding ourselves without the lifetime partners that we crave. Maybe it all boils down to the fast pace of society, that also seems to continue to become faster and faster as time goes on, so we are constantly hunting for a shortcut. Maybe it boils down to the computer age, and the decline in quality workmanship, which is also being reflected in our relationships.
It just all seems way too fake for me, but then again, maybe it boils down to me being way too “old fashion” in this regard. 
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1 Love note(s):
At the end of the day, it’s your decision whether you continue in a relationship or not, or indeed if you start a relationship. Flirting can start a relationship, and it can keep the spice going, but you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to and if you decide you don’t want to see them or you want to end it then this is your decision to make and yours alone. Don’t allow anyone to bully you into doing something that you don’t want to do or anything you feel is not right for you. You are in control of your life, you hold the reigns and it’s up to you and not anyone else. However, in saying that, remember there is always compromise to make in any relationship. You have to make sure there is a high degree of compatibility, at least 75 % or higher. But no matter how compatible you are with someone, there is always going to be differences and compromises. Be careful you don’t leave a good or potentially good relationship because you are living the myth of meeting your perfect ten, or one and only soul mate, as you could be very lonely.
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