So after the first few comments on yesterday's 'Experience and Maturity' post, I could tell that it was an EPIC fail. So today
I am going to try and get my point across without all the window dressing. In the immortal words of Don Knotts from The Ghost and Mr. Chicken, "Let me clarify this."
Person A is a mature adult looking for a relationship that could lead to marriage.
Person A has life experiences 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 and 10.
These life experiences can be just about anything from a socio-economic background, to education, to form of employment, to whether they like cats or dogs.
Person A joins a dating website.
Person B has a profile.
Person B has life experiences 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,11,12 and 13.
Person C has a profile.
Person C has life experiences 1,2,3,11,12,13,14,15,16 and 17.
Person A evaluates the two and tries to figure out which one is ready for a mature, long term commitment.
Person A knows that she is a mature adult based on life experiences 1-10.
Person B has 7 of these 10 experiences.
Person C has 3 of these 10 experiences.
Therefore
Person A figures
Person B may be closer to being a mature adult than
Person C based solely on what she can read on the profiles.
Person A contacts
Person B and they hit it off because of having so much in common in terms of life experience. After a few years they experience "X." "X" equals marriage.
Now none of this is to say that
Person C couldn't have also led to a happy relationship, it's just more likely to happen with
Person B.
So whether you agree with me or not, have I clarified my point?
Have you ever tried a site like match.com or eHarmony and experienced this for yourself?
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Comments (28)
fuck u talkin bout
Wow... this post literally went up when I was in the middle of typing this on an older post:
"There is no direct correlation whatsoever between having (or lacking) a college degree and the knowledge possessed by an individual.
Statistical bias.
Statistics do not apply to individual cases. Assuming that I'm not just as "qualified" to diagnose myself without knowing me personally because I don't have a college degree is based ONLY on yet another baseless assumption that I am an "average" person."
What people don't seem to understand is that information that is not used objectively is not objective information and using it will not produce objective (or fair) results.
If you have any expectations regarding the "quality" of a relationship you are not personally and currently in, you are seeking personal gain and the information you've gathered is not being used objectively in the least.
I don't know about you, but I would much rather be in a relationship with an individual than a (flawed/incorrect/arbitrary/false/subjective) statistic.
A strategy or policy that is fair and unbiased "on average" is not fair and unbiased at all.
The majority of people think it's fair...
I wonder why that is.
I'm actually more confused. Maybe it should be called, "Similar Experiences may have a lot to do with Compatibility" because this has nothing to do with maturity, just two people that have more in sociological similarities in common than someone else.
I totally see what you are saying as some people think like that. But people seriously assuming maturity or a lack thereof based on "society's standards" (for the lack of a better description) only, fall through my scheme.
This isn't mature in itself, it is presumptious and ...incorrect. First, if I want a 'serious realtionship' and maybe even marriage, I want to know that this person stays with me regardless of what happens. If I fit into someone's scheme right now because I have expiriences 1 to 10, it doesn't mean that in 20 years I'll have all the numbers from 1 to 40 that the person expects.
But most imporantly, experiences don't always say anyhing about maturity. They can have a good outcome but can also make you arrogant, stubborn, judgemental, narrow-minded, mistrusting, mean, jealous, bitter and other things, that I personally don't associate with being mature.
It is about what you learn from them. Some people don't even need experiences to learn certain things either, but learn from others.
I think it describes characteristics that you only get to see when talking to someone. A certain way of communicating, the general way of approaching problems and coming to opinions, ot the way you try to present yourself for example.
And probably what exactly it is is subjective too. Everyone assumes THEIR way is the mature one...and 'mature' is such a dead-beating 'argument' (albeit fallacious often) that people just love to throw it around.
It's probably not a good sign that it makes complete sense to me, and confuses everyone else...
Oh well....
I think you're running into opposition based on your assumption that some degree of maturity is required for a lasting relationship. This is the internet, no maturity is required to make a post, therefore, no maturity is required to do anything else... and if a reader objects this initial premise of your post, the following bits well... don't follow.
The connotations of "mature" are also problematic... you state that some person is a mature adult based on their experiences, but then say these experiences can be things as trite as a preference between cats and dogs. It doesn't track that a person who has made ten decisions about what types of ice cream they prefer is a mature adult. "Life experiences" are unavoidable. If we are operating under the assumption that a person is trying to "judge" all others as "fit" or "unfit" for a relationship, and that person assumes themselves a mature person, then I can see looking for common life experiences... as, at best, an amateur and immature strategy. If shared experiences are what someone is looking for on a dating site, they probably are going to be unlucky... and even if they are lucky, they're likely to end up bored.
Reading your initial post, it reads, to me, to say this : "If you are a person who had a really crappy life, other people with terrible experiences are the only ones going to be worth having a relationship with... and that means you need to have a terrible life or else you'll be a terrible person to be in a relationship with, because you're immature for not suffering constantly." That's another premise that would be often-rejected... frankly, observational evidence quickly disproves it, not to mention the problematic nature of the relativity of terms like "meaningful" and "sacrificed" and "struggled". The same thing holds true with the opposite example, of "silver spoon"... I can tick of half a dozen 30+ year marriages I know where one partner came from extreme wealth, and the other from a middle or lower class family.
The diction of "maturity" is a problematic one, because it would seem to be the opposite of your premise. A truly mature person should be the one who can recognize the learning potentials from a wide variety of other people, not just the ones that share a large amount of life experiences, and value input from diverse sources. An immature person sticks to their comfort zone, dates only people who they find completely safe and predictable with, and ultimately, I think we see a lot of those people end up unchallenged and unhappy... and divorced.
My personal 2c is that life experiences in the past may define who we date (I personally won't date any self-labeling "slut", because 1) ewww, and 2) I can't see a future with a person who describes themself in that manner, not to mention 3) that's not an influence I would want upon my future children, and I always consider the ways a woman would influence future children when I make relationship decisions), but it rarely defines happiness or satisfaction with the dating process. A lot of the fun of a relationship is the sharing of favorite movies, old stories, memorable vacations, etc. If a person has already done all the things you've done, what is there to learn and explore? I do, however, think common interests are a huge predictor of happiness in relationships... people who spend time with their partner doing all kinds of things, besides the horizontal mambo, tend to have lasting relationships and express satisfaction with them, even when they've ended.
haha don't take it so personally. now that i'm home from work, i can respond to this more clearly:
1) in what sense does person a define herself as "mature" because of having certain life experiences?
2) even though a, b, and c all had the same number of life experiences, why is b inherently more mature than c?
basically, nobody is happy with your use of the word "mature". @Kuai_le1010@xanga nailed it perfectly--it seems to us that you're talking about compatibility, which has little (if anything) to do with maturity.
Dating sites will never get to know each user on a best friend basis; all they have is the information you fill out in your profile. Therefore it makes complete sense for the computer program to use the best algorithm to match profiles up to one another. It's all probability and math. Don't take it personally. Also, having experience does not necessarily equal maturity.
@TheNotoriousGOD@xanga - I felt compelled to point out how strange it was that my comment on the other post was relevant to this one, but what you mentioned in your comment was the first thing I noticed as well. As soon as I got to "Person B has a profile." I was like "wait a minute... back up, when did we come to the conclusion that Person A is "mature"?".
Axiomatically self-identifying as "mature" (regardless of which life experiences the person has) necessitates that each and every person is mature if they feel they are mature (or even if they don't attempt to make such a comparison or never thought about it, as that is the ultimate level of maturity). Like I always say, the highest self-esteem one can possess is none at all. Person A has (unknowingly) reached an incorrect conclusion as a result of her ignorance of the intrinsically relative nature of any quality that can be assigned to oneself by oneself.
That is to say, Person A (like most people I know) doesn't realize that the only way a person can be "mature" is if they are mature compared to someone else and if Person A can self-identify as such, Person A cannot (without being a hypocrite) consider any other person "not mature" if that person believes they are (or doesn't care either way).
But this ultimately goes back to what I said about statistical bias...
Most people are average, but that simply is not a fair and unbiased basis for assuming anything about any individual... unless of course the person is into self-sabotage, because believing "maturity" can me measured or compared automatically skews their results regardless of the method used to quantify it to (what is to Person A) an unknowable degree of variance, and it is no better than dating a person at random (actually, it is worse than dating a person at random because they are entering into a relationship with the false assurance that the other person is "mature" as a result of their own flawed method, and could easily end up blaming the other person for their own mistake).
I agree that being with someone who has things in common with you tends to lead to a more successful long-term relationship. I still don't see what that has to do with maturity.
@DrummingMediocrity@xanga - I still don't see why you think "success" or "compatibility" speaks for anything more than your personal desire to avoid having to put more effort into a relationship than you feel you should have to at any given time.
If one person doesn't feel they should have to put any effort into a relationship at all and the other feels the two of them are still compatible, that's all it takes for a relationship to be "successful" because apparently the other person wants to put in the extra effort for it to "succeed". So really, it depends on their combined feelings, to which I still don't see why anyone would assume a deficit on one's own part couldn't possibly be corrected by a surplus on the others' if their respective feelings were previously equal.
@T3hZ10n@xanga - I put a lot of effort into the relationship I'm in.
I suggest limiting your monologues to relevant topics if you want to be taken more seriously than the circus clown you are acting like on here.
@DrummingMediocrity@xanga - Why do you feel the amount of effort you put into the relationship is "a lot"? Do you feel as though you're putting more effort into the relationship than your boyfriend? Also, what's to say that the effort you put into the relationship isn't far less than most relationships require to be happy and successful? You try to come off as "mature" and logical but the things you say about relationships are so riddled with comparisons that it's hard to tell whether you are spoiled or whether you are extremely insecure (or both) but it's obvious you over-analyze things "just as much" as anybody else. My question is, if you would so happily put "a lot" of effort into a relationship, why is he your boyfriend and I'm not?
@T3hZ10n@xanga - I am not interested in justifying my personal life to you. Berating my character is not going to change that, but it will make you look like more of an asshole than you already do.
are you going to hijack this thread with your bs also?
@TheNotoriousGOD@xanga - Oh please, you already know the answer.
@DrummingMediocrity@xanga - I'm not "berating your character", I'm questioning whether you are aware of the iniquity your erroneous assumptions about me resulted in and I'm very curious as to why you continue to ignore it if you believe your actions were and are justifiable.
I'm not asking you to justify your personal life to me, I'm asking you to admit that even if you wanted to you couldn't because deep down you know what you did was incredibly unfair and still is.
@T3hZ10n@xanga - I do not feel my assumptions were erroneous, and my personal life eludes your judgment. I'm not "ignoring" anything; I'm spending my time on more valuable things than your bickering. Unfortunately, this reply is an exception. And THAT I regret.
it won't work out because 7,8,9. (seven ate nine) Person A is a murderer and not mature.
@TheNotoriousGOD@xanga - That was exactly what I was thinking. Even counted the number of life experiences.
I was thinking, let's say experience #5 equals graduating from college. Okay, that's a shared life experience- they have something in common. Person C hasn't done that. But let's say that #17 equals starting a successful business. That possibly requires even more "maturity" and hard work, but Person A is looking for someone who's graduated college, like they have, because they believe that that is one of the particular experiences that made them "mature". I would have been silly to think that, because my husband was in the army and didn't go to culinary school like me, he wasn't mature or ready for marriage. And if he had limited his choice of mates to people who had the same experiences that made him mature, it would have been males only! Because women are not allowed in combat units. In any case, I think that, while life experience can contribute to maturity, ultimately it's character that creates it, and the individual who defines it.@DrummingMediocrity@xanga - Datingish needs to block his posts. He keeps taking over the comment section with his dumb rants.
Datingish - can you please shut @TheZion up? No one likes him, not even other datingish trolls which I find funny because you figure they'd get along well since what all the datingish trolls have in common is generalizing women and sexism.
Op Do you mean that in order for someone to be "experienced/give advice" they need to experience it themselves? If that's what you mean, I agree. I can't stand some of these cynical pessimistic commentors thinking they can give dating advice when clearly they follow their own advice and it isn't working out for them so I wonder why other people should follow their advices?
@xinq@xanga - Amen.
People are getting caught up on your word choice, mature...
It's not that we don't understand your point it's that your using the word mature... um wrong? lol
I think that's what people are thinking.
idk, maybe it should just depend on chemistry between the 2.