Thoroughly modern millennial

Tag: personal post

  • What Online Dating Has Taught Me

    What Online Dating Has Taught Me

    *just one of the few ‘charming’ messages I get online

    Happy Tinder-versary to me! It’s been just about a year since one fateful night when my housemates forced me to download the app. I’ve had a mix of good, bad and just plain embarrassing experiences thanks to it and, yes, to be clear, I am still unfortunately single as an outcome. But for all the ridiculousness of it I’ve definitely learnt a lot about myself, what I want/like out of a guy and how to navigate the Millennial online dating minefield.

    So as we’re on the run up to Valentine’s Day (shudders) here’s a few amusing, harmless tidbits I thought I’d share both from my own experiences and stories from friends who’ve also waded into online dating.

    You may find a few familiar faces:

    From old friends (who I always screenshot for blackmail reasons), to classmates from school, college and Uni and old flames/crushes *shudders*, Tinder can be awash with hilarious and bad memories. It’s also amusing to swipe past minor celebs (i.e. indie musicians and YouTubers) and equally good for the ego when you actually match with one of them (Claim to fame. Totally still matched with Noah Robbins on Tinder. Hit me up bro!).

    People are super un-original:

    You like to travel and meet new people? Wow. You’re with your ‘lads’ in your profile picture? Or on your ‘gap yah’? Or you’re skiing? You said ‘hi’ or ‘hey’. *snooooooze* C’mon! Put a little effort into this.

    Men DO NOT know how to take good selfies:

    Where are your angles at bro? Why do guys stand two feet away from a camera and use it as their ONLY profile picture? Or why on Earth would you just have a photo of your car on your profile. Are you an inanimate object? Compensating for something?

    You shouldn’t feel guilty about talking to more than one guy at a time:

    Learnt this one hard way, potentially missed out on meeting some great guys because I was hung up on being a monogamous dater. If that’s your vibe, that’s cool, but I think just talking to more than one person in the early stages is totally fine. I know friends who’ve ended up being good mates with guys from online dating simply because of this. Also – not to knock your self esteem down a notch – do you think you’re the only person they’re talking to right there and then? I know people who’ve matched with the same person and have received exactly the same message within 2 minutes.

    Most people on ‘certain apps’ are after one thing:

    But let’s be real don’t tell me you aren’t on Tinder for wholly innocent reasons either. As long as you’re all consensual, safe and comfortable then there shouldn’t be any shame in this. Go forth and multiply (if you want)

    The weirder, witter and straight to the point the better:

    A generic ‘Hi’ or ‘Hey Ria’ ain’t gonna cut it bro, unless you literally look like Chris Hemsworth or Darren Criss. I like a good opener, or something that indicates you’ve read something in my bio. Also a sucker for a good gif usage – in any context tbh. ‘DTF’ ain’t gonna cut it either, sorry lads.

    I totally have a type…:

    To the point where my housemate has swiped left and right for me, cause apparently my tastes are that frigging obtuse. If you follow who my fave celeb men are you can probably guess what that type is.

    Ghosting / Benching / Breadcrumbing* are so very real:

    And I haven’t quite worked out which one is worse in my head. Not to mention the fact I’ve totally done all of the above to guys myself (my bad). In some ways tech has made dating even tougher for us. Read receipts, those little ‘writing’ dots on messenger, and just plain social media is in itself the modern day equivalent of waiting by the phone or changing your MSN status to something they like. *I’ve linked all of those words if you have no idea what I’m on about.

    At the end of the day it’s just a bit of fun:

    As far as matters of the heart are concerned, getting in too deep with Tinder matches is probably not the road to true love. It can be and I’ve seen plenty of friends triumph into relationships off the back of Tinder dates, but for the most part I’m trying to not get too serious about it, after all dating should be silly, a bit ridic and give you plenty of stories to tell over a couple of glasses of wine until you find ‘the one’, right?

    — — —

    Tell me your online or offline dating woes (or triumphs) in the comments below!

    Ria Xx

  • Thoughts On 6 Years Of Blogging (& 1 Year of TMM)

    Thoughts On 6 Years Of Blogging (& 1 Year of TMM)

    Happy kinda-sorta blog birthday to me.

    The funny thing about rebrands is that you almost forget when to celebrate these kinds of things. But, yes, it’s been about a year since I hit publish on my first blog post as Thoroughly Modern Millennial.

    Aside from TMM surviving out 2016, I also hit the 6 years of blogging milestone back in December last year.

    Oh boy. 6 years is a long time guys. If my blogging life were a child it would be in Primary School already, learning how to read and do their times tables, and could probably work an iPhone to write their own blog posts (…maybe ambitious thinking for a 6 year old but I’m sure there are child genius’ this age who can sight read Mozart pieces on the piano or something right?). I, personally, have changed a lot in those six years. I’ve gone from Uni fresher to graduate to full time ‘adult’ (*snorts*). I’ve gone from writing about fashion shows and beauty products to activism, writing and books (though fashion, lifestyle and beauty still have a place in my heart).

    Not only have I changed, but the blogging community has changed too.

    You’re probably sick of us ‘old’ bloggers talking about it but blogging really was so very different six years ago. The volume of sponsored post/ad revenue/PR sample/event business was very much in its infancy. It was a very experimental and ‘odd’ thing to blog. For the most part, yes, all of us were in our bedrooms just writing for the hell of it. Now it’s a multi-million dollar industry (if you count the rise of Instagrammers, YouTubers and Snapchat-ers). Blogging is commercial now – and I wish people would seriously stop pretending this isn’t so. The fact I ‘rebranded’ (and not just renamed my blog) proves that, we’re semi-business savvy no matter how long we’ve been at the game.

    There are so many facets of the community now and as long as you don’t get caught up in clique-y drama, stick to your people and ‘do you’, there’s a lot of opportunity to grow. But equally it is harder. You really have to work at your niche and the volume of content can be really overwhelming.

    That feeling is one I’ve experienced many a time over the past six years. It’s been hard to keep going, but it’s been equality hard to just throw the towel in and let go. And I think that feeling right there trumps all in hindsight. It’s the feeling that this little corner of the Internet is so much a part of me, that the idea of not blogging anymore feels far too weird to contemplate.

    Despite the blogging breaks and numerous hiatus’ I’m drawn to the idea of evolving and seeing that progress in my blog posts.

    In the spirit of that, this is where I stand with TMM.

    As I said when I ‘rebranded’ I wanted to do more. I wanted to show you guys more of my writing, my interests, and what I feel passionate about. I did, but I want to focus in on the stuff that people really responded to. The activism, the political, the racial, all dotted among the ’trivial’ lifestyle/beauty/fashion lines. I want to focus on writing, on quality (not quantity), and my fervent love of pop culture. I want keep pushing myself out of my comfort zone and equally want to put some good out into the World.

    — — —

    If you made it to the end of that ramble, congrats! As a bit of call and response, I’d love to hear any thoughts on what you’ve enjoyed and would like to see more of on TMM.

    Ria Xx

  • One Word Resolution | Balance

    One Word Resolution | Balance

    Back with a vengeance in 2017, here we go.

    If you remember last year, instead of listing out a few resolutions that I wanted to hit, I decided to choose one word to encapsulate the theme for 2016.

    I definitely fell off the bandwagon with last year’s word (‘focus’). The scatterbrained way of thinking from 2015 did not fade in 2016, and I’ve been busier than ever professionally and personally in both good and bad ways. With all these facets of my life converging into a giant mess towards the end of the year and teetering on the edge for so long, the one thing I realised I needed was stability.

    So this year’s word is…

    BALANCE

    Life in itself is a juggling act and one part of learning how to ‘adult’ is learning how to give equal measure to all aspects of your life. Balance feels like an off-shoot to my focus goal, but for me there’s much more emphasis on reflection in this year’s word. It means re-assessing how much time I spend on all parts of my life, whether that be work, blogging, writing, socialising, and even alone time. It’s recognising that I struggled with giving time to the right things this year.

    This resolution is also about re-addressing the balance in the World. We’re now living with consequences of 2016, and it’s now more important than ever to stop burying our heads in the sand, to stand up, to speak out and to fight for those who have no voice.

    — — —

    You’ll see posts about in the coming weeks about how I want to try to achieve this resolution, but for now let me know in the comments what your goals for 2017 are. Do you need a bit of balance too? Or have you got a whole other set of resolutions to achieve instead?

    Ria