“Dating is like a hero’s journey, including monster” — 5 questions for Femke Deckers
@Interactive Storytelling Meetup #6 –9 June 2016
Interview by Klasien van de Zandschulp
In 2015 Femke Deckers — writer and ex-dating expert — had about 48 online dates with different men. She discovered that dating has a lot to do with storytelling: from the online dating profile, to the actual date itself to the struggling journey of finding love.
At Interactive Storytelling Meetup #6 she shared her learning from this dating journey and took us on the classic hero’s story of adventure, failure & success. Here are 5 questions for Femke!
1 Can you explain how you compare the ‘hero journey’ that we know from our storytelling theory books with dating?
“The hero’s journey from Joseph Campbell (1949) describes the classic journey of a hero, that after a call to adventure, gets faced with challenges and tests, defeats a monster (‘the big ordeal’) and returns home with the elixir (‘changed and transformed’). It has been the common template of a lot of famous film scripts like Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Finding Nemo, etc.”
Campbell’s hero’s journey also applies to personal development: personal change follows, more or less, this narrative. I discovered that my adventure of 48 dates showed a comparison with this template of adventure, temptations, fighting a monster, the transformation and the return home with a reward, in this case.. a relationship.
“I discovered that my adventure of 48 online dates followed the classic narrative of the hero’s journey.”
On the level of a date the resemblance between Campbell’s Hero’s Journey and my dating journey looks a bit like this:
And on the level of 48 dates, the full dating journey:
“The crucial thing that happened, was that around date number 38 or so, I started to discover a worrying pattern. Something was wrong with my motivation for dating. I discovered that also I -like a classic hero- had a monster to defeat first, which was in this case my biggest fear. The fear of ending up alone. I first had to conquer this fear in order to move on and be happy.”
“So after a period of crying and getting rid of the dating addiction, I changed the way I looked at myself and accepted that it was okay to be alone. After that phase I received ‘my reward’: I met the guy that I am still with today.”
“Like a classic hero I had a monster to defeat first, which was in this case my biggest fear. The fear of ending up alone.”
2 Why did you choose to research the combination of storytelling and dating?
“I am a storyteller by heart and have a romantic vision on life. I wanted to give this adventure of dating more meaning than ‘just a stupid, funny dating phase in my life’. So I started to look at the bigger picture and discovered the beauty of the process — the storytelling template as described above. Through dating one can learn a about him/herself.
I learned we all carry an ‘Identity Story’ with us. I defined it like this:
My Identity Story was:
So, not only the dating itself (the adventurous side of it) but also the stories I would tell during those dates (entertaining anecdotes): I was continuously confirming my identity story. Date after date after date. I called this process ‘agile dating’: date fast, fail fast, learn fast. Iteration not for software development but personal development, haha.”
3 Did you use your knowledge on storytelling when you were dating yourself? How?
“Yes, I did. I have a background in copywriting, photography and branding. For my dating profile for example, I tried to create an appealing profile that would elicit curiosity and action. And like I said before, I love telling stories, so going on a date was a perfect moment for me to tell some good ones! It’s a perfect way to keep a man interested - or any listener for that matter.
Creating a dating profile is a form of storytelling as well: with 150 characters of text and 6 photos you try to tell ‘The Story of You’, both visually and in words. A dating profile is nothing more than product marketing, or personal branding so to speak. Wat you are trying to sell in 2–3 seconds is... you.
I saw hundreds of profiles of men. After doing some research, I came to the conclusion that most men tell the same story: like 90% of the men use two or more of these types of pictures:
Also in the description of themselves, men told more or less the same story. I called it the ‘Hi, I’m John Doe’ profile text:
4 What is your advice to us on how to profile ourselves on a dating site with the most optimal results?
“Show your more peculiar side as well. A picture that shows your (presumed) big nose or bold head are totally fine. There is even evidence for that: research shows that a more extreme divided opinion on how attractive you are, actually makes you more popular on online dating websites. Hannay Frey explains this in her funny TED talk The Mathmatics of Love.
Also, be concrete, don’t be a ‘John Doe’ (as above), try to explain what makes you you, and write a short story, a narrative. Bullet points are for your grocery list. For example, don’t write: ‘I like traveling’ (of course you do, just like 56 million other people on this planet), but: ‘This year I want to backpack 3 weeks in Thailand.’ With a text like that you won’t only differentiate yourself, but you also grab the attention of the reader and create a personal hook to start a conversation with you. It all starts with that first message, right?
“Write a short story, a narrative. Bullet points are for your grocery list.”
5 Can we apply your knowledge on other social sites or apps like Facebook or LinkedIn?
“Good question. I think a lot of (young) people already apply this. I am 40 myself, so the men I interacted with were, lets say, less experienced in online personal branding. But still yes, especially on LinkedIn I think a personal and exciting story for an intro can help to differentiate yourself from the rest. It’s the best way to get the attention of, and be memorable to, the people who you will be doing business with - being it your future date or your future boss.”
