When considering what sort of person would make your ideal partner, it is useful to consider this question: “what sort of personality, habits, or interests am I looking for in a potential romantic partner?” In the past, this has rarely even be a consideration for most people; at one time the typical man or woman simply fell into dating whomever they were most frequently around or whomever they felt a physical attraction to. However, as modern practices such as online dating become more and more common, is it growing possible for people to choose the sorts of specific traits they would most like to find in a possible companion.

Today’s singles have greater options for taking their pick, for “weeding out” if you will, those possibilities that do not meet with their ideal standards. There is nothing necessarily wrong with this. On the contrary, it makes good sense. You wouldn’t waste time looking to buy a car or house which it was immediately obvious didn’t meet your buyer requirements. It makes similar sense not to invest too much time in getting to know someone only to discover they are not a suitable match for you. So far, such thinking is all well and good. But now what do we do with this new advantage we have, this opportunity of sifting through the no-fits to find exactly what we are looking for?

For many people the answer is probably “not much”. These singles may go on as they always have done: choosing potential partners based on little more than physical appearance, in the hope that maybe they’ll somehow make a “lucky” match by sheer chance. This brings me to my subject: what criteria do you use to choose who you will or will not date? I’m not denying that the decision is often largely instinctual; sometimes you simply know right away whether you ever could or couldn’t be with someone. But what about when you’re undecided? Once logic comes into the question how does it affect your decision? Probably there is no one who hasn’t heard the old saying “opposites attract”. But do they really? And when they do, how long does that attraction last? Sure, you might think now her sloppiness is cute, or it’s funny when he wears the same unwashed clothes for a week, but will you still be laughing about it five years from now? When looked at from this angle it seems obvious that relationships in which couples have little in common certainly don’t fare any better than relationships where both individuals share a great deal.

This is why I suggest that, ideally, singles should look for matches in which they share a vast amount of interests and preferences with one another, while each party still maintains enough unique personal traits to keep things interesting. Plainly spoken, you don’t want to date someone who’s every word or opinion is an echo of your own. On the other hand, neither do you want to find yourself with someone with whom you have very little connection. Maybe the best solution is simply to aim at someone in the middle—an opposite like you.

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