The Great Romance Slump

About 90 seconds into a three-minute hug with a stranger, I began to think that dying alone might not be so bad after all. I’d come to a candlelit loft in Manhattan for a “mindful singles event” called The Feels, which was designed to be the opposite of the disembodied experience of dating apps. Participants, phones tucked away, paired up and attempted a series of “somatic awareness” exercises, including staring into each other’s eyes, hugging, and holding a hand over each other’s heart.

We’d been warned that discomfort is part of the process. A facilitator had reminded us that, as long as consent and respect are involved, a little uneasiness opens the door to vulnerability. Having paid $100 for a process advertised as “better relating”—informed by Carl Jung and the Buddha and the body’s “infinite wisdom”—participants were motivated to agree. And many of us, more by circumstance than by choice, were already experts in exiting our comfort zone. We’d spent years meeting strangers, opening ourselves to judgment, scrounging for conversation topics, worrying about our outfits, gargling mouthwash in the office—but we still hadn’t found what, or whom, we wanted. We came ready to get to work.

The mere existence of The Feels, which hosts events in cities across the United States, suggests that we are living in a time of romantic plenty. In New York City, I could go to a dating event every night of the week. I could use a matchmaking service, or talk with a dating coach, or sign up for one of the many newsletters trying to bring back personal ads. Even if I didn’t live in a major city, I’d have dating apps to choose from: not only Tinder and Hinge but a zillion others—platforms for farmers, gamers, single parents, cannabis enthusiasts, and members of the gluten-free community. I have four apps in my current rotation; as I write this, one of them has 317 message threads and 455 “likes” that I need to evaluate.

And yet, despite the bounty of possibility, we are living through a great romance slump. Romance is a broad term, of course. Traditionally, it manifests in the thrill of sex, the devotion of long-term partnership, or the ritual of courtship, including the act of hope that is a first date. But all of those manifestations are becoming less common in the U.S., especially among young people.