Saying what you want will scare people away. Or will it?
Want Commitment? Say So.
If you want more love, reveal more of yourself from the start.
One of my clients recently told me she’d encountered some popular dating advice that went something like this: If you want a serious, committed relationship, don’t say so.
Apparently, letting a potential partner know you’re looking for commitment might scare them away.
To which I say: Yes. That’s the point.
If someone is frightened away by the knowledge that you’re looking for a committed relationship, and you’re looking for a committed relationship, this is not a marketing problem. Instead, it’s useful information.
For decades, I’ve encouraged clients who want lasting love to say so right up front, and if there’s a given commitment that goes along with it, to share that as well. I’ve also encouraged them to write fairly detailed online dating profiles—not War and Peace, but enough that another person can get a meaningful sense of who they are, what matters to them, and what kind of relationship they’re hoping to create.
Clients sometimes worry about this. Shouldn’t they play it cool? Reveal less? Keep things short, and vague enough that more people will be interested?
But the goal isn’t to interest more people.
It’s to help the right people recognize you (pssst: there’s more than one!).
And in my clients’ experience, that’s exactly what has happened. The people who ultimately became serious partners liked the fact that my clients had been clear. They wanted commitment, too.
My own husband did.
When Kerry found me online, my detailed profile explicitly said I was looking for a serious relationship. He appreciated both, because he was looking for the same thing. Nobody spent months pretending to be breezily indifferent while secretly hoping the other person would eventually want what they wanted. Neither wasted the other’s time. From the start, we had Meaningful Discoursetm, not tapdancing classes.
And now there’s research supporting what I’ve been seeing for years.
In a 2026 study of online dating profiles, psychologist Gurit Birnbaum and her colleagues found that people paid more attention to profiles containing greater self-disclosure and clearly stated long-term relationship goals. Those profiles also made their writers seem more sincere, more available for intimacy, and ultimately more appealing as potential partners.
In other words, revealing more didn’t make people look desperate.
It helped them look available.
Of course, what you reveal matters. My clients’ detailed profile isn’t an autobiography, a list of grievances about their ex, or the complete medical history of everyone in their immediate family. It’s a positive, honest, and kind disclosure of what and whom they’re looking for, which says much about my clients and the good lives they’ve built, too.
Because online, as everywhere else, like is attracted to like, and we tend to like people who are like us.
So if you want a long-term relationship, say so. If you’re looking for commitment, don’t disguise it as casualness to appeal to someone who doesn’t want what you want. And if you’ve built a life you love, reveal enough of yourself that someone compatible can recognize their equal.
Will that turn some people away?
I certainly hope so.
Dating isn’t an election. You don’t need the most votes.
You just need the right one.
If you’re over 50 and want to get better at finding and choosing the right person—without settling or repeating old patterns—I created a free 15-minute training for you.
You can watch it here:
coaching.lovesciencemedia.com/freebie
Reference:
Birnbaum, G. E., et al. (2026). “Too much information or not enough? How self-disclosure in online dating profiles influences attraction and relationship intentions.” Current Psychology. DOI: 10.1007/s12144-026-09787-y
Photo by Patrick Nguyen on Unsplash