This question haunts many women in midlife who find themselves alone in a life filled with couples. The fear that comes with this is one of uncertainty. Do men only want to date younger women? What do I have to offer someone when it’s not my youth and its beauty? Do wisdom and maturity count for anything in the dating world? How do I begin if I want to find a partner? Does online dating work for someone in her 50’s or 60’s? What are the risks? How do I open to this new and initially intimidating way of meeting someone?

Before going further into the process I want to state my ‘credentials.’ In my own recent quest for Love I met approximately 150 men through various online dating sites (Match.com; Matchmaker.com; Yahoo.com and a brief time with EHarmony.com.) What this means is that I met those men over a three year period, dating many only once, others a few times, and others for longer periods. This process brought me to the place where I feel I have something to offer to those just beginning to entertain the possibility of online dating. And the good news is it ended well! Hallelujah!! I met Dennis in early 2004. We dated a year before becoming engaged and were married in February of 2006. I won’t deny that finding my life partner was a long process but it was well worth the time, effort and energy required. The years spent in the dating world taught me more about myself than I could have foreseen. It is in that spirit that I offer to you some of what I have learned so that you might enter this new world with more confidence and less concern.

In 2002, I’d been divorced from my second husband since 1989, had been involved with a few men for varying lengths of time but for the most part was living the life of a single woman among coupled friends. In some ways it was a very contented life with dear friends, family, a satisfying career and deeply supportive spiritual community. Yet, for me there was something missing. I saw that my serious relationships with men had not been fulfilling on the deep levels that I knew were possible. I wanted something more in my life, someone to share the ups and downs, someone to challenge me and help me grow, someone to grow old with, sharing the later years of life, someone to play with, someone to share myself with, body, mind and soul. This all sounded good but how would I get myself out there when my life was filled with familiarity and comfort? It seemed a big stretch. I had heard friends experimenting with online dating and was intrigued but also intimidated.

What intrigued me about online dating was that the men who were going online were as confused and frustrated by their inability to meet women in the “normal way” as I was. In midlife the idea that you can easily meet someone in a coffee shop, at a workshop, in a running or activity club, at work or church seemed less and less probable. I realized it was going to require taking that huge step into the new and unfamiliar world of online dating. If it’s true that finding a life partner is not that different than finding that proverbial needle in the haystack then was it a matter of numbers? It seemed to me that one must meet a lot of possible partners to increase the chances of finding someone with whom you are truly compatible. This precluded the likelihood of meeting that special someone in the more traditional ways. This is also the beauty and wisdom of the online dating process. Online dating presents the individual with a virtual ocean filled with fish, fish of all kinds and colors. If one is open to the process, suspending belief that it can’t work, then the possibilities are endless.

This is where the real preparation begins to get interesting. What are your preconceived notions? What gets in your way of believing that you, too, can find your life partner online? What do you think it says about you if you do go online to date and find a life partner? What qualities do you bring to your search that are different from those you would have brought to this search in your 30’s and 40’s? What are your fears? What wisdom has come from your life and prior relationships that can inform your quest?

The process of online dating and the inherent questionnaires require that the individual spend some time with these and other questions. It is a distilling process, one that is very useful in that the distilling allows each person to ask herself important clarifying questions. Each woman will find different answers to these questions but the questions themselves will help you approach the online dating questionnaires with some degree of comfort. If there is an advantage to dating in midlife it I, I hope, the wisdom we have gained by living our lives until now. This wisdom can inform the quest in invaluable ways.

Personally, I spent a few weeks living these questions as well as clarifying what I wanted to say about myself as well as the person whom I was seeking. I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to settle into the right relationship to the process itself. I have noticed that if someone is not approaching the online dating process with a certain degree of non-attachment, objectivity and playfulness it can feel arduous and self-defeating. For me it was a quest that I knew might take a long time. I also knew that there were no guarantees but that I could infuse my experience with a lighthearted attitude. Initially it was a chance for me to get out there, have some fun and meet a variety of different people. That attitude became the fuel for the search. It was very useful to meet a lot of different people, to learn how to discern if this was someone I wanted to see again, to practice Truth telling/how to say No when it was clearly not going somewhere, and also how to handle rejection when it came from someone who interested me. I began to see that the dating process itself was helping me get more and more clear about myself as well as what my priorities were. It became fun to see how I reacted, what threw me off balance, how did I feel when I met someone interesting. Did I then get ahead of myself in imagining a future without any context for that imagining?

The most important thing I learned very quickly was that there are plenty of other people out there looking for love just as I was. Each one had something to teach me, regardless of our fit. Each person was vulnerable just as I was and each of us was taking that risk to open up to the process of actively pursuing our wish for love and partnership. And to answer the initial question: Am I too old for love? The answer is No, never. As long as you are alive and have the possibility of a new beginning you are young enough for love.

Next month we’ll talk more about the process of putting oneself out there and taking the step into the new and unfamiliar world of online dating. For now it’s enough to begin to ask the clarifying questions. This process itself is essential and hopefully will be fun as well as enlightening. Remember: it’s all in your attitude. Be light with these questions yet listen carefully to your heart’s wisdom and longing.