Modern Dating
Lessons from Rom Coms
I watched the total of four (4) rom coms in the past 24 hours. That means that a. I really lose my mind in those rare instances when I have free time and b. I’ve apparently unburied the romantic in me that I’ve been so desperately trying to keep locked up in the mines of Moria all these years. Lunar Eclipse season, am I right?
Much like my issues with Disney, I’ve had a very complicated relationship with romantic comedies ever since I discovered crushes circa the age of 8, around the same time when all children start getting these… weird feelings for classmates from the opposite (or same) gender. The beginnings of our tumultuous bond were all cutesy and demure, as you would expect for a coming-of-age hopeless romantic who thought that if you like a boy, you just send him a note for Valentine’s and that’s all.
And rom coms really made it seem that way. They presented love as an easy-peasy quest of finding the two pieces that fit together in a tiny puzzle. The seductive promise of fate and destiny, wrapped in meet-cutes and grand gestures. The siren call to any romantic soul, they lured us into a world where every heartbreak was but a steppingstone to an eventual happily ever after. Then I turned 14, and I hated them. Horror movies were a much better watch. At least they didn’t pretend their scripts were realistic.
In retrospect, the hate didn’t come from a place of disappointment and bitterness, but rather self-preservation. “Conceal, don’t feel, don’t let them know” was my mantra waaay before Elsa came up with it in a song because I became a teenager, declared my emotions a weakness and shunned them from my kingdom — to the mines! Romantic gestures? Cheesy. Having a crush? Weak. Saying ‘I love you’? Not on my watch. So, rom coms became the epitome of everything that I labelled wrongly and generally, in the meantime it had somehow become mainstream to be cool and act aloof (which I guess explains why so many of us 90s Millennials still struggle). Hope? Ha! No one can disappoint you if you don’t let yourself daydream and think of all the worst-case scenarios instead.
Fast-forward to today and you find me typing away in my living room, asking — why is hope so bad? Why are emotions a weakness and openness a threat? And why do I get so anxious any time I let a feeling out in the light? I know I sometimes sound like a broken record, but I cannot help but wonder — why is vulnerability so scary? What is it in me that tries to figure out the perfect ‘how to’ for every situation while overthinking my feelings to the brink of suffocation? And then to beat myself up because reality isn’t perfect, and I fumbled the toothbrush scenario I had in my head?
Upon reflection, it really stroked me that my aversion to rom coms wasn’t just about disliking their unrealistic plots, but it was also about the way they forced me to confront my own discomfort with vulnerability. These films celebrate swooning and emotional openness, two things I’ve always beat up with a stick in real life. The idea of being that open, of allowing someone to see me — flaws, insecurities, and all — felt less comfortable than giving a public speech completely unprepared, in front of a thousand people who know all my secrets. Naked. Rom coms lent me a roadmap for vulnerability, but always wrapped in the safety of fiction. Reality is far more complicated. Vulnerability is unpredictable; it can bring people closer, or it can push them away. And that uncertainty? It’s terrifying.
However, to steal a line from Hitch, (yes, one of the films I saw) — basic principles: there are none. As much as I’d love a script of all the right things to say, roles to prepare that guarantee success, or relationship timelines that predict how things are going to unfold, the awfully wonderful truth is that the most attractive thing about a person is all the ways in which they’re human.
It’s in the way someone’s eyes light up when they fumble through a punchline but still look at you with that hopeful, “Did I nail it?” expression. The shy smile that lingers after an awkward pause in conversation, over a glass of wine, when neither of you know quite what to say but it somehow feels right. It’s in the genuine laughter that spills out during moments that weren’t supposed to be funny but end up being core memories. The warmth of holding hands, even when someone’s fingers are fidgety with nerves or too cold to ignore. The shared glance across a room that says, “Did you just see that?”, and the quiet insecurities that creep in when they fix their hair or adjust their shirt, unsure if they’re enough. The unspoken connection when vulnerability slips through and they try to hide it, but you notice. It’s the pride they carry in small, personal victories, or the way they instinctively become the comforting presence you didn’t know you needed. And perhaps, in the small imperfections — those bits of insecurity, the blushing, the hesitation — that you fall for who a person truly is.
Despite all their flaws and the unrealistic expectations they often set, there’s something undeniably comforting about romantic comedies. They package love into neat, predictable narratives, where misunderstandings can be easily solved and heartbreak is only a temporary obstacle on the path to happiness. While no one who has stepped outside their living room believes reality mirrors these films, maybe we all yearn for a reminder that, amid the messiness of real life, there’s always room for hope. Letting hope in means opening yourself up to the possibility of being hurt, of things not going as planned. It’s much easier to prepare for the worst — to protect us from that sting — than to trust in something that feels so fragile and uncertain. And yet, no matter how much we try to avoid it, hope sneaks in. It’s the quiet force that keeps us coming back, despite everything.
Rom coms offer a kind of an emotional balm — a glimpse into how simple we wish relationships would be, while reminding us that connection, at its core, is always worth pursuing. Perhaps we cling to these idealized stories not because we expect them to be true, but because they serve like a weighted blanket, a way to indulge in the belief that love, despite its many challenges, is a force that brings the best out of people and draws them together.
Perhaps the key to finding connection is to embrace the imperfections of our own narratives. What if we believed that when we meet someone and things just ‘click’, it’s because they truly see us — and we are enough, messiness and all? As, in the end, it’s in the acceptance of our quirks and the embrace of our authentic selves that we open the door to genuine connection. While rom coms often offer a polished version of love, our own stories are beautifully flawed and deeply human. They are all tales of resilience, vulnerability, and the relentless pursuit of connection.
Thanks for reading. ✌🏻
