Oh people can call themselves whatever they want, but I'm not in any way obliged to be impressed by it, or feel I have to resist conveying my views about it. From my experience 'spiritual' people can get quite huffy if you dismiss this stuff.

@David1955 I have no time for any halfwit who makes claims that they cannot validate.

Don't know how one can push spiritual down people's throat. Spiritual just is, it's the 99% spiritual unknowns. Only the individual can explore and decide if they want to use spiritual as personal growth tool or not. Much of Religion threatening each person they go to heaven or hell for eternity. If everyone doesn't comply or be over obeisance to worship their God . Now that is jamming down people's throat and beyond into their presumed empty souls.

@David1955 Most people who profess themselves to be spiritual that i have met are pretty laid back. You must have met the fanatics.

Shitting spiritual, is the cleansing too?. I'll take my time, and meditate on finding another toilet, if there is a line up.

I Wish nature didn't put that man's g-spot up there also.

Well, that's part of the problem: no clear definition of the word spiritual. I know there's a dictionary definition, but that's vague too, so people just mean whatever they want. It's not the meaning of the word, really, it's the resonance they think the word has.

I like and agree with that, and that's why I can use that Spiritual, but not religious label for my religious affiliation trait label in my dating profile. I can do it without feeling phony because I do believe there is something to life and the world besides just physical matter and such. And that we are more than just flesh and blood, there is something to us having minds and even the existence of spirits in animals, nature, and people.

You sound spiritual, spewing jargon without making sense in order to sound spiritual.

@nogod4me

I base my life on good sense. Look for a better interpretation of the word spiritual, as it will enhance.
if not, go back the box of limitations. .

Everyone farts, and among a crowd, it becomes unknown, like spiritual is, in denial.

@Castlepaloma Sounds like you had a brain fart.

@nogod4me

When I Laugh, it's brain cum. I keep my farts from stinking to others.

@Castlepaloma Like the line in the Shawshank Redemption, by the warden, where he says the character Andy "vanished like a fart in the wind"...

No.

@anglophone

Between the two it's a matter of degrees in the lack of belief in God.
Many agnostic I know, say they are spiritual.

Explane?

@nowhereman55

Isn't the lack of belief in God , the most important definition for atheist? Since neither side of religion or non believers can prove God exist or not. Agnostic is more open to possibilities of God, yet takes no claim to know, there is God, making atheist a degree of agnostic. Wail spiritual is the unknowns, it open to think of the possibility through spiritual things are possible like love, for all earthling animals on the planet do love.

@Lack of evidenceCastlepaloma

It's why I don't like labels, it's often a forced perspective that many judge us by with wrong interpretation of a person's whole or well being.

@Castlepaloma True and I agree, but where I live religion is such a big thing with most people, that refusing to pick a label and leaving no answer or label for that trait in the profile would be seen as a red flag and also as evasive by most women in my dating pool, and thus would gaurantee rejection for it. Same thing with the kids situation trait. Leaving it blank would be seen as a red flag and evasive, so I have to just bite the bullet, be honest, and list myself as having no kids, even tho I know that 80% of the women in the dating pool, including some women who don't even have kids themselves, will make all their negative assumptions about me for it, because it's so unusual in Iowa, and reject me for it. There's simply nothing I can do about that...

@TomMcGiverin

One can not live a lie. If a Christian says she is spiritual rather than religious and won't try to convert you. Go for it!!! If she tries to save you, then tell that person, one who lies , can not love.

@Castlepaloma I never try to deceive anyone. I just fudge a couple of my trait labels in the profile so I can at least have a fighting chance with a decent number of women in my local online dating pool. Because if I didn't do that, I would have no chance at all in the dating game. The problem is that the homegrown women in my dating pool have usually never lived anywhere else, have a very narrow comfort zone and limited experience with anyone who is not part of the cultural and lifestyle mainstream here. So if I want to have any chance with finding someone, I need to temper my trait labels a bit on a couple of them, so I don't seem so extremely different from them and everybody they know, otherwise those traits of mine would be seen as a red flag and I would be rejected before they even got to know me at all.

One trait is being a non-drinker, where social drinking is a huge part of the social life here for mainstream people, so I identify as a social drinker, even if I'm not. Because I am open-minded and very tolerant of someone who is a moderate drinker. Same with identifying as Spiritual, but not religious, because Agnostic would be seen as something too weird or extreme. I would usually be immediately red-flagged and rejected, but I have found that many times using that mild label initially allows me to become accepted later as Agnostic, if the woman is only moderately religious, which is something I can easily accept and tolerate.

The fact is, I have a lot of competition in my local dating pool, three men for every woman, and the reality is, with that competition, the women, esp. ones who are in the mainstream on culture and lifestyle, know that they can be very narrow and rigid in their checklist of traits for men they want to date, so I know that if I list any traits that they see as unusual or extreme, then they will red flag me and instead choose men that fit every one of their traits checklist. Online dating is brutal and competitive, whether people choose to recognize and admit that or not.

@TomMcGiverin

I've found someone online pof, I love and she me. My profile says no drugs, I say no drugs or I sound like a drug addict . Sound all reasonable to me, everyone lies in indegree, if one has to lie, do it out of kindness for self and them. For love is not ever wrong, it is the mind that is the source of all fuck up problems.

@TomMcGiverin And so begins the lying to get a woman. Trust me, they aren't worth all the bother.

@Castlepaloma Interesting that you bring up drugs. Match also has a traits ? in the profile's checklist of traits. The trait is weed use or not, and the only two options are 4/20 friendly and Not for me. I leave that one blank, again because of bullshit assumptions that women make about someone using either answer to that ? I am fine with dating someone who uses weed, but the two choices don't make that clear in any meaningful way. If I say I am 4/20 friendly, even tho I don't use weed, I get pegged as a pot user and sometimes even as a user of drugs in general. If I choose the Not for me label, I get pegged by women who are pot users as intolerant and unwilling to accept their weed use. Since you can't win either way, with either label, if you are a non-using, weed user accepting person, I leave it blank. Like the other guy said in this thread, some lying is necessary to attract even compatible women within the limits of online dating profiles, and it also wouldn't be worth it or effective to use the profile essay part to state an explanation of my views on weed, as it probably would just complicate things, seem weird to add a statement about it in there, and get me rejected anyway for having something so unusual in my profile essay.

Women are generally suspicious about men's dating profiles, probably for good reason, and adding some statement about how I don't use weed, but am tolerant and accepting of it in a partner, would probably raise red flags and be seen as just another guy trying to have it both ways and tell women what they want to hear. So, like most things in the dating game, you just can't win, no matter how honest you try to be...

@rainmanjr Speak for yourself. I had only one long term relationship, because I am very offbeat for where I live and my local dating pool. I dated about as much as most guys when I was a young man, but the whole issue of me not wanting to have kids or even be a stepparent, made me unacceptable for all the women I dated as far as a long term relationship, since, here in Iowa, having kids seemed to be everything to the young women I dated and they would not settle for a man who didn't want to have kids with them and be a parent with them. I was in my late thirties, because of that, still single, when I met my late wife in 1995, after she was married and divorced twice, and was 15 years older than me and childless, which finally made the whole huge issue in my dating pool, of me being childless by choice, a non-issue for her and me, since she was too old to have kids by then. The first 16 years with her, before she developed dementia in 2011, were the best years of my adult life. So yes, it is worth it to me to find another life partner, not someone exactly like her by any means, but someone compatible that I can trust and that loves me as much as I love her.

And since I, like my late father, am likely to live another 25 years or more, after me being widowed for five years, you're damned tooting that I want to share as much of my life that's left with another partner. Some people are wired for being happily single. I never was before her and I never will be now or later.

Thanks for your reaction, Neil, finally, someone who listens, gets it, and accepts me for who I am.

@TomMcGiverin That's fine with me. I kind of forget, when I type something like that, that nobody's seeing me smile while I write it. That smile is to say it's not a joke but it's also not in any way serious. Everyone we meet is worth the bother, I suppose, because life has no means to proceed without some of the other people we meet. Not all of them but some. People just become troublesome for me, over time, because I don't trust any of them. They leave so I push them away before they can do that.

@rainmanjr I totally get that, Neil. Thanks for clarifying and explaining yourself, as well as not getting offended at my disagreement with the line about women not being worth the bother, since I didn't pick up on the snark intended. This is the kind of interactions I miss on here that used to happen all the time, before most members got into the sport of simply putting all the blame for someone's problems in the dating game all on the member who dared to bare their soul, so to speak, and put their feelings and experiences out there for all to read and hear. I wish more people here had your open-mindedness, empathy, and compassion, but they don't, so that is why the subject of dating on this site has become almost taboo, unless of course, the person posting or commenting limits themselves to simply posting joking observations about other people from online memes or makes light of their own dating experiences. All stuff that is non-controversial and nothing directly personal or intimate about the member posting it.

And you're right, some people are not to be trusted. Most of my offline friends are women, some younger than me, some my age, and some older. Fewer male friends, probably because I am more sensitive than most men my age, because I share more common interests with women than men. etc. It has always been that way for me, so it's ironic that most of the people on here that have blocked me are women, but I think the reason for that is that they are so damned defensive if any men on here butt heads with them or disagree with them about general behavior of women in the dating game, because they take it as a personal attack and rush in to defend their whole sisterhood of women. I call that out when I see it and they hate me for it.

I recently ended two friendships with men who I used to really enjoy spending time with. One because the guy had become more and more controlling and critical of me, probably because he is very smart, but has little tolerance for someone who does not want to always behave the way he wants, agree with him on almost everything, and accept most of his choices for what activities to spend time doing together. I am too independent for that, so we parted ways. The other guy, it was because of a long-standing issue involving church politics with the local Unitarian church, where I finally got fed up with how he would never take my side or even believe my side of how I was getting screwed over and mistreated by other people that he was friends with there. In other words, he put his church friendships with them over his personal friendship with me, for almost ten years, and I finally got sick of the contrast between how he sold me out and treated me on this compared to one more casual friend from the church and another new friend from the church, both of whom immediately sided with me on this church politics issue and offered to go to bat for me with the person in the church who was screwing me over. That is the sign of a true friend, loyalty and being willing to stand up for you.

@rainmanjr Believe me, lying to get a woman is something I know is extremely common, and a big reason why women are so damned cynical and suspicious, rightly so, on dating sites. So many things I would not and will never do. Using fake or outdated photos, saying they are politically liberal when they're not, changing their political label back and forth depending on the woman they are messaging with. Same with religious affiliation. Attending Christian and Catholic churches and faking it just to meet women for dating, the list goes on and on. Saying they are into cycling, yoga, working out, etc. along with other interests they know women are into and want to hear that they are into as well. Saying in their profile essay how much they love kids and how well they get along with their kids and their ex.

@TomMcGiverin I see little point, if any, to all online interaction except to learn something about myself in relation to a vast education about humanity. I have a 45 year friendship, with a man I owe a great deal to, that is much like yours. As for Unitarian politics...the only thing wrong with the Unitarian Church is many Unitarians. Peace.

@TomMcGiverin

Trying to deeply understand a woman can lead to a road of ruins. Although on the other hand, romantic love is the ultimate love and balance. They are my spiritual and relationship guilds. Beauty is, at my age, can't get them pregnant and they usually own their own private house to play with the girl, then to find the woman.

@rainmanjr I have a friendship with another man, a former Unitarian my age, that is almost that long.