You made the first move but never heard back. Your message exchanges were funny and frequent but then it goes radio silent. You talk on the phone and text and back forth but suddenly you’re ghosted. Rejection happens to the best of us. The key is in how you handle it. Here is some advice on how to move on after being rejected by an online date.

Don’t take it personal

It can be hard to tell someone’s state of mind, so don’t take it personally. If someone is in a bad mood they are more likely to find something they don’t like about you. It just happened to be bad timing.

Evaluate your feelings

Even with the above in mind, feeling hurt is normal. Allow yourself to feel those emotions. Acknowledge the feelings so you can begin to move forward from them. Harboring negative feelings long term never does anyone any good. Make sure you express your feelings instead of repressing them.

Take a step back

It could be helpful to take a step back and evaluate what happened. Take a look at the interactions and honestly assess if there was anything you could have done differently. Your self-esteem at this point may have taken a hit so when doing this keep things in perspective by sticking to the facts.

Love yourself

Being rejected can lead to negative self-talk. You start to beat yourself up which gives your self-esteem even more hits. Be kind to yourself! Recognize you’re not perfect, and neither is anyone else. Accept the experience for what it is without any harsh judgements. To counteract the negativity, write down a list of all of your positive traits.

Silver lining

Think of it this way, sometimes it’s better to recognize that it wasn’t going to work out. Accepting this sooner rather than later will help you move on. Finding out now is better than investing more of your time in someone only to find out down the road it doesn’t work out.

Keep on moving on. Don’t let this stop you from taking shots with people in the future! Not interacting with anyone ever again is no way to live. You don’t have to let rejection get the best of you. Learn to cope and get back out there.

The post How to Move On After Being Rejected by an Online Date appeared first on FirstMet.com Blog.