@Urban_Hermit @0xabad1dea I'm not queer, and am only autistic-adjacent, but have some advice/perspective to offer. I've only had one romantic relationship in my life, it started when I was 25 in grad school and my wife and I have now been married for 13 years; we're both on balance happy (not to say that everything is perfect or has been effortless along the way). Apologies in advance for a long post; I respect both of your wisdom on this.

I agree that:
1. Emotional maturity is extremely important in romantic (& platonic) relationships.
2. Intentionally waiting until a certain age to start dating is not a universally good strategy.

I disagree in that:
1. I don't think that waiting until you're older to dive into romance is always bad.
2. I think that there are multiple ways to build emotional maturity, and that failed romantic relationships are not required for this (they're not necessarily always bad either...).

I'd strongly encourage anyone thinking thoughts about romance and whether to try it now/later to read "Loveless" by Alice Oseman. It is an excellent counter to our culture's toxic fixation on romance and a wonderful celebration of platonic love, and thus it has a lot of value even if you aren't asexual/aromantic.

I think it's quite possible that my romantic outcome is lucky/unusual, so I can't exactly say you should do exactly what I did, but I think its worth sharing as a less-mainstream example of success...

My most important pieces of advice:

1. Don't force yourself to do something that's fundamentally uncomfortable, even though you may need to push through tangential discomforts. I was socially awkward and very uncomfortable with the process of asking my wife on our first date. I was also lonely & uncomfortable with my lack of romance, and that discomfort pushed me to act. There have been times when my relationship made me uncomfortable (& same is true for my wife), but those discomforts even at their most severe have never outweighed the comforts of the relationship. When you are pushing through discomfort, try to make sure that either you're willing to drop things if the discomfort gets too great, and/or the benefits of pushing through are worth it. And those benefits should be actual joy for you, not just avoidance of discomfort (and especially not avoidance of discomfort imposed on you my others).

2. Relationships take sustained effort. In romantic relationships, there will likely be some period(s) of infatuation where they feel effortless, but a fulfilling long-term relationship cannot be sustained on infatuation alone (more power to you if you just want temporary relationships, as long as you're honest about this). To create a loving relationship you need to practice & put in work to make your partner happy (and they should be doing the same so that your work is rewarded by their efforts and vice versa). You will also need to compromise (but again, this should be mutual and it's okay to have boundaries). Particularly if you've been socialized as a guy, ask yourself periodically "What actions have I taken recently where the motivation & purpose was to make my partner happy, especially ones that they didn't request?" If the answer is "can't think of any" then your relationship is at least a little bit unhealthy, and you need to work in that (also thanks patriarchy for raising men to not think about this, it hurts all of us & also our romantic partners). If you've been socialized to constantly worry about this (thanks again patriarchy) consider instead asking whether your partner has been taking these actions, and maybe talking to them about this if they're worth it. The good news: you don't need "true love" or to "find a soulmate." With effort, you can build a loving & sustaining relationship with anyone you choose (who chooses you back). I did not love my wife before I asked her out, yet we built a wonderful & lasting relationship because we chose to.

3. A good romantic relationship entails commitment/trust, and a lot of relationship pain and failure comes from inability to gently ratchet up that commitment/trust in synchrony with you partner in a way that keeps you both feeling safe & comfortable. Honestly, I cannot speak from experience on this one, but I'm confident in it nevertheless based on what I know about others' relationships. I suspect that clear and honest communication about commitment/trust levels is a very good thing here; it has been in my relationship. At the start of a relationship, commitment and trust should be low on both sides, and as it progresses ideally both sides should increase their commitment and trust in step with each other. Imbalance either way can be scary for both partners, but if you get to high mutual commitment/trust levels, you can build a very strong and sustaining and joyful relationship. It's not a one-time thing either: you'll have you re-commit and re-negotiate trust continually throughout your relationship. This is also another place where patriarchy rears its ugly head, telling men they don't need to trust their partners while their partners should trust them completely. Non-men are the primary victims of that mindset, followed by the men whose relationships fail (or are toxic) because of this belief (to be clear: for which they are responsible).

4. When we're angry or arguing, our brains have a tendency to formulate the most hurtful possible reply to our partners and queue it up to get spoken, sometimes almost unconsciously. These words sometimes have some truth to them, but are usually an exaggeration of our true long-term feelings, and they're not ultimately honest. Shutting up and walking away to cool down (or even better if you can, remaining present, apologizing, and reflecting honestly on your own contribution to the situation) is a very useful skill in a relationship. Especially when trust/commitment are low and/or the relationship is young, a single heated argument can derail the whole thing. If there's one thing I can believe has contributed the most to the success of my relationship, it's my ability to shut up and apologize, even in cases where I truly believe I haven't done anything wrong. At least 70% of the time I can see later that I did do something wrong, and often that points to opportunities for emotional growth. 100% of the time our relationship was better served by a quieter conversation later.

@Urban_Hermit 🫂

@0xabad1dea

@indigoparadox Repeating that that’s totally fine, with my similar life story.

Had one short relationship in my twenties that realistically had no chance to work anyway, for various reasons. A couple years after that a friend “bullied” me into a relationship with them that worked okay for around six years, when they broke up. I didn’t feel very sad and not for long. We are still (distant) friends.

I’ve been solo since then, am 43 now and don’t miss much. Someone to cuddle and hang out with by default would be nice, but I don’t really need that. I’m asexual, but not aromantic and have had crushes, but I don’t feel like I need or want a relationship at the moment, and that’s just fine. For a similar reason, too: I don’t want to do the emotional work to balance the different needs and wants.

@indigoparadox @0xabad1dea

I definitely feel this. I dated for a few years, it was nice, but it didn't work out; and seeing so many people get divorced I'm not especially keen to rush into a relationship.

Agree that you first have to be happy by yourself and if you then meet someone nice, then that would be good.

@raktheundead @0xabad1dea

Don't give up if a romantic relationship if what you wish. Don't listen to the 'statistics'. We are all individual. We all must create our own path.

My only advice is that life begins outside of your door. Work first to make new friendships w/ men & women. Expand your circle of friends. Don't worry about dating. And work on your self. Try new things. Learn to be more happy.

Successful romance comes after you learn to be happy on your own.

@flamecat @0xabad1dea You can be aro and still want a romantic relationship. I'm arospec and in a LTR, so I have proof it's a thing that can happen.

You might want to try exploring the aro community to see if it helps you figure yourself out. There are parts of it I don't recommend, but Arocalypse seems like a pretty friendly place.

https://www.arocalypse.com/