3 Ways Dating Advice Can Backfire

Some tips promise clarity, but end up creating confusion. Here's how to spot advice that disconnects you from your own instincts.

By Mark Travers, Ph.D. | May 29, 2025

Dating advice is everywhere, from pop-psychology tips on social media to well-meaning friends and family ready to jump in with their take on what you should or shouldn't do in the dating world. Whether it's "never text first" or "play hard to get," the advice is endless, often conflicting and very easy to get swept up in.

While it's natural to seek advice, validation or even just a sense of clarity about dating, everyone around you likely has an opinion, often rooted in their own experiences. Sometimes, you'll hear stories that feel strikingly similar to your own, making their advice seem even more appropriate.

It can be healthy to vent, reflect or take bits of advice that genuinely resonate with you, but there's a fine line between using advice to support your clarity and using it to override it.

As relatable as someone's story might be, the people involved, their emotional histories, attachment patterns and communication styles are never identical. What worked in their case may not always be helpful in yours. Their opinion should serve as a mirror, not a step-by-step manual.

This is why it's essential to build awareness around your own relational patterns, what you truly want in a relationship and what feels right to you in your dating process.

At the end of the day, no one else is living your experience. The more you crowd your inner voice with outside noise, the harder it becomes to understand what you want.

Here are three ways dating advice could be sabotaging your love life.

1. It Makes You Lose Sight Of Your True Self

One of the most common ways dating advice becomes harmful is when it teaches you to prioritize strategy over authenticity. You've likely heard suggestions like, "Don't be too available," "Mirror their energy" or "Always have the upper hand." While they may sound empowering on the surface, these tips often push people to suppress their instincts and disconnect from their inner compass.

Research published in the Journal of Personality on self-monitoring in close relationships found that people who frequently adjust their behavior to fit the situation (called high self-monitors) tend to form less emotionally connected and less committed relationships. They often build bonds around shared activities rather than deep emotional compatibility.

In contrast, low self-monitors, who remain true to themselves regardless of the situation, are more likely to form stable and meaningful relationships.

Much of the dating advice online encourages high self-monitoring behavior, where you're constantly watching, adjusting and performing to earn love. It pulls you out of your emotional truth and places you in a cycle of self-editing. Over time, this can weaken not just your connection with others, but also with yourself.

While strategy may offer short-term control, it's authenticity that builds long-term connection. True intimacy is only possible if you show up as yourself, and not as a version curated to win someone over.

2. It Oversimplifies Complex Human Emotions

Many dating tips are packaged in bite-sized, confident one-liners like "If they wanted to, they would," "Just move on" or "They're not confused; they're just not interested." While these seem to intuitively make sense, they often oversimplify deeply layered emotional experiences.

Sometimes, such straightforward advice can help bring clarity. But when it's used to quickly label or dismiss what you're feeling, it can lead to emotional suppression rather than emotional understanding.

A 2020 study on thought suppression found consistent evidence of "rebound effects," where trying to suppress a thought causes it to return more intensely than before. This means that when people attempt to "move on" or suppress their feelings too quickly, those emotions can resurface stronger and more persistently.

Interestingly, researchers also found "immediate enhancement effects," when someone experiences cognitive overload, where suppression increases the focus on the thought right away.

This can manifest as you dismissing your feelings or pushing them aside to align with oversimplified advice. While seeking clarity is natural, it's essential to process emotions authentically rather than suppress them.

Your emotional experience is unique to you, and one-liners serve as mere band-aids on deeper wounds without addressing what they bring up for you.

Humans are complex; so are relationships. For instance, what looks like "mixed signals" may be someone struggling with their own emotional capacity, trauma history or fear of intimacy. What feels like confusion on your part may be a sign that something in the situation isn't aligning with your emotional needs and that's worth exploring, not ignoring.

When people are encouraged to jump to conclusions or "cut people off" without processing their feelings, it often delays healing and lowers empathy. It also creates a cycle of repeated patterns because the deeper emotional work is left untouched.

In reality, rushing the process or adopting someone else's rules often gets in the way of the clarity and emotional resilience you seek.

3. It Keeps You Stuck In A State Of Anxiety And Distrust

You may have noticed that a lot of dating advice online can leave you feeling more anxious than reassured, and this may be intentional, to keep you hooked and coming back for more. The advisor creates a problem for you to think about, while establishing themselves as the one that can solve it for you.

Phrases like "Test them," "Don't trust too quickly" or "Assume they're seeing others" also encourage a mindset of emotional defense rather than emotional connection as you enter relationships.

This kind of advice wires your nervous system to expect a threat instead of a connection. It keeps you hypervigilant, always on guard for signs you might be hurt or rejected. While it might feel like you're protecting yourself, you may be reinforcing cycles of mistrust, anxiety and emotional distance instead.

Over time, this constant state of alertness makes it harder to feel safe with someone, even when they are safe to be around. It chips away at your ability to build intimacy because you're too busy scanning for what could go wrong.

Instead of tuning into your experience with someone, you're likely caught up in your head, overanalyzing every message, delayed reply or tone of voice. This pushes you into performative behavior and away from authentic relating.

Feeling safe in love doesn't come from testing others. Genuine connection is built on calm, curiosity and shared emotional safety. If you're always playing defense, you never get to fully show up and experience the win.

How To Use Dating Advice Without Losing Yourself

Navigating the dating world can be overwhelming with all the outside noise from well-wishers or self-proclaimed experts. That's why it's important to approach dating advice with mindfulness and discernment.

Here's how to consume dating advice in a way that truly supports you:

• Assess what resonates with you. When receiving advice, ask yourself whether it genuinely aligns with your values, needs and life goals. Not all advice is one-size-fits-all. Sometimes, advice may sound perfect, but it's crucial to check if it reflects who you are and what you want out of your relationships.
• Understand your underlying motivation. Understand why you're seeking advice in the first place. Are you looking for validation, clarity or reassurance? Be aware of whether you're seeking advice to justify a particular outcome or whether you're genuinely open to learning more about yourself.
• Give yourself time to process. In the heat of emotional moments, advice can sometimes feel urgent and overwhelming. Resist the urge to make decisions immediately based on external input. Take the time to process your emotions before acting on any advice you've received.
• Avoid the trap of overanalyzing. While it's tempting to constantly seek advice, remember that overanalyzing can create confusion. The more you listen to conflicting advice, the harder it becomes to follow your inner voice. Trust that you don't need all the answers right away. Sometimes, the best action is to simply let things unfold naturally.

Do you bring your authentic self to relationships or keep it hidden out of fear? Take this science-backed test to find out: Authenticity In Relationships Scale

A similar version of this article can also be found on Forbes.com, here.