What's More Important Than Being Chosen: What We Learned The Hard Way (So You Don't Have To)

Dateable: Your insider's look into modern dating and relationships

Yue Xu and Julie Krafchick

Society & Culture, Sexuality, Science, Social Sciences, Relationships, Health & Fitness

4.7 • 910 Ratings

🗓️ 24 April 2026

⏱️ 21 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Why do we place so much weight on being chosen and what does it actually get us? In this episode, we dig into how we’ve confused attention with real investment and chased validation instead of asking whether we felt genuinely valued. We reflect on the subtle ways performative dating shows up and how societal pressure keeps us focused on being picked and why the relationships worth having are built more so much more than simply being chosen. Enjoy! - Take the Dating Archetypes quiz now: https://howtobedateable.com/ Read our book: How To Be Dateable: The Essential Guide To Finding Your Person and Falling in Love: https://howtobedateable.com/ Try the Dateable AI Dating Coach: Get personalized advice trained on our years of podcast episodes, courses and frameworks: https://studio.com/dateable Follow us @dateablepodcast, @juliekrafchick and @nonplatonic. Check out our website for more content. Also listen to our other podcasts The Psychology of Relationships and Exit Interview available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. WE WROTE A BOOK! HOW TO BE DATEABLE (Simon & Schuster) is available now: https://howtobedateable.com/ Want to remove distractions from your dates? Download Brick and get 10% off at https://www.getbrick.app/DATEABLE Our Sponsors: * Avocado Green Mattress: Check out their mattress and furniture sale: https://avocadogreenmattress.com/DATEABLE * Get Rain of Shadows and Endings wherever books are sold or at Kensington Publishing https://www.kensingtonbooks.com * Quince: Get free shipping and 365 day returns at https://quince.com/dateable * Ruggable: Get 10% off your first order, sitewide, with promo code DATEABLE at https://ruggable.com Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcript

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0:00.0	In by 20s, I confused attention with effort and paid for it later. I wanted to be chosen,
0:07.4	but back then I didn't realize the difference between being chosen and being prioritized.
0:12.8	So how do you know if they actually show up for you or just keep you around? How do you know
0:18.3	you're being truly valued or just not being let go? I'm Julie. And I'm
0:23.3	UA and we're sharing what we learn the hard way so you don't have to. Oh my God, we hear all the time.
0:30.0	I just want to be chosen. I want to be picked. But I've come to realize that actually means nothing
0:36.3	if they're not showing up and prioritizing you in the way that you need.
0:40.9	Someone can pick you and not have the capacity to be with you or to be the type of person for you.
0:49.5	But also, why do we feel like we need to be picked and chosen? Is it the media? I think it's society
0:58.2	telling us that, like, being coupled, you have won, being singles, you have lost. There's this
1:04.9	reinforced message all the time that feels like you are doing something right. You're moving up the ladder.
1:12.7	If you have a partner and we fail to say, like, is this a good partner? Because I think if you
1:19.2	find the wrong partner, someone that treats you horribly and doesn't treat you well, you're
1:24.3	actually going down the ladder, not going up the ladder.
1:29.2	Yes, exactly.
1:31.8	But we feel like we're in this competition.
1:32.7	Yeah.
1:36.6	We're in a lineup and someone's going to choose us.
1:41.6	And what's dangerous about that mentality is that you lose agency in your choices.
1:43.0	You're not the one picking.
1:45.4	Someone else is just, you're just waiting for someone else to go, yep, you'll do. And unfortunately, in my 20s, that is how I felt. I had this
1:52.6	very toxic trait that if I started dating someone, I would go on Facebook and look at all their
	...

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