I was on Bumble BFF for a Month - Here's What Happened
So we all know that making friends as an adult can be pretty tough. In school, you become friends with your lab partner, your desk mate, the girl you once bumped into at the toilets. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. As an adult, your options are limited to work where not many of us are blessed with finding the right friends. Your current friends also go on to get married and have babies. Some move geographically. Some move towards a different direction in life. Things happen. Those things happened to me as well and I was wondering if it was time I should expand my social circle. If making friends as an adult is hard, making friends as an adult who works from home has proven to be especially hard. And that’s when I heard about Bumble BFF.
This is what Bumble’s website has to say about Bumble BFF:
“Building a strong community is key to a happy, healthy life, no matter your romantic relationship status. Think about it: The people who surround you, in a platonic sense, are the ones who support you through life’s up and downs. Whether recovering from a job loss or breakup — or, on the flip side, celebrating a promotion or marriage — it’s your friends who’ll be cheering you along and offering their encouragement.”
I was sold. I was looking to build my #tribe and I wanted to let people who inspire and influence me in a positive way into my life, so I signed up for an account.
Here’s how Bumble BFF works: Like Bumble, i.e, like Tinder. You see someone’s profile, you like it, you swipe right. You don’t, you swipe left. Simple and just a little oof if you ask me. Let me explain. Right off the bat, I had the challenge of setting up my profile – I didn’t want to leave it vague like on dating sites with some selfies, nor did I want to come across as someone who’s desperate for friends. The thought that someone would see my pictures and decide to swipe left was definitely disconcerting, and I felt very vulnerable. It didn’t really matter in the dating scene, but it felt oddly personal and hurtful in the friendship scene. Like, “You don’t want to be friends with me because of the way I look and/or because I like coffee? That’s harsh.” And that definitely dug its fingers a little in my already below average self-esteem and self-worth. Nonetheless, I decided to power through so I threw in some pictures where you can see my personality and wrote a quirky (or what I considered quirky) little bio.
And then it was time to swipe! I took an orientation-at-school approach towards it: I swiped right on everyone. Even on people who expressed their preference for dogs or cats or one over the other even though I’m not a pet person at all. I thought once we start chatting, if we click, we click, if not we don’t, we fizz out. Simple. No pressure. It didn’t seem fair to judge people based on the small information they could or chose to squeeze into their bio either. Sure, reading that someone has no clue about modern art might make you judge them, but it could be something that you choose to ignore if that person was your friend and you learned that about them later on. “Oh, that Thendral! You want to shut her up, bring her to an art museum!” is what I imagine my friends saying with a good-natured eye roll when they want to talk about me. Anyway, I swiped right on everyone and reserved judgement.
Okay, here's what actually happened. I didn’t swipe right on EVERYONE, I did swipe left on a few people who … let’s just say their outlook towards life was very, very different from mine. One girl was purely looking for someone to hit all the clubs in the country with, was very clear about it, and I wasn’t interested in that at all. You can’t make everyone like you, and you can’t like everyone right?
So, as I was swiping, I started to realise that some things were pretty common after I had been through a number of profiles – so many girls love wine! To the point I wondered if there was something wrong with my palate for my inability to appreciate anything beyond a happy glass of Moscato. Netflix was another common factor – maybe because of its rep on dating sites and girls would very much rather mention it among (potential) friends. Quite a number were also looking for friends to travel with. I even came across the profile of a girl who was an insurance agent, she slipped it in in a very creative manner about how she can be your insurance agent as well if you become friends with her. I thought it was a pretty smart way to get more clients.
I got matches within the day. I was actually pretty excited every time I saw Bumble’s notification that I had a new BFF connection. A possible new friend! So exciting! And then it soon turned into a problem. Initiating a conversation is not particularly hard for me but to make sure the conversation continued, I always worked in a question after “Hey!” based on something they wrote on their profile. Most followed up with a question for me and that ensured the back and forth for a conversation. But some simply answered the question and left it at that leaving me unsure what to do next. I'm not sure if there are lesser people on Bumble BFF than dating sites as well because it didn't take me that long to run out of people to swipe on. That was a sad moment.
But, based on the girls I have matched with, this is what I can tell you:
1. Most people are friendly and will say a hello at the very least back.
2. Of those who reply, a number will continue into conversations.
3. And of those conversations, most will peter out and only a few will remain for genuine conversations.
4. I got quite a bit of positive energy; it felt nice to receive compliments from strangers. Actual compliments and not “compliments”, like “I didn’t know Indian girls can be beautiful until I saw you” – especially when there were compliments about choosing to pursue my passion.
5. It felt especially nice to receive purely platonic compliments with nothing other than good cheer expected in return.
6. There are quite a few people who like the idea of having a friend app but don’t really want to put in the effort into interacting for potential friends.
7. You WILL learn something from this experience – be it how to be more comfortable in your skin, how to initiate conversations or maybe even something about yourself.
So, how would I describe my overall experience? Much like the orientation approach I took towards it – most people are friendly, and you can have some back and forth but for me, most of these didn’t evolve into a solid friendship. I'm not going to give up on it just yet because it's just been a month and people continue to join Bumble BFF so there's always new people to match with. And while I did come across some interesting profiles that don’t necessarily match what I would look for in a person at all, this experience was far more pleasant than any dating app. I didn’t come across any weirdos, creeps or clingy people. If you are looking to expand your social circle, put yourself out there and see what baits your hook! I don't know if you will meet your "BFF" but you might finally find someone to go for the yoga session none of your friends would go with you for!
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