Column: Love loading... Marriage Pact is not compatible with holistic dating

I've never had dating standards. As someone who went to an all-girls school, when boys eventually made their way into my life, I was so excited to date that I forgot to stop and set standards.

The same cannot be said about my friends.

From political affiliation to eye color, they are determined to find someone who fits the exact description of their dream person. And what better way to find your perfect match than the UNC Marriage Pact program, which promises to align one's desires with the standards of a potential partner.

The program asks students to fill out a survey specifying characteristics they would like in a partner, then creates pairs based on percentage compatibility. It asks about political alignment preferences, ideal height and even intelligence.

Relationship compatibility is complicated. If it could really be distilled down into an algorithm, wouldn't everyone be dating their perfect match?

Marriage Pact aims to find you a soulmate. In reality, all it does is perpetuate the idea that “100 percent compatibility” in romance means finding someone who checks every single one of your boxes.

By this strain of thinking, individuals fall in love with a list of characteristics and the potential of a new relationship instead of people as a whole. This lowers our likelihood of being in fulfilling relationships, or even starting one in the first place. More often than not, this list of traits doesn't even align with what we're looking for.

What we label as a desire for a partner who is politically aligned with us can simply manifest in a need for someone who won't get frustrated with us if we say something they disagree with. When we say we need someone who is more extroverted than we are, maybe all we want is someone who will call a restaurant for us and make a reservation. And maybe even that obsession with finding someone over 6’0” actually just means you need a good hug.

This mislabeling of expected traits ends up shutting down potential relationships simply because on the surface, this person wasn't exactly what we're looking for.

Even if we manage to meet someone who fulfills our endless list of desires, sometimes what they seem to be on the surface isn't who they actually are. The content of a class never exactly matches its description — so why do we assume all of our partners will behave in line with their presented characteristics?

To heal all dating qualms, I present to you a love potion: the Pareto Principle. This concept articulates that 20 percent of inputs create 80 percent of outputs. In the case of dating, this suggests that 80 percent of our happiness in a relationship can be derived from 20 percent of our partner's qualities.

Pay really close attention to the 20 percent of qualities you appreciate most in people. Maybe this is their extroversion or your love for a shared show. Maybe it really is that you like socially liberal, fiscally conservative people. Make a concerted effort to go after these traits in new relationships, and try to pay less attention to all the other ones — they won't contribute much to your happiness in the end regardless.

If you asked me before I started dating, I would have told you my standards were a Toronto Maple Leafs fan who's taller than me and really likes to read. But, I've been with people the same height as me, STEM majors and a boy who once told me he would rather listen to Led Zeppelin than ever touch a book. I'm even now dating a Carolina Hurricanes fan. Often the best people you'll ever be with are the ones who surprise you with who they are.

@dthopinion | opinion@dailytarheel.com