I’ve been talking to someone in a group chat for months now and we get along really well, so we started messaging privately. The conversation flows easily and it feels like we’ve become close, but I’m starting to wonder how you actually build a genuine connection with someone you’ve never met in person. It’s hard to tell what’s real sometimes.
I get how this feels warm and uncanny. You can sense a real connection in chat even when there is no face to face yet.
To build a genuine connection you can look for steady signals over time. Not just fast banter but how they show up when your plans slip or you are quiet.
Maybe you read closeness from chat speed and the amount of detail. They might be great at texting but distant in real life and you would not know yet.
I am not sure the online space makes this easy. It is easy to curate a profile of yourself and hide the messy parts which can tilt the sense of realness.
If the frame shifts from chasing a perfect bond to checking what you learn about yourself in these chats you might find value in the process not in the endpoint.
Why assume a real bond only happens after we meet Could the question be about how much you enjoy the dialogue and what it teaches you about your own boundaries?