SNOQUALMIE, Wash. — The Seattle Freeze is real, says world renowned relationship expert Dr. Pepper Schwartz: “I do think there is a freeze here. I do think it's real. I have met so many people who have had trouble making friends, much less finding dates."
She blames Seattle's reserved Scandinavian roots, and the fact that people aren't transient here - they tend to settle in.
Dr. Schwartz, who lives in Snoqualmie, has written multiple best-sellers about love and sex.
She's also a cast member of the Lifetime reality show ‘Married at First Sight' where couples are matched and get married without meeting each other beforehand.
Two of the three marriages from the first season are still together. So this matchmaker knows what she's doing when it comes to melting the Seattle Freeze.
First tip - get to work.
“If you are going to go and try and find someone, you are going to have to take it on like a job,” said Schwartz.
Tip two: no hiding behind excuses.
"And I also hate it when people say, ‘Oh there's no good men out there, or all the good women are already taken.’ It's just such crap,” laughed Schwartz with her characteristic bluntness.
Tip three: there's an app for that. Schwartz met her husband on a matchmaking site.
“I think apps are fine. Yes, it's not all rainbows and unicorns. But it will help you eventually get to where you want to go."
Tip four: volunteer in politics. Really.
"That is where people are passionate, that is where people are active. In the last elections it was do or die for a lot of people. Both Republican and Democrat. And a lot of people volunteered. Well if you're lonely, you should have been one too, right?”
Final bit of advice: don't let falling in love with this place keep you from falling in love. Dr. Schwartz says you can have it all.
In addition to teaching at the University of Washington, Pepper also writes a column for AARP called The Naked Truth.
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