Save your energy (Picture: Getty)

‘Don’t send those long paragraph texts, stop it’, Self Esteem warned us in her hit I Do This All The Time.

Have you recently been ghosted? Are you in an on/off situation? Or are you being treated poorly by the person you’re dating?

It might be time to adopt the ‘boring uncle theory’.

Designed to get you to stop investing your time and energy into people that won’t romantically commit to you, it can help you create some emotional distance from the situation, and feel empowered again.

Because really, when do those long pleading texts ever make you feel better?

‘Boring uncle theory’ is pretty self-explanatory – the idea is you see this person in the same way as the boring uncle trying to talk to you at a family gathering.

Margarita Nazarenko, a TikToker specialising in relationship videos, shared: ‘When you don’t know how to react to somebody, imagine yourself at a Christmasdinner where your uncle is there […] and he’s telling you some story […]

‘You want to be talking to your cousin over here, because she’s got some juicy gossip.

‘So what you do to him is you react to him politely, but you’re not going to give him all of your attention, you’re not going to tell him how boring his story is.’

She adds you should view them as nice enough, but someone who is ‘so deeply boring’ and avoid asking further questions or getting any deeper into the conversation.

By doing so, you can free yourself up from further emotional investment and get back to having fun – just like in the real-life boring uncle scenario, where you disengage politely to chat to your fun cousin.

Someone commented under the video: ‘Love! I’ve been wondering if I should explain or educate but it wastes energy on people who actually don’t want to try to keep you.’

Others called the tip ‘brilliant’, and another added: ‘Yesssss be nonchalant. I’m naturally like that. Save yourself.’

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This will help you stop wasting time and effort on the wrong people when dating.