Not meant for each other after all?

I met J, 29, in spring. He had moved to Stockholm from England for work. We connected via Hinge and he was very quick to ask me out. I saw his profile and felt an intuitive pull. Was probably sold by him mentioning reading "Crime and Punishment". My “type”: intellectual, searching for “the truth”, spark in the eyes.

I got Hinge last November and had been on a fair amount of dates since then. Mostly nice guys... but rarely that feeling of wanting to meet again. And then there he was. Beautiful as a man can be. Impeccable manners, wit, charm, style. We ended up talking for hours about everything, including Dostoevsky :) The evening ended with a walk in the park. The connection felt so beautiful I didn’t mind him taking my hand and kissing me on the cheek.

We had another two dates that felt magical. He was a true master of “magic”. I am usually very sceptical, if not repelled, by direct flattery. But somehow I leaned into him calling me “princess”. Completely bought into his talk about all the things we were going to do, how wonderful it was going to feel, how rare our connection was, how completely stunned he was by me, etc. I am familiar with the concepts of narcissistic love bombing and future faking, but of course, “J was different”. Just a hopeless romantic.

Naive? Maybe. I probably attached too much meaning to him being Sikh. True, obviously a “modern” one: a lot of good wine, dating outside the faith, not exactly giving the vibe of a celibate guy patiently waiting for “the one”. But who am I to judge? A Christian myself, I know very well the struggle of wanting to do the right thing while seeing that the pool of practicing Christian guys my age is more of a little puddle. The strange thing is that I had not felt so spiritually connected to someone in a long time. Also, I loved seeing him proud of his culture, unapologetic about wearing a turban, going to gurdwara, connected to something bigger than himself. Felt beautiful to me.

Then came the blow. He ghosted me after three wonderful dates, where he had done everything to make me trust him and believe we had something rare. Suddenly there was “busy work”, a “family visit” etc. Then, after a couple of weeks, he dropped an AI-style message about us being “at different stages of life” — dry, impersonal, cold. Didn’t make any sense after all the intensity he had consciously been creating when meeting me. To say I felt manipulated and played would be saying nothing.

Forgot to mention that he hinted at intimacy on our last date. I was very attracted to him, but declined politely, explaining I wanted to get to know him better first. Maybe that was the moment. In retrospect, part of me wonders if he was mainly looking for something physical. But then again, that does not add up with the spiritual language he used and the way he presented himself. I cannot imagine making someone feel chosen, rare, almost destined, and then dropping them without a proper human conversation. I'd feel like a complete jerk.

The annoying part is that I still have feelings for him. Some part of me still wants to believe there was something real there, which is probably why the whole thing feels so hard to digest.

I am not looking for sympathy as much as reflection. Especially from Sikh men and women, or people who date with faith and tradition somewhere in the background: how would you read this gap between spiritual language, intense romantic behaviour, and such a cold ending?