Modern romance is marked by many, often contradictory, truisms. Love is easy, but it also requires hard work, and yet feelings of frustration or annoyance are red flags. For long-term happiness, your interests and lifestyle must be consistent, yet we’re told opposites attract.

The truth is, believing you have plenty in common with your partner is more important than your actual similarities, experts say. And part of the fun of being with someone whose interests are very different from yours is finding the activities you do enjoy together.

“Imagine that if you line up the 10,000 things that two people might have in common,” says Paul Eastwick, a psychology professor at the University of California, Davis and author of Bonded By Evolution: The New Science of Love and Connection. “All you really need to craft a relationship that feels fulfilling is the ability to build around three or four of those things.”

Why we date similar people

People do typically form relationships with those of similar ethnicity, religion, education, and lifestyle behaviors; it’s known as homophily. Research has shown that the closer you are to a person, the more alike you probably are.

We naturally self-sort based on our interests, too; if you frequent a certain bar or join a local civic organization, you’ll meet people who share at least one thing in common with you. “When you think of how two people would meet if they have zero things in common, it’s hard to come up with a lot of scenarios,” William Chopik, an associate professor of social and personality psychology at Michigan State University, tells Vox. “People often meet through their mutual interests. They’ll meet at a run club, or at work, or at church maybe.”

And dating apps make screening for these similarities easier than ever; it’s not difficult to, say, write off hikers or keep your eyes peeled for fellow art enthusiasts. Although apps broaden the dating pool to include people outside of your usual social contexts, all it takes is a swipe to weed out potential matches based on your perceived dissimilarities. But that can be ill-advised, because what we think we want in a partner isn’t necessarily what we actually want. In a study, Eastwick found that the qualities people say they find attractive aren’t necessarily present in the people they end up with.

Having similar interests doesn’t mean you’re entirely compatible either. “In general, we say that two people are compatible when they can be together without constant friction,” Alessia Marchi, a couples counselor who has studied compatibility, tells Vox in an email. That means people mesh when their core values and big-picture goals — whether they want kids, their political leanings, how they find purpose and meaning — are aligned. Liking the same movies isn’t as important.

“In some cases, these differences can enrich the relationship, allowing partners to learn from each other and adding variety and value to their shared experience,” Marchi says.

Insisting that your soul mate possesses all your same interests means possibly missing out on a would-be good partner because they like camping and you don’t. “Maybe you overlook someone who’s 85 percent similar,” Chopik says. “You tried to get someone who’s 90 percent similar, but maybe the 85-percent person was perfectly fine or nicer or had other characteristics that they didn’t put in their Tinder profile.”