Dating Tips: Y is for You

While participating in the dating game, as well as in many other situations in life, it’s easy to have your feelings bruised. Most often, this happens when the words and actions of others are taken more personally than intended. 

Of course, in the midst of a personal interaction, it may be difficult to avoid feeling this way. 

Over the course of a dating career, you will meet lots of new people, each with their own agenda, and it is one they are probably NOT sharing with you during the first few interactions. Consequently, you have no idea what they are really thinking. 

While you may believe a date went swimmingly and the two of you are headed for a happily ever after, your date may be just looking for a good time. 

If you ass-u-me that your date is more interested than he really is and, thus, make an innocent remark about your future together, you can scare him away. Chances are he will disappear, never to be heard from again. You are left wondering what YOU did wrong. 

The truth is that you did nothing wrong because this incident wasn’t about you. It was about your date’s inability to express himself honestly and his fear of commitment.

If you encounter this scenario, or another similar one, don’t waste your energy beating yourself up or pine for this person to return. Just say NEXT! 

If you let every rejection or slight throw you off track, you will have a difficult time with the dating scene. Simply keep in mind that everything is not about you!

The preceding is an excerpt from my book, Understanding Dating and Relationships From A to Z, which is available via Amazon. Click on the title to see more about it.  Here are the other subjects covered in the book about which you can learn.

From A to Z: Ageist, Behaved Well, Cerebral, Deceptive, Egocentric, Fear, Genital Health, Hesitant, Imaginative, Juvenile, Knight in Shining Armor, Lust, Monopolizer, Noncommittal, Optimistic, Platinum Rule, Questioner, Rebound Relationship, Stymied, Tenacious, Uncompromising, Virgin (Born Again), Wary, eXcessive, You, Zero-Tolerance.

Culture, Accents and Attraction

The word ATTRACTION is often used when referring to prospective dates. Let’s examine what it means to be attracted to a person. 

According to Webster, attraction is defined as the following. 

1. The act, process or power of attracting 

2. Personal charm 

3. The action or power of drawing forth a response; an attractive quality 

4. Something that attracts or is intended to attract people by appealing to their desires and tastes 

 Attraction, often thought of as chemistry, is really the spark that inspires you to want to find out more about a person. 

Of course, after you get past the initial draw, there has to be some substance to the person for the relationship to morph into something meaningful. 

However, humans are a very visual species and most make quick decisions (although not always accurate) about a person upon a first viewing. 

There are lots of variables that can act as a catalyst for an initial attraction, including a person’s height, hair, personality, lifestyle, sense of humor or even that sexy foreign accent that indicates a cultural heritage different than your own. 

I was just introduced to a relatively new and free online dating site that caters to those who find people from different cultures captivating. If this interests you, visit the site at DatingMashup.com. 

DatingMashup.com says that exploring a relationship with someone who is from another country can be very attractive. Providing a sense of intrigue, it beckons you to discover your differences as well as your similarities. Be it an Aussie, Brit or an Irishman, some people just seem to be uncontrollably drawn to a foreign accent that makes them weak in the knees. 

The site features an international search engine that allows you to locate people from other countries that reside in your current city, as well as connect with those from the U.S. 

If you are looking for love, this is just one more option available to you.

Are You Too Busy To Look for Love?

Many say they would like to date in order to find a new life partner. However, in the next breath, they complain that they don’t have enough time to devote to the endeavor. 

Are these excuses put forth because of a fear of dating – both a fear of failure AND a fear of success? 

OR … do many feel so disorganized that there aren’t enough minutes in the day to accomplish the necessary tasks of living, let alone add dating into the mix? 

If time management is your issue, here are some seven helpful suggestions to get your life in order so that you can make some room to look for love. 

1. Know your priorities. By defining your goals, and then creating an Action Plan that moves you towards those goals, you will be able to stop wasting time on the things that distract you from moving closer to your desired outcomes. Each day, make a daily “To-Do” list, which defines the important tasks for you to complete that day. Of course, there are always emergencies which need attending, but don’t let them derail your journey towards your ultimate goal. 

2. Define your hours of power. Each person is different: some are most productive first thing in the morning and others are most creative in the wee hours of the night. Keep track of your own patterns to discover when you get the most work completed. Those are the hours to work on projects that require prolonged concentration. 

3. Avoid multi-tasking. Concentrate on one task at a time and then move onto the next one. Although multi-tasking seems like a good idea, it actually divides your attention and decreases your productivity. When you are able to focus your undivided attention to a task at hand, you can complete it with efficiency. Publius Syrus said, “To do two things at once is to do neither.” 

4. Create routines. Try to do the same tasks at the same time each day. For example, if you use Facebook for your business, create your posts at a set time. You can always schedule them for later, but now you don’t have to think about writing them throughout the day. Moreover, in this way, since you visit Facebook less often, it precludes you from being distracted by the postings of others and wasting valuable time. 

5. Be realistic with your time estimates. Most under-estimate how much time something will take. Consequently, don’t over-schedule yourself so that you short change everything and everyone, including yourself. 

6. Write it down. If a brilliant idea comes to you in the midst of a task, write down your idea so that you can revisit it at a later time. By taking a few moments to record your train of thought, you can then refocus on the current task vs. thinking about your new idea. 

7. Give yourself limits. Time is your most valuable commodity and it’s important not to squander it. However, it’s equally as important to set aside time to do nothing. Everyone needs to take a break in order to refresh and rejuvenate. Taking short breaks during the day; a day or two during the week; and one or two weeks each year for downtime allows you to address your work in more creative and productive manner.

For more time management tips, you can read the article I wrote for Always New You as a guest blogger for FizzNiche.
http://www.alwaysnewyou.com/balanced_you/time_management/save-minutes-to-save-hours-with-time-management-techniques.html

6 Ways To Cultivate The Culture of Your Relationship

According to Webster, the word culture is defined as follows. 

1. the act of developing the intellectual and moral faculties especially by education 

2. the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution or organization 

3. the act or process of cultivating living material 

Just as you might experience a corporate culture in your professional life, your relationship also has a culture, which is developed (or cultured/cultivated) by the actions of the participants. 

Here are six ways to culture your culture so it becomes a healthy breeding ground for friendship, love, respect and honor. 

1. Choose well. This is the most important. Take the time to choose the right partner. Don’t rush into a relationship because you’re lonely or want to be rescued from the circumstances of your life. You must “rescue” yourself. Learn to be happy on your own and then seek a partner that can enhance your already wonderful life. 

2. Practice your communication skills. You were given two ears and one mouth. That should be your first tip-off that you should listen twice as much as you talk. Practice active listening instead of just waiting your turn to jump in and express your thoughts. 

3. Don’t let little annoyances fester. Oftentimes, if you find yourself continually clamping your mouth shut over a behavior that really sets you on edge. This little annoyance can turn into something bigger than it needs to be. Ask your partner if he or she would have time to discuss something. This way you’re not cornering him/her without any warning. When in a calm state of mind, discuss your grievance and provide alternative ways of handling the same issue. This turns a potential argument into a productive session where partners can reach a compromise. 

4. Find the balance between your personal and professional lives. Often, every part of your life demands attention and equal time. Unfortunately, there is no “equal” time. At times, you must devote all your energies to your job, for example, when you have a big presentation looming in front of you. Other times, you must forego work to attend your child’s athletic game or school performance. As with all circumstances in life, you need to get your priorities in order and decide which area will get your focus at what time. Family members need to be accommodating and flexible. If you’re a family unit, you have the same goals and each person needs to do his/her own job, which may include being a support person only. 

5. Honor your differences. I’m not a big fan of opposites being in a relationship because it seems to make everything twice as hard. However, I also don’t believe you need to be clones of each other either. With core values in common, along with a shared rhythm of life, each partner goes out into the world and brings back interesting information to share. Sometimes, one will be the teacher and the other the student, and, at other times, vice versa. Balance is all about shifting the focus back and forth, and this creates the days of your life. 

6. Learn from the past, focus on the present; keep an eye on the future. Rather than repeating ingrained patterns that have not served you well in the past, glean the lessons to make beneficial changes. Enjoy the present by living in gratitude for what you have vs. what you feel is missing. The act of always wanting more leads to discontentment in the present. While it’s important to keep an eye on the future and plan accordingly, the present is all we really have. Appreciate the one you’re with while you have the time to do so. Learn to love and accept your partner’s love unreservedly. That’s the answer to why we are here on Earth.

Looking For Love In All The Right Places

You have worked long and hard on yourself and accepting your present circumstances. You now have a clearer picture of your new single self. You have also assessed your readiness and determined that, although you are fine with the possibility of being alone, you rather look for a new partner with whom to share your life. 

NOW WHAT? 

Due to what you have heard from others, you might be a little hesitant to jump into the dating pool. Don’t worry about what others are saying. Your experience will be unique and your success or failure will be based on the attitude you hold throughout the process. Consider that the disgruntled remarks you may be hearing can simply be excuses people are making for themselves because they’re not finding success. You may want to take an objective look at their attitudes and the methods they’re employing to meet people. Rather than be turned off to dating, learn from their mistakes. 

If you’ve already “put yourself out there” and can’t seem to find quality prospective dates, consider changing your patterns. After all, doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results is insanity, as defined by Albert Einstein. 

Here are some suggestions on where to meet new people.

1. Frequent Different Places. Travel away from your beaten path by going to coffee places, bookstores, lectures, etc. in a different part of town than you normally would visit. Be the “new girl or guy” in town.

2. Join Groups or Volunteer. A great way to meet like-minded people is to join or volunteer for organizations you support. It’s a very natural way to meet others and it takes away the dating prowl tension. 

3. Be a political activist. No matter which presidential candidate you like this year, it’s a great time to get involved in supporting a political candidate. You will find lots of passionate folks working for the things in which they believe. 

4. Get a pet or borrow a baby. It’s hard to resist pets and babies. They are great conversation starters. 

Here are seven other venues to consider. 

1. Places of worship singles groups. (Find people of a similar faith.) 

2. Single Parent Associations (These are folks that are interested in learning about good parenting techniques.) 

3. Dining clubs. (Worst case scenario: you eat a good meal.) 

4. Golf courses/Tennis clubs (In case you don’t meet anyone, at least you’ll get some exercise.) 

5. Networking groups (Good chance these folks have jobs or they wouldn’t be networking.) 

6. Single cruises/vacation packages (Meet people who like to travel or are adventurous.) 

7. Dancing clubs (Meet those who like to “shake it up” vs. remaining a couch potato.)

The truth is that you can meet prospective dates in any venue. The important thing to remember is that you need to just get out there and make yourself visible.

Use Your Imagination to Find Love After Loss

Graham Greene said, 

“A brain is only capable of what it could conceive,
and it couldn't conceive what it hasn't experienced. 

You might take this statement to heart when you are thinking about the possibility of inviting new love into your life. 

Many years after my first husband passed away, it was still quite inconceivable to me that I could ever be with another man. After all, I had met my husband when I was 15 years old, and he was my one and only boyfriend. I didn’t know anything else, so, as Greene states, I couldn’t conceive anything else. It wasn’t even that I felt I would be “cheating” on him. As a person who had never dated, I just could not grasp the idea of being with a different person. 

Greene’s statement may be applied to loss in general, too. Moreover, I believe this concept contributes to the difficulty some encounter as they attempt to move through any sort of loss. 

In the case of losing a mate, if you’ve never experienced this circumstance before, you naturally have not conceived or learned how to deal with this tragic life event. At first, your body goes into shock to protect you from the assault on your sensibilities. It doesn’t allow you to even think about what your life will look like going forward. You just exist to get through the days ahead of you ... moment to moment. 

This “inconceivability factor” also hampers your belief that it’s possible that you will eventually feel better and be able to live again. 

Consider the idea that your brain is a “fixed” part of your body, and, therefore, it can’t change. The good news is that your imagination lives outside of your brain, so it CAN change and conceive the impossible without having any prior experience. 

I suggest that you dream big and then “pull” your ideas into your brain for digestion and eventual implementation. Remember that all greatness is first born in your imagination. 

I like the words of Albert Einstein: "Imagination is more important than knowledge for while knowledge defines all we currently know and understand, imagination points to all we might yet discover and create." 

                                                                                       

A tip to the wise, though …. 
The imagination, which operates in duality as does everything in nature, can help or hamper your success. I suggest that you, first, harness your imagination so you can point it in the right direction before letting it have freedom to explore delicious possibilities. When you are able to point it towards the positive vs. letting it run rampant in any which way direction, you can deter it from conjuring up worst case scenarios and frightening outcomes. 

So, what does all this have to do with finding love after loss? 

Over time, as I worked on and moved through my grief, I began to open myself up to new experiences, which included meeting lots of new people. Even though I had a hard time conceiving that I could be partnered with someone new, I allowed my imagination to construct scenarios. It was almost as if I made mini-movies in my mind, which I could watch and critique whether I liked them or not. 

This type of exercise can help you step out of yourself and experience new ideas and circumstances. And once your brain has experienced them (whether they were actual events or events you imagined), they become less inconceivable. 

If you find yourself stuck in no-man’s land, which is the place between wanting to share your life with a partner and still having a hard time imagining that there is another special someone out there for you, one way you can step into new territory is to practice date. 

Practice dating is an opportunity to learn about yourself; to become more comfortable with the idea of meeting and being with prospective partners; and to determine if there are more areas and personal issues which you need to work through. 

Most importantly, if you believe Graham Greene’s statement, practice dating allows your brain to have new experiences so, when you do find that special someone, it can conceive of the possibility of a new life with him or her.

Is Being Single Really That Bad?

If you have experienced the loss of a beloved partner or, if you have divorced a spouse with whom you’re very glad to part ways, either way, you have now entered the Kingdom of Singleville. 

There’s a good chance that you never thought you’d be forced to move here – and especially at a more mature age. You survey the landscape, and you spy lots of young singletons, who have never left the kingdom, as well as many in the same situation as you.

You reluctantly set up your home and continue to go about the business of your life. However, you’re mad to be in this place and your attitude reflects it – so much so that, if I were a wagering woman, I’d bet you haven’t even given Singleville a chance. There are lots of good things in this kingdom, but you may be stuck in resentment over your circumstances, and this is making you oblivious of what it has to offer. And Singleville CAN be a great place, if you can look at it from a slightly different perspective. 

Here are three ways in which you can look at your situation. I urge you not to take offense at my comments; instead read them all through to the end.

1. Sure, you’re missing a companion with whom to share your life. However, maybe sharing is overrated. 

Look at the bright side. You can now hog all the covers; stay up as late as you want and not worry about bothering a partner; not shave your legs; wear ratty old underwear and PJs; watch what you want to on TV; eat cereal for dinner because you don’t feel like cooking; not have to sit through endless sports games; or not have to associate with former family members you never liked. This is a time to be selfish and not feel guilty about it.

2. The silence in your house is deafening. 

Look at the bright side. When you’re single, you may have lots of time on your hands to think and, even better, to dream. You can take this quiet pause in your life and utilize it to formulate an Action Plan for the next part of your life. Without having to worry about ignoring a partner because you’re too busy, you can continue your education or work towards a higher degree, pursue hobbies you love, learn new things, and volunteer for causes dear to your heart. 

3. You look at older couples walking in companionable silence and feel you’ve been robbed of the experience. Even if you meet someone new, he/she will only be able to see you as you are now and will never see the young person inside that your former mate did. 

Look at the bright side. I agree that this is a sad fact of losing a partner at an older age. However, if you look at the divorce rates these days, there’s at least a 50% chance you wouldn’t make it to your old age with one partner. When the institution of marriage was first invented, longevity for humans wasn’t in the cards. “’Til death do us part” might have only meant 20 or so years before one or both parties passed away. Without negating your loss, instead of ruing the fact you have to look for love at an older age, consider the idea that you’re a grown up now who knows what he/she wants and needs. The fact is that the next partner you meet might be better suited for you and the second half of your life than the partner you met and married at a young and naïve age. 

Now, I realize that even the good parts of being single don’t ease the pain of loss, and I certainly didn't mean to be flippant in my comments. Of course, you'd gladly share the covers with a partner, but the truth is that it’s necessary for you to work with what you have. You can’t undo the past, so your power lies in what you do with your present in order to build a bright future for yourself and for your children or children-to-come. 

 Living in a single state can be a very selfish time of life – and I mean that in the most positive of ways. Without the distraction of a partner and the responsibilities of commitment to another, it’s a period that can be all about you. How often in life do any of us have that opportunity to concentrate all our efforts on personal growth? Spend your time building your emotional, spiritual, mental and physical muscles. When you’re totally buff, you can use these muscles to lift you out of Singleville and onto your next adventure.