Sarah shared this with me the other day, and I'd like to reprint it here.  If you're struggling with accepting being out of a relationship, or if you're looking for ways to change yourself so that you'll become more attractive to men, then this message might just come at the right time.

The first key to finding love is to believe that it will happen. Believe that you are single at the moment for a reason, and that destiny is trying to teach you something about yourself at this time. It might be to feel comfortable within your own company, or to celebrate being an individual and having control over what happens in your everyday life. But now that you are looking for more, the belief that it will happen will enable you to start to attract your reality.

You may be looking for things in your life to change so that you can attract a man. This is perhaps a misguided way of looking at finding love. The key to finding genuine love is to identify what the person inside you really is, and to celebrate being it. Don’t be the version of you that you think you need to be in order to find the man of your dreams. If you are able to be yourself and love being that person, your genuine nature will attract genuine men to you.

Remember that like attracts like, so if you are looking for genuine love you need to celebrate the genuine you. That way the men who are drawn to you are attracted to the real you.

If Sarah's message spoke to you, you'll love the 2006 Edition of "How to Be Irresistible to Men" (available August 1).  It's an incredible program that will bring out your inner, genuine irresistibility without making you into someone false that you're not.

Thanks to everyone who entered our Readers Story competition.  Congratulations to Noël Christianson, our first place winner!  Her determination not to lower her standards in her search for love is a valuable reminder for all of us.

"Will Date for Food" 

by Noël Christianson

"Mom, you live like there’s no tomorrow." Obviously, my son was dizzy from seeing me fold clothes, watch CNN with the phone to my ear while adjusting leg weights for final reps. I never did take living for granted. My mind’s eye carries along a rhythmic hour glass, dribbling sand with every heartbeat. It’s my reminder of this world’s short gig. Really, if I have any excesses, blame my Dad. He had a way of delivering quips that made you think. My "life’s short" attitude began incubating lap-side when he said, "You know, you start dying the moment you are born."

Whether it was his voice or teacher’s demeanor he dragged home each night, his dinner time talks made you listen. Truth had a place at our table. But life with a teacher is not always easy. At home there are no recess bells to free you from the lecture sure to come over any topic. Teachers are well-read and are trained to explain everything. There is a sure-fire system, a root to the problem, a cause and effect and historical reference to all of life’s foibles. I now know to settle in real comfy when talking with Dad.

None of his children are complaining about those dinner times. Mom scurried around tending to boiling pots and our needs. The warmth from that kitchen, conversation and good times jelled our sense of self, preparing us for the future. Unfortunately my new cynicism causes me to peer suspiciously through the clouds of steam those meals brought. Little did I know, my Truth would be "This ain’t the way your family life is gonna be."

On the Eve of my divorce anniversary (is there a Hallmark card for that?) I continue to analyze what went wrong. My sister and I share the common bond of not having good luck with men. Goodluckwithmen. It sounds like a Bavarian cookie. Well, these cookies crumbled all right. On the outside, our marriages looked pretty good but the real stuffing showed up when lifelong promises were tossed aside, fell and splattered. After kicking around the pieces through therapy, self-help books and Anything Anonymous meetings, Sis, I think I have the answer. Those Great Depression boys are the best.

Our parents talked often of The Depression. Hard Times was the hub of their adolescent lives and the spokes from that era radiated into their futures. We heard stories of hard work, no work, no food, big fear. It seemed grimy. The Dirty Thirties. Families struggled to survive – together. Did my relationship-sensitive ears hear through the bleakest days of this century there was commitment?

But as my Dad would say, "Things could be worse."

At that time, he did have it worse. Orphaned in the middle of The Depression, he later lucked out to marry my mom who held the same belief in family covenant. They survived The Depression, never quite shaking off the residue, causing them to cling to Family and Faith. Strong ethics helped assuage their new Gripes of Wrath: illness, clamoring kids, penniless days.

So maybe I have been going through this husband-hunting thing all wrong. I could run a personal ad looking for some down-trodden war refugee who escaped famine, floods, a POW camp, hungry for hearth and home. Beaten down from survival uncertainties, he would be content to have me clang a tin cup along the boards to announce dinnertime and serve the man some gruel. Add a warm bath and he would think he was in heaven. Repeat after me, "I will learn commitment."

16^th century George Herbert spouted, "One Father is more than 100 school masters." Think of the mathematical ramifications the impact this father-school master’s talks had on us through the decades. We girls listened. It’s been challenging for us to pursue relationships without testing and grading each man against our standards without lowering the curve. So when I gnash my teeth in frustration over the men I meet who aren’t strong, smart or in any way committed to family, I just blame my Dad.

Our second place winner in the 000Relationships LIVE Readers Story competition teaches us that even when we find the man of our dreams, get married, and believe that we have a future of happy-ever-after to look forward to, the story doesn't end…

"My Story" 

My name is Beth.  I grew up in a typical suburban family in Central Florida.   I left my parents home in 1973 to attend the University of Florida.  Like many young women then as now, I left my parents’ home with the typical post adolescent insecurities about my self image.  I was terribly insecure about my appearance and shy about meeting and dating men in general.  I always had a few dates, but my fears were paralyzing and those dates never led to any long lasting or serious relationships.  I was terribly smitten by a couple of men that showed an interest and tried to pursue me long term over the years but ultimately their attention and efforts were not enough to help me overcome my fears.

I continued my education and moved cross-country to continue my college education in San Francisco.  Despite my fear of men, I was amazingly fearless in my pursuits and had opportunities and successes in my education and professional life that many of my peers envied.  They admired and respected my courage and strength.  Only my closest confidantes recognized and understood how inexperienced and underdeveloped I was in the affairs of the heart.
 
By about age 28 most of my girlfriends were married and with children.  I started to become a little frightened that I would never find true love.  At that age I was working for a major engineering research and development company in a low level management position.  Even though I was surrounded by eligible men and my corporate responsibilities included supervising some of these men I was still clueless how to connect with them in a romantic way.

My roommate at the time, who was a couple of years younger than me, was going through a divorce from her first husband.   She and I in an effort to keep our lives entertaining and with the ever-present desire to find a really good man joined one of the original dating services.   Nothing like the online dating of today.  A sales representative from the dating service came to our apartment to interview us, get our profile data and take pictures of us for a card catalogue of sorts they kept to manage their clientele.   Once a week we would receive in the mail a batch of index cards with photos and brief profiles.  No phone number: it was up to the men who received your matching index card to make the first phone call.
 
I had a number of men contact me over a period of a few months and had some first dates but, as usual, no big success.  That is, until I met Lloyd.   I didn't fall head over heels for him as one might imagine.  In fact, when I met him my first impression was that he and I had virtually nothing in common.  He was a jock and a hunter that had grown up in New York.  He was divorced.  I was raised in a Southern family and had no interest in sports and had never even had a live in relationship. My passions were art and literature.

He seemed like a nice enough man, though, and was pretty cute, so after our first date when he asked, "When can I see you again?" I decided to give him some more time to capture my heart.   My response was, "I dunno, when would you like to see me again?"  He quickly responded, "How about tomorrow?"

And so we did, and each time he asked his request was "How about tomorrow?"  I can remember telling my assistant at work about this new man in my life.  We would joke about my new dating adventure and even gave Lloyd a nickname.  When Lloyd would call me at work, my assistant would put him on hold and call to me in my cubicle, "The hunter's on the phone.”  We would chuckle, and then I would take the call.
 
As time went by and Lloyd and I spent more and more time together, my feelings for him grew.  Soon we were practically inseparable.   I started to enjoy going to basketball games with him and going to watch him play softball.  A whole new world opened up for me.   Lloyd likewise would accompany me to the independent films with subtitles and take me out to trendy little restaurants and try all kinds of new foods that he really hated but never complained and was always willing to share and share alike in our diverse tastes and interests.

He was a pretty macho guy and had the typical guy talk code and was sparing with his expressions of love and admiration, but I was beginning to understand that his faithful and dependable attention and his eagerness to please me spoke volumes about his feelings for me.  We dated for about a year and then decided to move in together.  After living together we found that not only could we survive this transition but that our relationship flourished and our feelings of love and contentment grew even stronger.   A little more than two years into our relationship, Lloyd asked me to marry him, and I graciously accepted his proposal.
 
I wasn't low maintenance.  I was still insecure about my self image even though I knew in my mind that my new husband absolutely adored everything about me inside and out.   I was 31 when I married him, and I don't think I honestly became comfortable with him seeing me naked in the shower or without my makeup until I was close to 40 years old.  But this amazingly sweet, gentle, kind and adoring man just kept reassuring me with his love and devotion that I was a beautiful and desirable and charming woman until I finally started to believe it.

Lloyd and I had an incredible marriage.   We became the absolute best friends and lovers and shared everything: our families and friends, our financial and professional goals, our vacations, our love of home, and did all this with almost never a cross word between us.   I learned the true meaning of unconditional love and thought that I was one of the luckiest women on the planet to have such a great guy and such a happy and successful marriage.
 
On November 26, 2003, we were traveling north on I-95 to visit family over Thanksgiving weekend when a drunk driver caused a horribly violent car crash.  I can remember the young people that stopped to help us telling me to squeeze Lloyd's hand, that he was injured worse and they were going to try and help him first.  I do remember actually squeezing his hand and telling him how much I loved him and to please hang on that I didn't think I could live without him.  I know he heard me because he squeezed back.

The next thing I remember was waking up a few days later in the hospital and Lloyd's best friend leaning over my bed to tell me that my precious Lloyd hadn't survived the crash.   My mind went blank.  It was more than I could deal with in my critically injured state.  I stayed in that frame of mind for weeks.  When I was finally released from the hospital and came home to a house full of family waiting there to try and help me through my long and painful recovery I wished I hadn't survived that crash.  In one instant my whole life had been taken from me.  My precious, long-waited-for husband was dead and I was left behind to pick up the pieces of our shattered lives.

But somehow his love for me had survived that crash and I could still feel his faithful and dependable presence encouraging me and giving me the strength that I needed to solve all the problems that faced the next year of my life.   Yes, I cried and I despaired and I wandered aimlessly through the many memories in my mind trying to imagine what could possibly left of my life that was worth living.   I was terribly scarred by my injuries and have permanent nerve damage in my upper left body.  I was 48 years old and alone for the first time in almost two decades.
 
I know this story is terribly sad but you will be relieved to know that there is a happy ending.   For the past almost three years now, I have worked very hard to recover from my grief and my injuries.  When I finally became well enough, I dedicated myself to getting strong and healthy, and, believe it or not, you really can survive these kinds of tragedies.

Today I feel good, really good.  Although I'm still scarred and have limitations, I feel very good about my body image.  I'm very proud of myself for the way I have gracefully and with determination pulled myself back together.  I wake up every morning with an almost childlike excitement about what new experience or adventure my day may bring.

I can also tell you that I recently met another very sweet, sensitive and caring man.  Although I don't know if our relationship will grown into a serious and committed one, I can tell you that I have absolutely no doubts that I am a beautiful, charming and accomplished woman and that this man or some other equally wonderful man will be a lasting and important part of my future, and it's all because of the unconditional love and encouragement of my precious Lloyd.  I also know that he is happy for me that I have survived his death and would want nothing less for me than the best that life has to offer.

Sarah forwarded me the following consultation she did for a member of 000Relationships.com, and I felt that it was so beautiful that I asked her if I could share it with you here.  [Parts have been edited from the original consultation.]

Waking up and realizing you are running out of time to find a soulmate is a scenario that is not to uncommon for a number of women in their mid to late 30s. In fact, it happens all the time. But while this happens all the time, I am continually baffled why this happens. Where in society or in your own individual programming does it say that in order to have achieved you have to have a man? You want a man, yes, but outwardly believing that you are running out of time puts you in a destructive mindset in which you project your impatience and expectation upon others.

Your first step is to believe that it will happen. It will happen. And, in believing that you will find someone, you will start to live your reality. You may have been hurt in your previous relationships. That’s understandable. But you have also probably loved and been loved in your past relationships, too. Which part of your past do you choose to bring with you? The hurt, or the love?

Each relationship you are in offers you the opportunity to meet a different man and learn something more about yourself and the type of man you are looking for. Trying to recreate your past is not going to work. We need to stop comparing our future relationships to our past ones and have faith that each man we meet is going to be even better than the last.

My recommendation is to have some patience and enjoy living in the present. Enjoy each man you meet and each experience you have, and look upon each experience as bringing you closer to your destiny. The key to finding love again is to change your perspective and be in a position where you can understand and appreciate it when it comes. It may not be the consuming lust of your teenage years, but it may be packaged differently.

Focus on the journey, not the destination. 

You are meant to be single right now.

What a strange thing to say! Isn't our natural state to be in a relationship, and when we're single we're … well, lacking?

Of course not.  That isn't true at all.  But as a woman I am still very conscious that all the models of happiness I see in society – from Hollywood movies to family pressures – involve being matched up with a man who is one's soulmate. (One's soulmate, of course, has to be a man according to this ideal.  It can't be a female friend, or a mentor.)

Wait a moment!

Although many of us enlightened women like to think that we celebrate our single status and desire a relationship as an extension of our happiness, rather than the purpose and cause of it, we still respond to the cultural programming that tells us that we are incomplete if we don't have a man.

That same cultural programming shames the woman when her man cheats.  That same cultural programming blames the woman for not holding the relationship together.

Although we know in our minds that it's all a bunch of baloney, I don't think that there are many of us who can honestly state that we don't respond to those beliefs on a heart level.  Emotionally, we still feel shamed if we can't "get" a man.  We feel shamed if he leaves us.  We feel that it's our fault, somehow.

Our cultural programming is so powerful that many of us end up seeking out a relationship just because all of our female friends in relationships seem so happy.  We want to have what they have.

Yet what if you told yourself that, unlike them, you were meant to be single right now?  You were single because there was something that you had to do.  God is giving you the chance to be on your own because He wants you to learn something, or to develop a new skill, or move to the next level spiritually … and being single is the only way you can do it.

Wouldn't you want to know why you were single, and then take advantage of it?

Very few of us spend any time examining our belief systems about what it means to be single.  Socially we're told that being single is merely the limbo period between relationships.  But is it?

What if you were meant to be single right now?

What if it was your job to figure out what you're supposed to be doing with your single time and doing it?

Wouldn't you feel a lot more okay about being single?

Wouldn't you feel a greater sense of meaning and purpose in your life right now, rather than waiting for the time in which you have a partner?

You aren't single because you can't get a man.  You aren't single because you're not enough.  You aren't single because you're bad at dating.

You're single for a reason … and it's your job to find out that reason.

Once you do, then you'll have completed the reason for which you were single.  And then, magically, you'll find that relationship opportunities open all around you.

Does that sound too airy-fairy?  Perhaps.  But it can also make your single life much more wonderful and meaningful than an endless search for a partner.

By now, most of you know that my colleague Sarah Paul (author of "How to Be Irresistible to Men") is having a baby!  We've known in the office for quite some time.  🙂 She's just been glowing.  This is definitely where she's wanted to be in her life, and I know that she and Jason are going to be fantastic parents.

Many of my friends have been having babies recently.  It's that time in people's lives.  Five years ago, everyone was getting married except for me.  I was too busy traveling the world, having adventures, meeting tons of fantastic men, and enjoying every minute of it.  I didn't want to settle down; I had too much to do and see!

Now, I've finally reached the stage in my life where settling down appeals to me.  I've done most of what I wanted to do in my life, seen most of the places I've wanted to see, and staying in one place doesn't sound too shabby at all!

I'm not yet at the stage where Sarah's at.  She's been so happy with Jason that having a baby is the natural next step in her life.  All the inconveniences of being pregnant — who ever thought that buttoning up a winter coat could be such a chore! — are simply amusing events that she laughs off.  She keeps focused on the future.

The one part of it that saddens me — a purely selfish sorrow — is that when Sarah and Jason become new parents, they won't have time to do all the things we used to do together.  I'm not the only single woman who finds that as her friends have children, social events become less and less frequent.  Children change everything.  For my married friends, their lives are richer.  For me, I feel a small sense of loss for the time that we'll no longer spend together.

I went to a barbecue recently with another single friend.  We sat in the garden with paper plates balanced on our knees and watched as kids played recklessly with cardboard boxes, sitting in them, putting them over their heads, and falling over them.  Parents kept an eye out from the porch to make sure that no one hurt themselves.

Every so often some of the parents would detach themselves and come talk to us, shaking their heads in amusement.  I think they envied what they saw as our single, carefree lifestyle.  But as my friend said, "They've got the real prize.  They have partners who love them and children they love.  What they see in us is a false memory of their single days, without any of the loneliness or wasted nights in bars hoping to meet someone."

It is difficult being single and getting older … watching your friends marry, then have children.  But there's nothing wrong with being different from everyone else.  A male friend told me recently, "All of my friends are getting married.  I'm dating this girl that I really like, and I know that she wants to get married.  But I'm not ready yet.  Am I just being selfish?  Maybe I should just take the plunge and do 'the responsible thing.'  But then what if I regret it later?"

I hope that no matter where you are in life, love and romance isn't on your agenda simply because all of your friends have boyfriends, partners, or husbands.  Pressuring yourself to get married by a certain age or to have children by a certain age can cause havoc with your love life.  Give yourself a break and believe that the universe has great things in store for you.  There are so many men out there right now who will make great friends, even if they don't end up as boyfriends, so get out there and meet them for the pure joy of it, not because you expect something.

As for me, I know that Sarah's life is beautiful and perfect just as it is .. and so is my life.  We're both exactly where we're supposed to be. 

I don't think there's anybody who doesn't know this already, but just in case … we've just launched a fantastic 6-Part MiniCourse for Sarah's "How to Be Irresistible to Men" course!  Sarah and I have been working on the minicourse for the past month, and it reflects many of our new ideas about where the 2006 Edition of "How to Be Irresistible to Men" will be going.  Each day introduces you to a new concept that will transform how you think about love and dating.  You can get it by signing up to the "How to Be Irresistible to Men" newsletter series at www.000relationships.com/tomen/.

I'm really excited about what Sarah and I have created.  I don't think that any program like this exists yet for women.  I've read sooo many dating and relationship books over the past year, and most of them teach one thing: how to manipulate men into falling for you.

But I don't want men to simply fall for me.  I want love!  I want REAL love, a guy who will commit to me freely, from his own heart, and work on our relationship with a genuine desire for intimacy.  I want the kind of love that long-married couples have, the kind that only arises after you've worked through conflicts and difficult times together and come out stronger.

Most of the techniques taught in popular dating books will attract men to you, that's for sure.  But once you get into a relationship with those men, you'll find that their attraction was shallow.  You have to keep your games up to keep his interest level high.

That's because his initial feelings of attraction to you isn't actually love.  It's infatuation.  And, let me tell you, it's easy to get a guy infatuated with you!

Personally, I don't want to have to keep playing games to keep a guy interested.  I want to know that when the first sign of trouble arises, when that "veil of illusion" falls and he sees all my flaws, that he's going to make the decision to stick with me and work through whatever conflicts arise.

But to get to that point, I have some work to do on myself.  I have to be the kind of woman that men naturally feel comfortable with … the kind of woman that men know won't judge them … the kind of woman who is not only fun but also makes them feel more alive, more masculine, and more at peace.

Many women will say, "Hold on a minute.  It's is the point of my life to make men's lives better.  He has to do something for me, too!"

But it's exactly that kind of thinking that sabotages relationships.  The kind of thinking that says, "I'll give you love if you give me love."

Have you ever been loved unconditionally?  If so, you know how wonderful it feels to be loved no matter what … no matter what you've done for the other person … no matter whether you've hurt them or not … you simply know that you'll be loved anyway.

If you are doing something so that you can get love back from a man … if you're treating him a certain way so that he'll treat you a certain way … then you may benefit from our 2006 "How to Be Irresistible to Men" course.  It will teach you how to let your inner light shine in such a way that men will be drawn to your radiance.  You'll learn to let go of your expectations and instead trust in the natural course of attraction.  You'll learn how your beliefs create your reality, such that simply by shifting your thinking you can transform your love life.

There's only one catch: the 2006 Edition of "How to Be Irresistible to Men" hasn't been launched yet.  We're starting filming on it tomorrow.  We've got a fantastic guest speaker in, and I truly believe that magic is going to happen in the studio.  I'll keep you posted on its progress!

If you've already purchased the 2005 Edition of "How to Be Irresistible to Men," then you'll get the 2006 Edition free!  That's because every purchase of "How to Be Irresistible to Men" gives you lifetime membership to our Members Area.  You can start working on the current course and be ready to take your attraction to the next level when the 2006 Edition is launched.

For now, I highly recommend that you try out the 6-Part MiniCourse.  Again, all you have to do is sign up for the free "How to Be Irresistible to Men" Email Newsletter Series at www.000relationships.com/tomen/.  I'll be excited to hear what you think!

I've been going on a slew of blind dates from an online dating site recently.  It seems that every profile I put up attracts a different sort of person.  My last profile seemed to attract young, intense, focused entrepreneurs.  My current profile appears to have attracted intelligent artistic men.

It's strange how a online dating profile, like a resume, can highlight different aspects of yourself, each attractive to a different sort of guy.  My early efforts into online dating attracted a lot of immature young partiers.  I wasted hours chatting to men who lived so far away that we would never meet, and I spent ages composing carefully polite responses to men that I knew I'd never want to date.

Although I know much more than I did back then, my online dating efforts seem to follow the same pattern: I put up a profile, chat with a dozen or so guys, meet half of them, then end up with one really cool friend/romantic interest with whom I end up hanging out constantly for the next six months.

I tend to get discouraged with online dating sites.  It's like the old adage: "Water, water everywhere, and not a drop to drink."  There are so many men online, but finding someone you click with is hit or miss.  The effort involved in answering emails and sorting through "winks" can become too much when coupled with work and social activities.   After a month online, I end up removing my profile and spending more time on me rather than dating.

The great thing with taking a break from online dating is that when you get back into it, you have fresh enthusiasm.  I recreate my profile from scratch every time, with different photos, so that I can meet different sorts of people.  My most successful profile was when I was moving to a new country and men lined up to show me around.

Why was that particular profile so successful?  I think it was because men had a reason to meet me that wasn't to suss out the romantic possibilities.  Even if they weren't particularly attracted to me, they felt a friendly obligation to welcome me to the area and did it with pleasure.

And when romance happened, it struck without warning.  A friendly fellow thought that it would be a laugh to meet this traveler for a drink and a chat, and the attraction was immediate.  We ended up having a wonderful six-month relationship.

So what does that suggest about online dating?  That perhaps a better approach to meeting than the first casual coffee date is to meet one another for a reason.  Maybe he is into kayaking, and you'd like to learn.  Maybe your favorite museum has a new exhibit, and he doesn't know much about art.

When one of you has something to share, and the other one is willing to learn, then a friendly ground is established that promises that the date will be a positive experience with no pressure. 

I am always wary of online profiles that state that Bachelor or Bachelorette X is seeking for their soulmate.  We're ALL looking for our soulmate.  But I don't want to meet a possible online match knowing that I'm going to be immediately rejected if I don't fit his vision of the perfect mate.

I think that men feel this way, too.  Men will want to meet you if they think from your profile that they're going to have a great time chatting with you.  If they sense that your only purpose in being online is to find the guy of your dreams, then they may not want to put themselves up for rejection.

At any rate, I've had a couple of nice chats with lovely men.  No sparks yet, but I don't have any expectations.  I'm simply enjoying the experience of dating.

I didn't recognize him at first.  We walked into the hostel and glanced in the bar on our way up to the room.  There were a couple of guys drinking there.  "Is that your friend?" Daryn asked me.

I looked, but their backs were to us.  "I don't know.  I said I'd meet him at his room."

We went up to the second story of the hostel and knocked, but no one was in the room.  "Maybe they were in the bar," Daryn said.  So we trooped down again.

As we walked into the bar, the first guy in a white striped shirt turned around and smiled.  "Well, hello!"

Yep, it was him.

It's so surreal to meet someone that you had a fling with, years later, in a different country, when both of your lives are so different.  I'd met Ben (not his real name) back when I was working in a winery, sorting grapes for the harvest.  He was full of energy and enthusiasm for the wine industry, and he introduced me to the artsy wine bar scene.  At the time he was living in a fantastic house with a hot tub on the deck and a game room complete with pool table, wine cellar, and wide-screen television, where I watched Sex and the City for the first time.

Even though we only knew each other for a few months, I was always grateful to him for showing me what big city life could be like.  We zipped through Portland in his yellow convertible and browsed organic vegetables, Doc Marten shoes, Nike pedometers.  The city seemed full of possibilities, potential, and fascinating people I had yet to meet.

Meeting him here, so far from home, brought back memories of Portland.  It seemed strange not to remember our relationship as vividly as I remembered the city itself, its feel, its energy.  What I felt wasn't nostalgia for him but rather for the sense of possibility I felt at that time and place: the culture of youth, the celebration of being alive, and the promise of bright careers ahead.

So many of my past relationships have been like that.  When I think back on them with nostalgia, what I remember most isn't him and me, but rather the feelings I had at that point in my life.  For example, when I think of my first love, I remember how excited and aware I felt as I experienced the beauty of those emotions for the first time.  Yet the years have faded his face in my memory.

I realize that my journey through love has not been a journey from lover to lover, but rather a journey through myself.  Each relationship has taught me new ways of appreciating life.  My romantic history is not one of winning and losing but rather of seeing through ever-renewed eyes.

Each relationship expands my sense of who I can be as I learn to enjoy his hobbies, understand his world view, take pleasure in his tastes, respond to his rhythms.  I'm not leaving behind my self: I'm becoming greater than I was before.

If we limit our lives to what we like, to how we think, to what we want, then we're keeping ourselves constricted in a tight cage of identity.  Loving gives us the gift of opening up our cages and allowing us to dissolve our singularity into something greater.

Even when he leaves us, or we leave him, we carry part of him with us: the way he thought, his mannerisms, his favorite books or music or shops.  We can appreciate more of life because he shared his world with us.

Yet, last night, I didn't share these thoughts with Ben.  Instead, we chatted and drank and caught up with stories until it was time to go home.  I promised to give him a call next time I was in Portland, and he promised he'd be back this way again.

And instead of thinking about him on the way home, I simply thought of Portland and how wonderful it will be to experience the city again. 

My colleague Andrew loves Dr. Phil for his no-nonsense, get-real approach to relationships.  Friday, as I was leaving the office, I passed Andrew's desk.  My attention was caught by a book with a big red heart on the cover and a familiar smiling face.  It was Dr. Phil's Love Smart: Find the One You Want – Fix the One You Got.

"Andrew won't notice," I thought, as I picked up the book and slipped it in my bag.  "And I need some weekend reading."

Now, to be completely up front, I am not a Dr. Phil fan.  I feel that Dr. Phil tends to make gross generalizations in his attempt to be "real" with his clients.  Personally, I prefer to empathize with people first, understand them, then encourage them towards a new perspective or way of behaving.  The shock treatment of a cold splash of reality in the face just seems, to me, unnecessarily cruel.

My personal opinion notwithstanding, I was excited to learn what Dr. Phil had to say about relationships.  So, on my commute home that night, I opened the book with anticipation.

A half hour later, I'd had enough.  I put the book down and stowed it carefully in my bag to return to Andrew on Monday.  I didn't even want to look at it again.

What happened?  It all started on page 6.

Dr. Phil tells us that dating is a game, and the only reason any of us is single is because we don't know how to play it.  Let's listen to him in his own words.

Let me start us off by telling you two things that I know for absolute, drop-dead certain.  First: if you do not have what you truly want in a relationship, then you are right, something is seriously wrong.  …[T]he problem is not you.  You are not a bad person…. (pp. 5-6)

Whew, glad we got that out of the way.  So none of us are bad people, but if we're still single (when we wish we weren't), then something is "seriously wrong."  Oh dear.  Never fear: Dr. Phil can fix us.

The second thing I know for absolute, drop-dead certain is that you are not thinking right or playing the game well; otherwise you would have what you want. (p. 6)

So the reason we're not in good relationships is because we're lousy at playing the dating game?

Yep, says Dr. Phil.  In fact, the only reason you're not married right now is because "you apparently don't know how to get in the game or play the game once you do" (p. 6).

I disagree … quite vehemently.

I'll talk about my own beliefs in a moment, but right now let me share the perspective of Dr. Barbara De Angelis.  In her wonderful book, The Real Rules, Dr. De Angelis describes an unhealthy belief that sounds suspiciously like Dr. Phil's.

The premise of THE OLD RULES is that your purpose is to find a man and get him to marry you.  You are the hunter, and he is the prey.  Your goal is to catch him.  But THE OLD RULES say that a man won't naturally want to make a commitment to you–he doesn't want to be caught–so somehow, you have to trick him into it…. (p. 19)

In other words, to get a man, you have to play the game.

Even though Dr. Phil may not agree with the Old Rules (as described in Ellen Fein's and Sherrie Schneider's book The Rules), his language sounds suspiciously Rules-esque.  For example, we learn in Chapter 10 of Love Smart how to "Bag 'em, Tag 'em, Take 'em Home."  True hunter language.

Marriage seems to be the natural culmination of the dating cycle for Dr. Phil.  It's the happy-ever-after ending that is our reward for playing the game well.  In fact, his five-step series of goals to CLAIM what we want includes: envisioning our perfect relationship, finding the perfect person, seducing him, getting him to "want what you want long term" (p. 5), then marrying him and getting "busy being happy!" (p.5). 

Does this match Barbara De Angelis' description of the Old Rules, in which "the goal of a woman's life is to find a man and get married" (p. 11)?  Sounds like it to me.

Barbara De Angelis explains the problem with game-playing beautifully when she says:

Playing games is for women who've been convinced that they aren't intelligent enough to figure out the right way to communicate or behave with a man, and instead must memorize absurd lists of do's and don'ts….  Playing games is stupid, and you're not stupid. (p.39)

So, Dr. Phil, I won't be learning how to play the game better so that I can get the relationship that I can deserve.  Instead, I'll be taking a leaf from Barbara De Angelis' book.  I'll be focusing on learning how to become emotionally generous, being honest (with myself AND others) about my feelings, and remembering that everyone (even men) needs love and reassurance.

As for myself, I believe that the reason that most of us are not in good relationships yet is because we still have some growing and learning to do.  The time isn't yet right.  Forcing things will just hook us up with the wrong men and hold back our own personal growth and development.

This doesn't mean that you should sit back and assume that the universe will bring Mr. Right into your life (though, if you've done your spiritual homework, you've got a very good chance of this happening).  What it does mean is that instead of focusing on how you can get Mr. Right, you should be focusing on how to grow as a person: how to become more open-hearted, loving, and caring to EVERYONE you encounter.

When I focus on becoming a more open, genuine, and loving person, I know that I will naturally draw the right man into my life.  I don't have to worry about it.  I don't have to waste time envisioning, judging, or evaluating men based on my character profile of Mr. Right.  I believe in the law of the universe that states that we attract what we are.  I feel confident knowing that my ability to attract the right men into my life is proof that I am developing my character in the direction that I want to go.

Best of all, because I am not focused on getting a relationship, I have faith that the right relationship will just happen.  Have you ever noticed how the best things happen when you're not looking for them?  If you follow the advice of other dating gurus and focus all your efforts on meeting and interviewing dozens of potential mates in the attempt to find the "right" one, then judge your success on whether you can "Bag 'em, Tag 'em, [and] Take 'em Home," you're almost ensuring that you won't get the best possible relationship that the universe has in store for you.

One of my favorite songs is one by Garth Brooks called "Unanswered Prayers," in which he tells the story of meeting his high school sweetheart after many years have passed.  By this time, he is married to another woman.  Yet such is the power of first love that he can still remember how he used to pray to God every night to make this other woman his forever.

At first, it seems that he'll be tempted to reconsider his marriage vows.  Yet as they chat, he realizes that they don't have much in common any more.  He looks at his wife by his side, and such is his gratitude and appreciation for her presence in his life that he thanks God for unanswered prayers.

We don't always know what is best for us.  Sometimes the greatest tragedy is actually a blessing in disguise.  And that, I suppose, is the message that gets lost in Dr. Phil's Love Smart.  Sometimes, the smartest thing you can do with love is to simply allow it to happen as it should.