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Dating, Dialog and Discovery!

I find it interesting how much effort and energy is often put into “where to meet people” when we’re single.  I have found with my clients. as well as from my own personal experience, its not about WHERE you are, but more about WHO you are being.

Dating is important for one reason that most people overlook – PRACTICE!

In order to change the patterns that you’ve been living over and over again in relationship its imperative for us to practice that new way of being in the world.

When I was internet-dating I had set one clear intention – to discover things about myself.  

If I met someone I was interested in, then that would be icing on the cake.  My clear goal was to pay attention to who I was being.  How was I different when I was meeting with someone I was attracted to, versus someone with whom I had no spark?  How did the presence or lack of that spark shift my internal dialog?

Often times with our clients the desire to find “the one” by internet-dating comes up again and again, and we respond “Its just practice!”  (This is true whether the dates come from the internet, or in “regular” life.)

Take that in.  

If it is truly just practice, then how would that change your relationship with you?  

Ultimately you cannot say or do the “wrong” thing with the Right Person.

When we desire love, we look for it outside of ourselves, yet it must be INSIDE us in order for it to be mirrored back to us.

Years ago, I married myself.  I went down to Venice Beach and bought a plain solid silver band, went out to the beach and promised to Love, Honor and Cherish ME!  It was incredibly fulfilling and nurturing.  Each time I looked at that band, or felt it on my finger, it was a constant reminder of that promise to myself.  

Nurturing yourself during the search for love is NOT optional.  

If you are truly in a place where you really don’t get out to meet new people, that’s okay.  Practice with the people in your life; friends, family, and co-workers.  Start to pay attention to what you would like to shift and then practice.  Do you judge?  Do you get angry?  Do you run through what may happen later in the day while you take your morning shower – only to realize that the dialog you’re having is not the one you want, but the one you fear?  

The real KEY to shifting on the inside is to pay attention to what you are saying to yourself about yourself.  Notice the negative dialog and change it to positive comments that you believe.  Pay attention to your inner dialog the way a marathon runner pays attention to their pace.

Discover what you would like to be saying to yourself and say that instead.

Do You Know How to Love and Value Yourself?

We are strong believers that your ability to attract love in your life is tied to your ability to love and value yourself.  These practices are at the root of creating intentional love.  When you embrace the idea that your experience in the outer world is nothing more than a reflection of your inner world, then it seems obvious that in order to attract and receive the love you desire you need to create that relationship with yourself first.

I can hear you thinking how great that sounds however, what does that look like in practice?  What actions can I take that teach me to love and value myself?  We’re going to start looking at those practices and how to implement them in the next series of blog posts.

The place to start is to begin to examine your relationship with yourself and ask yourself some key questions:

1.  Do I feel that others are always draining my energy?

2.  Do I have a list of actions or activities that I do regularly to replenish myself?

3.  Do I feel any resentment towards important people at home or at work?

4.  Do I set and enforce my personal boundaries?

5.  Do I know what my ideal day would look like?

6.  Do I speak to myself in a harsh or critical tone?

7.  Do I dwell on past mistakes?

8.  Do I focus on what I haven’t yet accomplished?

9.  Am I holding onto unresolved issues from  the past?

10.  Is there anything that I am unwilling to change or let go of in order to get what I want?

11.  Do I take time for myself away from friends and family?

12.  Do I focus on the present and reward myself for how far I’ve come on my journey?

If you answered yes to #’s 1, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, or 10 then that is a great place to start making changes.  Pick one of these and add it to your New Year’s Resolution list.  In order to avoid becoming overwhelmed, work only on one at a time and be compassionate towards yourself.  There is no time limit for how long it should take to make these changes, its all a process.

If you answered yes to #’s 2, 4, 5, 11, or 12 then you already have some great practices in place.  If you answered no, then these are great actions to add into your daily life.  Once again it is best to take them one at a time.

So today’s tip is to spend time with this list, notice where you are not honoring your needs or hanging onto the past, notice which practices you would like to develop and pick one to focus on for the next 30-60 days.

Let us know how you’re doing.  We’ve set up a forum topic so that you can support one another and keep track of your progress.  Click HERE to post on the forum.

Love and Abundance,

Orna and Matthew

Self-Acceptance is the Key to Feeling Loved

 

Which one of these scenarios best describes your experience in relationships?

 

1.  You always find yourself needing to please your partner.  Constantly putting their needs ahead of yours, you find that at times you feel resentful wondering when all of your selfless action will be recognized and reciprocated.  You wish your partner would be able to anticipate your needs as well as you anticipate theirs.  Ultimately, all of this leads to you constantly twisting into a pretzel to receive love.

 

2.  You feel like you’ve been duped in your relationship.  You thought you knew who your partner was until you made that deeper commitment and everything changed.  Suddenly your partner has different opinions than you and begins to express them.  This person is no longer  interested in doing the things that you did during your courtship.  In fact it may seem like you’ve married or moved in with a completely different person.

 

3.  You are extremely attracted to people who reject you.  It seems that the more you are told that you are not right for that person, the more you want to prove them wrong.  You may even begin a process of changing who you are in order to become more like what you think that person wants.  When you meet someone who is attracted to you and likes you for who you are, you are not interested in that person.  You may even feel that person is not worthy of being with you as it would be too easy to start a relationship with them.  You prefer a challenge and like the chase, but lose interest when you get the prize.

 

These may seem like completely different scenarios, but they all point to a common problem – a lack of self-acceptance.  In the first scenario the person lacks an ability to see their needs as valuable.  When we seek approval outside of ourselves we find ourselves twisting into pretzels.  We often think “What shape can I assume that will make me attractive to you?”  This is a game of rejecting who we are and hoping that the new shape we assume will be loveable.  When what we really need to do is to learn to accept all of our qualities, both good and bad, and by finding that acceptance then we can be authentic in relationship with others.

 

In the second scenario the partner in the relationship isn’t purposefully deceiving their partner.  Instead, this is caused by someone thinking that it is not okay or safe to be themselves until they get that deeper commitment from you.  They finally relax and allow their true self to be revealed to you.  This is not usually a conscious choice to deceive you.  It happens because that person does not believe that you would love them for who they really are.  That person lacks a sense of self-acceptance.

 

In the last scenario the problem lies with a sense of worthiness and an inability to receive.  This person seeks that rejection because that is what they feel inside.  Often times when they are in relationship with the person who does love them for who they are, they will sabotage the relationship to prove that they were not worthy of receiving love and acceptance.  The desire to prove themselves worthy to the person who rejects them is really a desire to prove to themselves that they are worthy.

 

Why is self-acceptance so important in your relationships?  Because how you see yourself, how you feel about yourself - self-judgment, self-criticism, etc - effects your ability to be authentic in relationship.  The belief is that if you show your true self you will not be loved.  The problem is if you don’t ever show your true self, then you can never be loved for who you really are.

 

Another problem that arises in relationship that comes from a lack of self-acceptance is that we begin to judge our partner’s behavior and become critical of them.  If it is true that all judgment is self-judgment, then when we are so annoyed by our partner’s behavior we can ask ourselves “Is this a reflection of a fault within my character?”

 

Only by knowing what we truly need to be happy, what we truly need in order to nurture ourselves, can we feel comfortable asking our partners to love us in the way we truly can receive love.  It is in the search for self-acceptance, that all parts of us are worthy of being loved, that we begin to learn to love ourselves.  When we love ourselves it becomes easy to ask for what we want, it becomes easy to enforce our boundaries, and it becomes easy to receive the love we most desire.  That love is what “true love” is all about.