“Hope for love, pray for love, wish for love, dream for love… but don’t put your life on hold waiting for love.”
~ Mandy Hale
Preparing yourself for true love starts with changing your perspective about what true love really is and by healing yourself in order to show up in the world in equal vibration to what you’d like to attract.
Some years ago, I realized there was a repeating pattern of the type of men I was attracting. I was not attracting men who recognized or honored my worth. Nor was I attracting men who treated me as a priority in their lives.
After a profound betrayal rocked my world in 2009, I made a steadfast decision to stop dating altogether until I located what was inside of me that was perpetuating this cycle of nonreciprocal, painful relationships.
After two years of time well spent on myself, I decided I was ready and within 6 months, I met my ideal partner. He is the polar opposite of any man I have ever dated. Our meeting, dating and journey has been unconventional to say the least, but my healed and open heart allowed for the divine perfection of its unfolding. I know unequivocally that the sacred time I invested in myself is the sole reason why I am now experiencing the best relationship of my life.
Here’s a snippet into what my journey looked like:
1. He’s not here to save you – No person can save you, but yourself.
Putting a man in the “knight in shining armor role” is going to breed disappointment every time. Men are spiritual beings just as we are. They are afraid, they are sensitive, they are fallible and they need tenderness, acceptance and love just as women do.
Remove the belief “If I just meet the right guy, everything will be fine!” That belief alone puts a lot of pressure on a relationship from go. Seek not to be saved, but to be equally yoked.
2. Recognize you are the common denominator
You are responsible for what you bring to a relationship. If you are not attracting a certain caliber of man, there is something inside of you that desperately needs your love. What you are not receiving from him, is what you are not giving to yourself. Be willing to locate your defeating thoughts and unworthy places. They are the key to changing your attraction point.
3. Open your heart
The typical response to heartache is heart closure; however, this defense is counter intuitive to what we are most desiring. Open heartedness and vulnerability are key components to true connection and true love. If you wait for the right man to enter before opening your heart, you could be waiting for a very long time. (Refer to #1) If it’s an open heart and vulnerability you desire, work on becoming the same.
4. Change fear to love
All fear is illusion and it can repel all that we desire for our lives. Only love is real. We have the ability to see the Truth (love) if we are open to it. Go within to find the fearful places inside of you and be willing to change those fears to love. For example:
Fearful thought: No one will want me because I have children.
Truth: There are good men everywhere who love and marry women with children.
5. You are worthy
Our level of worthiness will proportionately dictate the type of man we attract. When we know ourselves unquestionably worthy of a great love, we are then in position to attract just that! We must own our worth in order to attract a relationship that reflects our worth.
For more on how I healed my unworthiness in order to attract my ideal partner, please visit my website and click on the “My Book” tab.
Kristen Brown, Author & Certified Empowerment Coach – www.kristenbrown.org
Most of us learn how to be in an effective personal relationship by going through the school of hard knocks.
But you’ve just left your last dysfunctional relationship and you are asking yourself, why you keep getting attracted to the jerks. Why does this keep happening to you?
Falling in love is an unconscious act.
That in-love feeling comes out of the unconscious and falls down on the conscious mind as an awareness of the feeling. If we have unresolved issues from family of origin or from previous relationships, these issues will come out of the unconscious attached to the in-love feeling—we will be attracted to these unresolved issues in some way.
So the best way to prepare ourselves for a lasting, healthy, committed relationship is to resolve the unresolved issues.
We get attracted to those people who present us with unresolved issues because the psyche, always leaning toward wholeness, wants us to resolve these issues. We do not get attracted to these people in order to marry them. Unfortunately, we don’t know this.
For example, if I get attracted to people who are verbally, emotionally, mentally or physically abusive to me, then I may have some unresolved issues about abuse.
Perhaps I’ve been blaming myself for this abuse. Perhaps I feel that this means that I’m unworthy of love and nurturance.
I will get attracted to another abusive person in order to find out that the abuse perpetrated on me, really had nothing to do with me. It had to do with the fact that the abuser couldn’t control his tongue, his emotions, his own sense of self-esteem or his own sense of empowerment.
Coming to know this fact on a deep emotional and psychic level may heal us, and we may begin to be attracted to people who are more authentic, capacitated with relationship skills and able to openly and freely love us for who we are.
We can prepare ourselves for a healthy relationship, by looking at what worked and what didn’t work in the previous relationship.
What worked is evidence of our psychological progress. What didn’t work is information we can use to ask more questions.
- Why didn’t it work?
- What about it didn’t work?
- What was my role in it?
- What was my partner’s?
- What are my chief emotional responses to what wasn’t working?
Answering these and other like questions will help us wake up to what is unresolved.
If we are brave we will take an especially close look at our own role, and our own emotions before, during and after the events, situations or dynamics that did not work. Taking responsibility for those may facilitate a change in behavior, in attitude, in thinking and in emotional responsiveness that allows us to transform and heal the old unresolved issues.
This is not easy work, but the pay-off is great. Many will need to seek out a trusted therapist with whom to do this work.
Andrea Mathews, LPC, PhD – www.andreamathews.com
True love is an experience. Myths about true love set a person up for expectations and when there are expectations there is bound to be disappointments.
I see this a lot with individuals that come in with their “should list.” They (meaning the relationship) should be this, they should do that, “if they loved me they wouldn’t be doing that, because they should be doing this.” Therefore, being willing to explore your myths about true love and looking at your “should list” is one of the most healthiest things you can do, as you prepare for the experience, which by the way is something that just happens, one really has no control when true love will happen, so in essence life is a preparation for true love.
a. Self sabotaging patterns in relationships are rooted in fear.
The goal would be to explore the fear that is driving the sabotaging patterns in your relationships. When you find yourself setting yourself up to be sabotaged, ask yourself, “What is the threat?” This observation of self sabotaging takes willingness, practice and awareness. A way to start this is, practice being aware of your behaviors and patterns, ask yourself “Is this effective in getting me what I want or not effective?”
b. Relationship Baggage is a very heavy load to carry, and lets face it, we all have it.
The idea with baggage is to unload and relieve yourself the stress of carrying it around, and that means you have to accept what happened, not approve or think it was right, just accept that whatever that situation was that created that baggage, it happened, and if you can accept it, and live with that, it will be lighter. It will always be a part of you, but not in the terms of baggage, more as just a scar or healed wound that taught you something about yourself and about others.
c. Childhood wounds are sometimes revealed in relationships and deserve gentle care.
Sometimes we find ourselves, having to “re-parent” ourselves, meaning we care for our child within, being able to comfort ourselves and remind ourselves that we are okay, may mean you seek spiritual practice or support in therapy to help with this process and be aware of when you are looking to your relationships to heal child hood wounds.
True love is life, life is love. If you can think of truly lovely yourself and all you are, then you have experienced true love.
Lisa Bahar, MA, LMFT – www.lisabahar.com
I can’t talk about preparing for true love without first defining what it is you are preparing yourself for. My take on true love involves many components.
True love is more than an emotional feeling you have for a romantic interest. That is only a small part of true love.
To truly love another person you are making a commitment to stay in the relationship even when you don’t want to, which is a reality in any relationship. It is usually a temporary state.
If you frequently don’t want to be with the person, then chances are this isn’t a relationship to stay in and not an ideal situation to experience and live out true love. It involves deeply connecting with the other person by letting your partner see who you truly are.
All of you is present, not just the parts you want to show.
This is reciprocated by your partner. You both share your fears, sadness, frustrations, joys, dreams and aspirations. You both bring honesty and authenticity. You both choose to understand each other rather than dismiss or condemn.
Now that you know what true love is, what elements seem challenging to you?
Taking the time to look at your weaknesses will give you a clear understanding of what you need to work on which will help you prepare yourself for true love. Do an honest assessment of how you have done in these areas in past relationships.
Have you placed too much emphasis on the romantic passionate side of love, expecting it to be like the movies and books? It’s not.
Maybe sometimes but not regularly. If you don’t have butterflies in your stomach every time you are around your partner, it doesn’t mean you should end it. So start by adopting a realistic view of true love.
How are you at being vulnerable, sharing who you really are?
Chances are if this doesn’t come naturally for you, it may be tied to a shaming message you picked up in your early years or later. Start noticing what you’re thinking and feeling about yourself when you are in settings with others who are sharing about themselves. If this is a challenge for you, it might help to work with a coach or counselor to gain comfort being yourself and sharing yourself with others.
Start exercising your ‘seek to understand’ muscle.
Anytime you are around others, really listen to what they are saying. Repeat back what you’re hearing. Notice the response. You will usually hear something that indicates this person feels heard. Now focus on why this person is having this experience. It’s trying to be in his shoes.
We can’t ever really know what that’s like because we are each our own unique selves but given what the person is saying can you understand her experience? It’s not about agreeing, just understanding.
Commit yourself to being as healthy as you can be in all areas to prepare for true love.
Karen Thacker, LPC – www.journeyforward.net
Most of us don’t think much about essential elements: we either want what our parents had or wish for anything but what they had.
Even when you know what contributes to relationship happiness, you might be thinking about the traits you desire in another person rather than about the traits you bring to the partnership. Each is equally important.
And finally, you might be such a romantic that you never even consider that everything you do and say is either moving you toward or away from attracting “true love.”
Here are the basics of what to expect from yourself and from your partner in order to maintain a mature, lasting union.
1. Know yourself inside out.
Although we can be observant, reflective and self-analytical, we will always have blind spots. That said, to be mentally healthy, you must be able to identify your strengths and weaknesses without bias or judgment.
Knowing yourself means taking off the blinders and keeping your eyes wide open about your experience of being you and how you seem to be experienced by others. When you know yourself well, you are then able to recognize in a relationship what emotional baggage is yours and what belongs to somebody else.
2. Be able to recognize your feelings and share them appropriately.
This means being able to contain and expand emotions.
For example, you’ll want to know how to feel hurt and share this feeling at the right time in the right place and in the right way. This is also a trait you’ll want to find in a partner.
Someone who has few internal resources to manage and contain his or her emotions or someone who refuses to experience feelings and share them will find intimate relationships difficult if not impossible. One key facet to emotional health is being able to comfortably say that you are wrong or sorry.
3. Keep focused on “we” as well as “you” and “me.”
This includes having appropriate boundaries and finding a partner who also has them. Boundaries involve knowing where you and another person start and end. Respecting boundaries can be tricky in relationships as you try to balance your needs, your partner’s needs, and what the relationship needs to keep running smoothly.
If either partner can think only of “me,” that means he or she is too self-absorbed to be in an intimate partnership. If either partner can only think of “you,” that means he or she doesn’t have a strong enough sense of self for healthy intimacy.
The good news is that the more you are engaged in the above practices, the more likely you are to find a partner who also is.
Karen R. Koenig, LCSW, M.Ed. – www.karenrkoenig.com
I wish someone would’ve sat me down in my twenties and imparted some of the wisdom I am about to share with you. This wisdom comes from years of study as well as personal experience of what it takes to have healthy and fulfilling relationships with men.
The first thing you should know is your relationships with men reveal the TRUTH about your relationship with yourself.
Therefore, you MUST first develop an empowering relationship with yourself before you can have fulfilling relationships with men.
If your experiences with men have been unhealthy or unsatisfying so far, I would encourage you to do some self-exploration.
Where are you engaging in unhealthy or self-sabotaging patterns? Pay attention to your current interactions with men.
- How do you act around men?
- How do you communicate with them?
- What do you expect from them?
- Where do these expectations come from?
- What do you find attractive in men and why?
Some women claim to be attracted to “bad boys.” I am not sure exactly what this means, but if you are attracted to someone who is not trustworthy or routinely behaves in foolish ways, then you cannot expect to have a lasting and fulfilling relationship.
Choose someone who you admire and respect rather than someone who only offers excitement-unless you simply want a fling.
Review your past relationships and identify any unhealthy habits or patterns. What do you notice? Do you have a fear of rejection? I once dated a man who was a smooth talker. He could write for Hallmark. I didn’t realize until months later that his actions never matched his words.
If a man’s word does not match his action, then believe the action.
Never let a man love you more than you love yourself. Never mother the man or treat him like a child. Allow the man to please you and reward him with your appreciation.
Some people recommend that you focus on the qualities of the person you want to attract in a relationship.
This is fine, and I would also encourage you to consider what you want to EXPERIENCE in the relationship.
How do you want to FEEL in the relationship? Do you want to feel safe, protected, supported, cherished, respected, or nurtured?
Finally, take an honest look within.
- Who do YOU need to be in order to have the relationship of your dreams?
- Do you need to be more secure or assertive or compassionate?
- Can you love and accept all parts of yourself as you work on the unhealthy habits or patterns from your past?
I believe one of the best ways to attract an ideal partner is to practice living from your greatness, and choosing a partner who is committed to living from their greatness too.
Dr. Shannon Tran – www.shannontranphd.com
First, love yourself by enjoying your strengths and accepting your weaknesses
The first step to finding love is, paradoxically, something that begins, not by loving someone else, but by loving yourself.
One of the easiest ways to start to love yourself is to understand and accept your unique strengths and weaknesses. If you are pretending you are perfect and have no flaws, you will likely be seen as unapproachable and rigid.
Conversely, if you are totally down on yourself and can only see your flaws, you will likely be passed over for someone who has more confidence.
The ideal here is to enjoy you for you, and to be able to understand what your unique strengths and weaknesses are.
This way, if you are complimented you can really enjoy the compliment. And, when someone notices something not so great, you won’t need to be defensive or surprised.
Second, treat yourself the way you wish to be treated
This is really an extension of the concept of loving yourself.
- How can we expect our partner to treat us well if we don’t treat ourselves well?
- Are you constantly apologizing, downplaying yourself or beating up on yourself in your mind?
- Are you constantly critical of how you look?
- Are you spending time pleasing others but always leave yourself to last?
It is high time to start treating yourself well. This includes pushing yourself to think kind thoughts, treat your physical body with love and care, and balance taking care of yourself with taking care of others.
Third, pursue activities that interest you and reflect who you are
When you go out in the world and do things that interest you, it makes you more interesting! Not only can doing things you like improve your mood, it can help you meet new people, and, when you start dating, it gives you something to talk about. Plus, this is just plain fun.
Fourth, know and HONOR your deal makers and deal breakers
You no longer need a huge list to find your ideal partner, you only need 2 short lists. The first is our top 3-5 deal makers. What qualities do you need your partner to possess to feel good in the relationship? This isn’t stuff like “tall, dark and handsome.”
Deal makers are things like kindness, ability to fight fair, must be a family person. Then identify your top 3-5 deal breakers, the absolute must nots. Examples of deal breakers can be active addictions, doesn’t want kids, sexually incompatible. Now for the tricky part: walk away when your deal makers aren’t met, or deal breakers are there!
Finally, understand love is a practice, not a destination
As you pursue loving yourself and getting into a love relationship, remember that love is really a verb. It is a practice, a series of actions, repeated over time, with yourself and your partner. Love, love, love!
Dr. Carrie McCrudden, PsyD – www.coloradotherapycare.com
From a spiritual perspective, it’s pretty simple to attract your soulmate.
But from the everyday perspective, you might not know it by the way it looks out there these days. Between depressing digital dating or worrying that all the good ones are taken, it’s hard to believe that our guy could be out there somewhere.
But he is. And he is looking for you too!
From a spiritual point of view, none of our fears make any difference at all, of course. For the manifestation of true love is all about the Spiritual Laws of Intention, Magnetics and Receptivity.
The first spiritual law is ASK.
Ask and it is given. Not so easy to do, of course, because we must ask purely, and without doubt. If we doubt our worthiness or our lovability, our manifestation of our dreams are diluted by exact proportion!
And, if we try too hard, we can repel our answer. Think of a person that feels desperate for a job that posts 500 resumes. That energy is palpable by text, by email, and by interview. People sense it. The more desperately we feel we need something, the more likely we are to repel it – in exact proportion. It is like an alchemical formula. And it is always correct.
Conversely, the more sure you are of your goal, the more you know it, feel it, and expect it, the more attractive you are to it.
The woman who knows her man is coming – who is just waiting for him to show up, and knows that the timing will be perfect – meets her man at the gas station pump, bumps into him at the market, or he sits right down next to her on the bus! She can’t get it wrong, and she cannot miss him. And neither can he.
But how do you make yourself attractive to what you really, really want?
The very word attractive holds the answer. It’s not about being more beautiful, or charming, or sexy, or clever. Those qualities are simply natural extensions of your intention and who you are. It’s about learning to become more magnetically attractive to what you want.
By setting your intention clearly, from your innermost self, you may not attract a hundred dates, but you will attract your one true love. And the good news is, one is all you need.
The 3 Spiritual Laws for Finding True Love
1. Ask – Be very clear in your intention. Write it down. Feel it in your body. Expect it.
2. Prepare – Love yourself. Make your home, your life, and yourself attractive to YOU.
3. Receive – Be receptive. Stay open. Don’t get discouraged or impatient. Impatience is the greatest detriment to positive manifestation.
When your love comes you will know. It won’t be confusing or maybe. It will be sure as lightning. You will feel it in your bones. You will know it in your heart.
And you will recognize each other.
For, of course, it will be mutual.
Diana Lang, Counselor and Spiritual Teacher – www.dianalang.com
I just recently had a conversation with a friend who shared some of her concerns about finding love.
I had to ask the question that some think is so easy to answer – How do you define love and how would you recognize you were in love or if someone were in love with you?
After much concentrated thinking, she rolled her eyes and did not want to continue the conversation.
So I took a different approach and asked her the following questions:
– How did you know you received (or did not receive) love from your caretaker as a child?
– When was the first time you recognized you had feelings (whatever they were) for someone you were interested in during your teen years?
– In your relationships during adulthood, what was the one need (sense of belonging/friendship/intimacy; self-esteem/confidence/respect; security/safety; and, food/shelter/water) you hoped your partner could fulfill?
While the questions opened up the conversation, I asked her to do the following:
– Identify the themes in her past and present behaviors that drove her relationships (e.g., cried when person left the room; fight when sad; told everyone you loved them; gave friends money; etc.);
– Identify the individual who made the most significant impact on her life in childhood, teen years and adult life thus far (e.g., parents, best friends; grandparents; etc.);
– Determine why she looked to this individual to meet her needs at each stage (e.g., too young; person reminded me of my father; person told me I was pretty; etc.); and,
– Identify who is currently responsible to meet her needs today (where/are they qualified?).
During this conversation, my friend was able to understand how her definition of love changed throughout the years and how her behaviors/responses to it sabotaged her efforts in getting her needs met in adulthood, often feeling unfulfilled in and out of relationships.
While she was not responsible for meeting her needs as a child, she now knows she is responsible for meeting her needs as an adult. My friend is on a journey in developing a healthy understanding of what love looks like and feels like to her which will afford her an optimistic outlook for what’s to come.
My Lovelies, take the same journey and then ask yourself – what is my definition of love?
Dr. Maurita Hodge – www.movingmountainsconsultingllc.com
#1. Learn about yourself.
In order to prepare yourself for a healthy relationship, the first thing to do is to learn more about your unhealthy dynamics from your past relationships. Do you feel comfortable being single and/or not seeing anyone?
If we are uncomfortable within ourselves, we could use relationships as a distraction from what we do not want to see in ourselves.
What are your strengths and weaknesses? What dynamics are you reproducing from childhood in your relationships? A relationship inventory can be a helpful tool in the self-discovery phase by identifying who you are in each relationship you have been in. Therapy can help to identify patterns that may not be apparent to you.
#2. Give yourself time between relationships.
It can be very tempting to go from one relationship directly into the next one. It can help to stop a cycle of unhealthy behaviors by giving yourself time to grieve and reflect on your previous relationship/s.
Infatuation feels good and can be addicting; therefore; many women find themselves jumping from one relationship into the next, only to see themselves reproducing the same unhealthy patterns.
Infatuation usually wears off in the second year of a relationship and if we do not do the emotional work needed to stop detrimental patterns, then we will find ourselves in the same relationship with different people, time and time again. Give yourself time to find out who a person really is after the infatuation period wears off.
#3. If you are single, date a few different people at a time before committing.
Take it slow. An unhealthy pattern is meeting someone that you click with and spending every moment with them. This can lead to changes of your priorities and not having time for the things that mattered to you before meeting the person you are dating. In addition, there could be someone that could be healthier for you by opening up your schedule.
#4. Establish boundaries for yourself that you feel good about.
Before you start dating, it is important to figure out how you truly feel about having sex, kissing, holding hands, priorities, a schedule, etc. Once you are able to get clarity on your thoughts and feelings about important topic, the next part is being true to yourself and following through with what you feel comfortable with. This helps you increase self-worth.
#5. Continue spending time with your friends.
If you start to date or just begin to get into a relationship, continue doing self-care. Examples of this are: spending time with your friends, making time for your hobbies, doing things that make you happy that are separate from the new love interest. By continuing to do self-care, you continue to have your own life that is representative of you and your relationship can be an addition.
Dr. Heather Gaedt – www.miraclehorseranch.com
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