A very wise woman and friend of mine once shared the secret to her happy marriage.  She said something like this, “Every morning I wake up and fall in love with the man who is beside me.  It’s not the same man I went to sleep with.  For each day, he has grown and changed and it’s my job to recognize him for who he is today, and not to dwell on who he was yesterday. ”

Wow, I’d never heard any relationship advice like that before, and it really made me think about what she was saying.  Each day, she is releasing all the old complaints, problems, annoyances, etc. and is waking up with a clean slate.  Each morning, she is looking at her husband with fresh eyes, to see how he is choosing to express his authentic self today, what aspects of him she might not have noticed before, how he’s grown and changed…

Another happily married friend reminded me recently that there is a powerful second aspect to this relationship advice — and that is to see the divinity within your partner, in other words to look for what is good in him, focus on his best qualities and traits, enjoy and celebrate his wonderfulness.  And to do this each day, with new eyes, looking for his greatest self and really seeing him.

Now here’s the catch:  While it’s possible that this might work if only one person in the relationship does it, it’s not likely.  As you can imagine, it takes both partners opening up each day to the wonder and newness of their spouse/mate, for this to be truly effective.

Rodgers and Hammerstein wrote in the lyrics to Cinderella, “Do I love you because you’re beautiful, or are you beautiful because I love you?”  For most people, they fall in love initially because they see the obvious beauty (internal and external) of the other.  And likewise, for most people, they have trouble maintaining that level of enrapturement for their partner over time, simply because they choose to stop seeing that beauty.  (Note: this isn’t always a conscious choice, but it is a choice, nevertheless.)

When you commit to love someone, commit also to focus upon and see their authentic self, their inner beauty, and to really notice who they are becoming (rather than stagnantly seeing who they were when you first met).  When both partners do this every morning, day in and day out, you will see magical transformations occurring in your relationship.

Charles R. Brown said, “The white light streams down to be broken up by those human prisms into all the colors of the rainbow.”  What awesome colors are you seeing reflected from your loved one today?

About EliseOnLife

Elise Fee is a Consulting Hypnotist and a Life Mentor — her business “EliseOnLife” helps clients get a new lease on life. Elise’s many varied life experiences have taught her broader, more expansive ways to view and experience the world and humanity.  She works with clients all over the world, locally in one-on-one sessions or via Skype (audio and/or video) or telephone.  If you are interested in contacting Elise for a personal session, post a comment and she’ll contact you directly.  If you’d like to subscribe to her free daily blog, go to www.EliseOnLife.com

View all posts by EliseOnLife →

Most of you are working on personal change –so you are aware of areas you wish to grow in and are actively becoming your best self.  As such, you’ve experienced how change can sometimes take longer than you think, can come about in a different way than you anticipated, and how it can sometimes feel like a stop-n-start activity (with times when you’re progressing and other times when you feel stuck or like you’ve relapsed).

Knowing how much focus and effort it takes to change yourself, why would anyone undertake the task of changing another?!  And yet, in the US society, women are typically led to believe that if they can just find a good man, they can then change him into ‘Mr. Right’.

Paradoxically, the typical US man believes that the woman will always remain just the way she was when he met her (that she’ll never change).  So when she grows and changes, he wants her to go back to the way she was when they met.

She tries to make him change, and he tries to make her not change.  As you can predict, both of these scenarios are doomed to fail.  Unfortunately, I’ve seen this far too often.

So what’s the cure for this disease?  It comes down to two things:

1) love your partner unconditionally — in other words love them for who they are right now (not for who they could be or who they used to be), and

2) spend your energy working on yourself and let your partner do the same (it’s not your place to make suggestions of things your partner could work on).

When you meet someone and are dating, take the time to really get to know that person well.  Meet their friends (recent and long-time), get to know their family, meet their co-workers, and be certain to share lots of mundane, everyday experiences together so you can tell how this person really is in the world.

Date for a while; don’t rush into anything.  It’s really important that you know all aspects of your partner (and vice versa) BEFORE you commit to each other.  By doing this, you will be able to unconditionally love and accept your partner for who they are, in their entirety.  And that is the key to a happy relationship — truly seeing, knowing, accepting and loving everything about the other.

Another helpful technique is to stop thinking that your way is the right way.  Instead, shift your thinking to “there is no one right way; every way has validity”.  When you make this shift, you won’t be inclined to insist that others do things your way, and you’ll be more receptive to learning new ways of doing things and seeing things.  In other words, you’ll have an open mind.

As Colonel Potter said on M*A*S*H, “Just remember, there’s a right way and a wrong way to everything, and the wrong way is to keep trying to make everybody else do it the right way.”

If you want to change the world, change yourself.  For that is the one place you have any influence.  And the change you make in yourself will impact others in many seen and unseen ways.

Trying to change another is futile, but working to change yourself is miraculous!

About EliseOnLife

Elise Fee is a Consulting Hypnotist and a Life Mentor — her business “EliseOnLife” helps clients get a new lease on life. Elise’s many varied life experiences have taught her broader, more expansive ways to view and experience the world and humanity.  She works with clients all over the world, locally in one-on-one sessions or via Skype (audio and/or video) or telephone.  If you are interested in contacting Elise for a personal session, post a comment and she’ll contact you directly.  If you’d like to subscribe to her free daily blog, go to www.EliseOnLife.com

View all posts by EliseOnLife →

Intimate connection = Soul Mate

The idea of soul mates wasn’t much in vogue when I was doing personals dating back in the 70s. Now it has become a cliché, and like all clichés has just about lost its meaning.

My ex-therapist Jim, who is one of the wisest people I’ve ever known, used D.H.Lawrence’s books for illustrations of what love was about. He described one of Lawrence’s couples as having a deep sexual connection that was always there and that was reflected in the way they touched each other, looked at each other, and presented themselves to the world as inseparable.

Lawrence thought sex was the root of our connectedness to a mate. Of course he was a male chauvinist pig, but he did have a couple of good ideas. Plus he chose a brilliant, feisty, highly independent woman as his mate, not a wilting lily, which gives him credibility in my book.

I do believe that there is such a thing as a soul connection, but it’s pretty mysterious because it’s different for each couple. The more levels on which two people connect, the deeper their union becomes. The soul level is the most mysterious, maybe it even has to do with knowing each other in past lives (call me flaky I don’t care). And there is a power balance that must be maintained or the whole thing falls apart.

What was missing from my marriage—and from most people’s failed marriages–is intimacy—another mystery. I thought we were intimate but I was mistaking common intellectual interests, values, sense of humor, and the same outlook on life for intimacy.

Jim described intimacy to me for an article I wrote over 20 years ago—long before I even met my ex husband. If I’d looked at it before I married him I might not be divorced today:

Intimacy has become a psychological buzzword. What exactly is this elusive quality called intimacy? Why is it so difficult to find? Why is our longing for it so mixed with fear?

For lovers intimacy means nothing more than good, direct communication in the context of a sexual relationship. This sounds almost simplistic but the problems in maintaining such communication can be formidable. Intimacy is possible only between two people who have a strongly felt and accurate sense of who they are—people who intuitively feel OK about themselves (this left out me and Ira)

Most of us are hiding something, and we are terrified of being found out. When we search for intimacy, we’re trying to have verified the part of ourselves that we like the best while ignoring and repudiating the part we secretly hate. But intimacy demands that, over time, all of a person be shared with all of another person. It’s not a question of saying everything but of not hiding anything.

This includes sharing our weakest, shakiest aspects—ways in which we don’t feel as good about ourselves as we’d like the world to think we do. Of course, sharing our insecurities with someone else means sharing them with ourselves. And many people find it enormously difficult to look at themselves squarely and face how scared they feel inside. Instead, most people keep trying to find verification of that false version of themselves.

The more narrowly and neurotically focused we are, and the more incomplete we feel, the more we mistakenly believe that intimacy is the answer to identity.

Substituting sex for intimacy

Sex and intimacy tend to get confused in our society where sex is often used as a cheap substitute for intimacy. Sex doesn’t take all that much time and effort, and it allows the partners to fantasize a sense of closeness that doesn’t really exist. In a love relationship sex can deepen what is there but can’t create what isn’t there.

You can have an active sex life without intimacy and you can have an intimate relationship without sex. Sex and intimacy are often not connected at all. Intimacy is possible between any two people who care about each other. What must be there is the willingness to reveal one’s true self, mutual trust and understanding, the sharing of feelings and experiences, the continuity of a relationship that has lasted over time.

For a nation used to working hard for rewards, it is ironic that we expect intimacy to materialize instantly and effortlessly. It takes both time and effort. Two people need months or even years to achieve clarity of communication, a sense of belonging, a sharing of events and time.

Intimacy takes a lot of practice before it becomes second nature. An analogy is watching an Olympic race. When you see the winning runner win, you get an instant sense of the runner’s exhilaration. If you identify with the runner, it’s almost as though you’ve won the race yourself. But you haven’t. She has. And in order to win she’s gone through a lot of changes and continuous self-discipline. There’s no avoiding the process to get the results in athletics. Like any other worthy endeavor, achieving true intimacy takes consistent hard work.

Erica Manfred is the author of He’s History You’re Not, Surviving Divorce After 40. She has written for Cosmopolitan, New York Times Magazine, Ms., Parenting, Women’s Day, and Bottom Line/Personal. She currently runs a women’s divorce support group in her hometown of Woodstock, New York.

When I think about other women in a marriage that can be defined as “sexless” that is what I think about. Are these women in marriage similar to mine? Are they holding onto hope that things will change, that one day they will be desired sexually? Will they find out, like I did that a man who can’t make an intimate connection can’t make a connection of any kind? Are they not seeing the reality of the situation?

How do you define a sexless marriage? Some experts call marriages that average 10 or less “intimate couplings” a year “sexless.”  I recently read that an estimated 18% of marriages become passionless and making love less than 10 times per year can be the norm in some.  Are those marriages amongst those who have been married for decades though?

How about us who suffer sexual rejection from the beginning. The passion hasn’t faded, there isn’t a loss of interest after years of marriage. That, when I think about it seems easy to live with when compared to what my marriage was like.

While dating we had a normal sex life. He was as interested as I, or he behaved in ways that lead me to believe he was interested. His interest came to an end the night we married. We didn’t have sex that night and averaged sex every 6 to 8 weeks from then on.  Being the problem solver that I am I immediately went to work trying to fix the problem in our marriage.

And like most women, I blamed myself for his lack of interest in sex with me. It never occurred to me that I was married to a man who didn’t care for sex in general. It was ME, if only I were more sexual, slimmer, a better cook, more willing to experiment sexually he would come around.

I read a lot of advice geared toward women in sexless marriages. I took most of the advice and in hindsight realize more often than not it was nothing more than sleazy and useless tips on how to be sexier and arouse your man. I came across a lot of sex tips and seduction techniques which now seem quite insulting to the intelligence and integrity of most women who have probably already done all they can to arouse their husband and becoming an amateur porn star doesn’t really improve things … it only serves to make a woman feel worse about herself!

So, although I can’t tell a woman who has found herself in a sexless marriage how to solve the problem, I can suggest she not do as I did. The frustration, shame and hurt that comes from a marriage that is lacking in physical intimacy can do more than hurt your self-esteem; it can bring on depression, self-loathing and anxiety, not to mention dealing with the conflicted emotions that come along with the knowledge that the person you love doesn’t want to “make love.”

What did I learn?

There is no easy solution.

It wasn’t about ME. And, it isn’t about YOU. The focus should have been on fixing HIM and not on changing who I was to satisfy him. It wasn’t that he didn’t want me, he just didn’t want sex. If you take anything away from this article, I hope it is the knowledge that you are desirable, not in need of change, are not doing anything wrong and most importantly can’t fix a problem if you are not causing the problem.

It’s been three and a half years since my ex-husband and I split up.  And since then, despite the many dates and mini-relationships I’ve had, I’m still single.  But I don’t think of this as being a ‘bad’ thing ; I think I’ve needed this time – to heal, to grow, to like myself more…and to get a much stronger sense of what a healthy relationship looks/feels like.

That being said, I want to bring up a conversation I shared with a divorced girlfriend the other day; it was a bit of an ‘aha‘ for me and I’m filing it away for reference for when I meet a potential Mr. Right:

My friend suggested that one flashing, yet oftentimes overlooked warning of an unhealthy relationship is when a woman constantly talks about her man’s potential instead of how he is – like right now, day-in day-out.  This woman talks a lot in the ‘future tense’, ie, he will be happy/more loving/more successful/a better father/ spouse when he gets a new job/believes himself more/is less stressed out/ finds his spiritual center etc.   Until he gets ‘there’ – wherever ‘there’ may be, she tolerates his poor treatment of her, buries her unhappiness and hurt (maybe even blames herself for it?), and may even makes excuses for his behavior.

Now please, let me clarify:  I’m NOT saying you should high-tail it out a relationship as soon as a rough patch arises in your partner’s life; we all go through those.  I’m talking about something much more insidious - it’s like a self-defeating, ongoing  ’dynamic’ that women may unconsciously get trapped in.  And I think some of us need reminding to clearly see someone for who he is and how he makes us feel…instead of who we hope and dream him to be.  

Of course my hand is waving in the air here - cause my tendency in past relationships has been to allow my romantic notions of who someone is to blind me.  Actually, it’s more than just my romanticism – it’s that I want to see the good in someone and focus on that. I’d always thought that was a  good thing…

But the problem is that there’s a fine yet dangerous line between believing in someone’s soul potential and seeing things that aren’t there and possibly never will be in this lifetime.  If he’s grumpy and mean and disrespectful to me now, chances are he’ll continue being this same way even when factor A, B or C is accomplished.  There’s a good chance that who he is NOW, how he treats me and the kids right now,  is exactly who he’ll always be.  And unless he decides he wants to rise into a bigger, better man, unless he decides he wants to treat me with the love and care I deserve, I’ll forever be living in an excuse-filled fantasy world that damages my soul.

Like I said, I’m filing this tidbit away for future reference with a potential Mr. Right.  Cause next time round, I want to do it right - and this will involve my focusing more on how I feel NOW versus ‘some day’.  I’ll also be paying closer attention to how I talk ‘out loud’ to my girlfriends about a man – cause really, that’s me thinking/feeling out loud, possibly even giving voice to incongruities.  And the bottom line is that if what I’m saying sounds like  a skunk and smells of a skunk, then goshdarnit, he IS a skunk.  And I’m done with weasels.

Delaine

www.iamdivorcednotdead.com

Did you get lucky this week?

Or should I say, did you score? Did you hook up? Or are you more comfortable if I ask if you made love?

Whatever you call it, great sex is great sex, right? Not exactly? Then do our distinctions in terminology serve us, or complicate matters?

When it comes to sex and love, these days – everyone seems confused. I can’t help but wonder if the problem is an issue of language, at least in part, and an implicitly assigned value system we ascribe to the words we use. Are we living by a hierarchy of intimate encounters that we judge in their aftermath?

Rules, no matter what

When we’re young, any sexual contact is a “score” – and may also be a credential, an obstacle to overcome, a source of embarrassment, or an accomplishment. Good, bad or indifferent, sex is a constant preoccupation, and not just for the young.

 The caveats and exceptions to the rules of engagement? They are many, including socially acceptable age ranges, mutual consent, guidelines about power relationships (like boss-employee or teacher-student). There are cultural and religious boundaries that reserve intimacy for marriage, the taboos against incest, and the impossible-to-unravel stigmas and myths around older man-younger woman, and older woman-younger man.

All that aside, “doing it” is considered a rite of passage. And once beyond that barrier, a vast area of self and other opens, and the real exploration unfolds.

Scorecard or report card?

So returning to the essence of my original question – did you have sex this week, or did you make love?  And why is it that at age 30, “making love” may rate an A on the report card, but “having sex” – even if it was fantastic – only earns a B? What about relations after a long marriage, then divorce at 40 or 50? Will sex of any sort garner high marks from the friends, without further qualification? Do these assessments vary by gender?

It seems we all swim (consciously or not) in a constantly shifting pool of approval (or not), a sort of system of standards tied to demographics, personal history, life stage, or all of the above. Must we really assign judgment to our assorted encounters – or authority to the judgment of others?

Great sex is great sex

Some say yes to the carnal side of life. Period. The sexual aspects of any relationship – one night or a lifetime – are fundamental.

Some don’t ask these questions. Or they pose them later in life, when they sense something is missing.

Others qualify their musings on this topic; perhaps the diversity of sexual encounters before, during and after long-term relationships enable them to do so. Their journeys have taught many shades of sexual expression, something beyond a simplistic mention of compatibility, or a tally of partners, positions and orgasms.

Some experience sex without investment in emotion as good and part of the many ways sexuality plays out. Tenderness, intimacy, and shared comforts needn’t be banished from the bedroom because the word “love” isn’t spoken.

Lovemaking

The distinction between sex and lovemaking is vital to some men and women. They seek lovemaking – a fusion of body and spirit; they assume, or ascribe love to acts of lovemaking.

When we introduce truly splendid sex into the mix, do some of us confuse it with love? Do we then call it lovemaking, grade it with the long-awaited “A,” and hang on too tightly?

Must you be “in love” to “make love?”

Men, women and sexual energy

I suspect that men and women grow similar in our inclinations as we gain experience, capable of recognizing the differences between sex with emotion and sex without. But then we’re back to individual perception. To history. To personal needs. Yes, we love great sex – but great lovemaking? Does that remain the fine bottle of wine worth the wait? The holy grail, for some more than others?

• What about sex as fun, or joyful exercise?
• What about the fact that sex is a natural anti-depressant?
• What about the way it energizes and fills us with a sense of being alive?

“Just sex”

“Just sex” is often the phrase reserved for the contrite cheating lover; it is dismissive and impersonal, rationalizing infidelity where fidelity is assumed. Sex is slotted into a compartment as a physical act, a bodily function. We place boundaries around it, separating it from lovemaking.

When we are honest with ourselves, isn’t “just sex” - sex? Enjoyable, mediocre, fabulous, empty, affirming, or whatever else any coupling might entail on a given day? Don’t we understand “just sex” quite well, especially if we’ve ever been married for a long period of time?

Eroticism

Where does eroticism slide into our sticky spectrum of sex to lovemaking? Does it fit somewhere along the scale we’ve devised – deserving of an A+ or extra credit? Does it exist in some other dimension altogether, veiled or tucked away beyond closed doors and discussion?

If eroticism involves the forbidden, the “little bit naughty” or something more, might it be as simple as sexy stilettos in bed? Is it the twists and turns of a supple body and a Tantric consciousness?

Is it role play for all participants, unusual locales, experimentation, games and toys, a provocative sharing of consensual attitudes and activities? Is it always about the thrill of pushing boundaries, even just a little?

When you move into realms of the erotic, the sexual magnetism of our partners may be heightened; encounters reverberate and replay in our minds, in our fantasies, and in our expectations and needs. We’ve journeyed to a new place in ourselves; we don’t want to lose sight of that landscape.

When the sex is extraordinary, must we convince ourselves it’s love? And why is love always tied to the A or the A+ in our assessment? Are we back to a socially-sanctioned hierarchy of sexual experience, in which the pinnacle is love?

Good is good, whatever you call it

Great sex may be soulful, imaginative, lighthearted, tender, unexpected, intense in sensation, and overflowing with emotion. It may also serve as a bridge to a deep place of self that longs for solace or celebration; we’ve experienced a loss or a win, and the connective tissue of shared emotion deepens the experience, even if only briefly. After all, our vulnerable selves are inside each other, joined, and we are quite literally not alone.

Why do we feel compelled to package, label, and channel sexual experiences into compartments? Do we manufacture love where it doesn’t exist in order to feel comfortable with splendid sex?

And if our hearts and lives are tenderly intertwined, whatever the assessment of our physical encounters,  are we not making love?

In this fusion, will there always be confusion?


© D A Wolf

These days, Big Little Wolf (”Ms. Big”) reflects on life and her Daily Plate of Crazy, where she writes essays on everything – sometimes serious, sometimes fun – whatever strikes her on a given day as interesting, unusual, entertaining, or of concern.

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It’s easier than it sounds. You don’t have to speak a foreign language, live in a loft in a trendy neighborhood, drive a hybrid, or down tequila shots without flinching. You don’t have to be anything but yourself.

The key to attracting a man is to cultivate and maintain interests of your own. This means:

1. Never cancel a night out with a friend to go out with him. Doing so sends the message that you are desperate.
2. Continue to pursue your hobbies, your career, and your relationships with friends and family at the rate you did before you started dating.

In other words, live a full life!

If the guy tells you he can’t see you this weekend, don’t ask him why. Let him volunteer the information. If and when he does, tell him to have a good time and mean it. Chances are, he’ll be intrigued enough to ask you what your plans are for the weekend. Keep your answer vague. Tell him that you may go out with friends, and then go home and call one or two to line something up.

It’s also attractive to a man when you are not available to pick up every time he calls. If the phone rings while you’re in the shower, let him leave a message and wonder where you are.

I don’t suggest you lie or play games, and I do not advocate manipulation, but ask yourself:

Do you like men who follow you around, hang on your every word, and call you more often than necessary? Are you turned on by a guy who shows up after you’ve told him you need a night out with your friends? A guy who’s afraid to let you out of his sight?

Of course not.

All of us–men and women–want a “prize” when it comes to dating and relationships. We want someone who will treat us well, but who isn’t overly available. Overly available people are not interesting. People who have places to go and people to see are exciting–and a bit mysterious.

Keep a full life, and you will be interesting. You will be attractive. That man you’re so crazy about will definitely come back for more!

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Submitted by Delaine Moore

So I broke up with someone last week – a single dad of two.   He’s the first man I’ve gone out with since divorcing that I contemplated getting serious with whatsoever.  But even though we got along brilliantly, even though he said he was crazy about me, one main thing deterred his interest: the fact that I have three kids. And I admit, it slapped me in the face and kind of hurt.  Not because my feelings were that deep for him – but because this scenario has always been one of my greatest fears…how about you?

When he first expressed his feelings to me (via email),  I admit I was mad and wanted to scream, “You’re a F***’ing coward!”  I mean, jeez, he’s a parent too, and he’d rambled on about how he’s learned to take risks and grab life by the horns since divorcing.  Guess I found myself another ‘talker’, not ‘walker’….

But I didn’t lash out.  Instead, I deleted his phone numbers and email address as gestures of “screw you.”   And those rituals made me feel somewhat better - gone, done, whatever; the past few years have well-trained me for sudden endings…

Over the next few days, my anger turned to forlornness as my mind drifted to my closest girlfriends, both whom are divorced moms and are now in serious relationships.  For there are BIG differences between their situations and mine: first, they only have two kids, not three (doesn’t each child you have up the ‘intimidation factor’?). Two, their ex-husbands take their children often and on a regular schedule.  Mine doesn’t.  Bottom line is I’m a TRULY-full-time mom.  Any man who falls for me also has to be prepared to be strong step-father figure.  How many men out there want THAT? I mean, when you cross out all the divorced dads my age who are carrying emotional cargo on their backs AND you cross out all the non-dad bachelors who are set in their me-focused worlds, who am I left with?

But a few more days to think on it, has me shaking me off my blues and holding my head high.  In fact, I almost find my brain’s need to figure out the ‘grim odds’ of my meeting such a man laughable.  Why?  Many reasons.  And darn right, I’m going to share them:

Number one, I LOVE being a mom and would never change that for a second!  I love the fact my house is constantly full of kids and my weekends are slotted with family activities.  Moreover, I KNOW my kids are so loving and open to having a strong male figure in their lives that whoever takes on that role one day is going to be thanking his lucky stars! My children and our lifestyle will be a blessing/bonus to him, not a hindrance.

Secondly, just because I’ve been programmed to believe I’m ‘missing something’ just because I’m a mom with no man in her life, doesn’t make it true.  My life is full and joyful in MANY respects, even if I don’t have everything figured out.  If there’s anything the chaos of infidelity and divorce has taught me these past years it’s that I’m way stronger than I ever thought, and life is to be lived right NOW.  Sometimes, in my mind’s eye, I see myself at eighty years old, scolding the Delaine of today: “Stop thinking so damn much!” she says. “Just get out there and enjoy yourself!” I’m young, healthy, attractive, smart, and hey – I can still enjoy the many pleasures of dating different men.  I’d be a fool NOT to take advantage of the male opportunities I’m presented with.

Thirdly, even if THIS guy wasn’t THE guy for me,  I am so very pleased and proud of myself for allowing myself to take a risk and actually feel for a man again; it’s been a long time coming!  And how lucky am I that I discovered his take on things before I got too invested.  No – he wasn’t meant to be my new life-partner, he was meant to be a stepping stone, a well-lit beacon reminding me of how far I’ve already come.  Moreover, in the big scheme of things, I’ve a strong sense that my relationship with this man was ultimately designed to test my  Big Looming Fear – the one that said, “You’re unlovable and unworthy because you’re a single mom.”

It’s funny eh?  How our brains race ahead trying to figure out our futures for us?  And how they trick us into believing it’s all bad?  But I call bullshit on mine here.  Instead I pull from my pool of ‘truths’ which are solidified every time something goes astray in my life : I need to focus on WHAT I want, and let the universe figure out the HOW.  In my heart, I TRULY believe that there is a wonderful match out there for everyone.  And some incredible man is going to look at me and my three kids and say, “WOW.  This is EXACTLY what I want.”  He will adore me in ways I’ve yet to experience, and love my children like his own because he is truly THAT great a man.

And even though that kind of man/person is a rare breed, one that is the exception, not the rule in today’s day in age, I WANT exceptional.  And I know he’s out there looking for me/ us.

Delaine www.iamdivorcednotdead.com

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Almost all women at some point in their lives attract a ‘bad man’; some of us marry him. And by ‘bad,’ I’m not simply referring to men who are drug lords, pimps, or wife abusers. No, “bad men” are men who don’ treat us and love us as wonderfully as we deserve. They are, as Sarah Breathnach puts it, “spiritual disgraces sent in disguise to teach us, through torment, to love ourselves.”

It can be hard to identify the spiritual ‘gifts’ our bad men have brought us – especially if they cheated and left us for another woman. When everything first erupts, we’ll call them ‘bad’ and mean it literally, venomously, blamefully.

But as I’ve moved forward on the divorce timeline, I’ve begun to revisit my marriage from a different place – a place that takes responsibility; not for the choices he made, but for the big life lessons I needed a ‘bad man’ to teach me.

The lessons I’ve excavated are so poignant and obvious to me now, I seriously think that our union was divinely orchestrated for my soul’s higher good. Here are some of the ‘biggies’ I learned:

1) I am a pleaser and will bend myself into a pretzel to keep my man and other people happy. My self-posed question post-divorce is : What makes Delaine happy?

2) I am big-time left-field thinker. And I need to be with a man who cherishes that in me, not one who ridicules me for it.

3) I deserve to be loved in ways that are meaningful to me. And though I appreciated my ex buying me gifts and wanting to do things together (which were things he wanted to do, like riding dirt bikes and going to bars), I need love to be expressed through language too. I love words. I love self-expression. And how they are said are as important to me as what is being said.

4)  As much as I believed in the beauty of ‘family’ and working as a team with my ex, I was left vulnerable taking on the huge task of stay-at-home mom. And though I am so deeply grateful for all I learned in this role, this is not ALL of who I am – Delaine has dreams…big dreams.

These are but a few of my personal epiphanies. And as time moves forward, I’m sure there will be more. But as Sarah Breathnach said, these ‘bad men’ are meant to teach us to learn to love ourselves. So I’m making the time to learn that, instead of rushing into my next relationship to find a sense of worth or purpose. And because of all my hard inner-work, I trust that the next man I fall in love with will be a Good Man.

Delaine

www.iamdivorcednotdead.com

Shannon’s day had been typical and ordinary; she’d had no ‘signs’ or reasons to think it might be anything but.

At 5 o’clock, having finishing her nursing shift at the hospital, she decided to stop in at a trendy bistro for a drink;  having a drink alone was no big deal to her whatsoever.  She stomped out her cigarette just as she reached the entrance doors and headed inside with nothing but a cold margarita on her mind.

Movement to her left caught her eye – she glanced back over her shoulder.  And there, in the corner, with his chair backed against the wall was a man – a long-legged man wearing glasses and smile.  Had he just gestured her over? she wondered. Or had she imagined it?

Too late.  She’d already started walking over to him.  “Were you just smoking?”  he asked.  Nice opening question. Nice deep voice too…

“Yes I was,” she said.

“Ah….that’s too bad.”

“Haha.  Actually, me and my boyfriend are both planning to quit next week,” she replied.

“Ah.  That’s too bad too – the boyfriend part I mean,” he grinned.  He waved his hand to the open chair in front of him.  “Well then – she who has a boyfriend and will only smoke for one more week, would you care to join me for a drink?”

And with the wave of his hand, so Shannon’s life was swept onto a new page as well.  That casual drink two months ago was followed by many more drinks, dinners and dates….  A long story short – Shannon broke up with her boyfriend within a week and she and this guy have been together ever since.  She is happier and more at peace with hersself than I’ve ever seen her her whole life; she knows she has met The One.

So… what’s the point in my sharing this story with YOU? Perhaps you’re thinking, “Good for her Delaine, but I don’t even know this person…”

I’m sharing it for a few different reasons:

1) The story is simple.

2) It’s powerful (seems Divinely orchestrated to me!)

3)  And it can make us feel good.

And when it comes to divorce - no matter WHAT stage we’re at – we ALL sometimes need to hear some ‘good news’; you know, a ‘happy story’ where everything works out.  We ALL sometimes need a little hope, a little lightness, and a little faith in both the universe and our futures.

Me, personally, I am savoring my friend’s story as if it were my own.  Her story reminded me that there is a time and season for everything, including discovering new love; that when two people fall in love it can happen EASILY and with a sense of CONFIDENCE; and that in the blink of an eye, on any given day, our lives can majorly change – not just in a downward motion like we all know because of divorce…but upwards, and for the better.

I know that day is coming for me too.  I may not be out there looking hard for love…but I know it’s out there looking for me.

Delaine www.iamdivorcednotdead.com

Other Articles:

That Blissful Moment Of Physical Merging

What Do You Say To A Greiving Friend?

Would You Go Out To A Bar Alone?