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One Helluva (Happy) Woman

I had to share this story. It’s absolutely true. It’s about a courageous grown-up woman who confessed her secret wish, did a little work, and then had her wish come true.

My client Pamela is in love. Not only that, she’s in love with a charming man. He’s very accomplished and, like her, highly educated. He brings her flowers, listens to every word she speaks, laughs with her, shares intimacies about his life and his feelings, wants to know her opinions on everything, takes her to fascinating and luscious places, and even enjoys walking rose gardens with her. He’s also in love.

Pamela is 66 years old. Ricardo is 70. Pamela hadn’t dated for about 8 years when we first met. She’s a successful business woman with a PhD. She has two happy and loving sons, a great house by the beach, and a large circle of lifelong friends. She’s full of energy. I don’t mean the “energy for a 66 year old” energy. I mean she can constantly go go go. And she wants to.

Pamela had told me that she’d not been dating for so long because she “didn’t need a man to screw up her great life.” (C’mon…you’ve said that at least once in your life, haven’t you??) But as I told her my story – that I was 47 when I was first met and married my honorable and loving husband who is truly the love of my life – she started to tear up. It touched her, and she admitted that she really did want that too. So we got to work.

She got online, took some advice, and soon after met Ricardo. He’d been online for about a year searching for his mate. Seems he knew it was Pamela as soon as they met.

At 66 and 70 Pamela and Ricardo – two brilliant adults with very full lives – found each other and came together. He still sees his patients and runs his thriving business; she still runs her company, meets her friends for wine, and spends time with her sons. They both keep reading the books they love and having the quiet moments alone that they both need. They have the same great lives. Just now they also have companionship and intimacy.

Ricardo is taking Pamela to Costa Rica next month to meet his family. She doesn’t know the end of the story, and I’d be lying if I said there isn’t some fear of disappointment or being hurt. But she’s plowing ahead with an open heart, knowing that her life experience will guide her to good decisions.

Go Pamela. You are one helluva fantastic woman.

Gotta go.  Be good to yourself.

Enjoying this blog? You can subscribe in the upper right column of this page so you get our upcoming newsletter with stories, resources, tips, and techniques on how to date and romance like a grown-up.  And you can be among the first to test your readiness to date as a grown-up by taking my Man-o-Meter test.  Subscribe to the RSS Feed to get notified when there are new posts.  And stay tuned for my new eBook which will be ready for you next week.

The Four Commandments of Kindness to Men

In a few days my eBook How to Succeed in Your Search for Love: 7 Things You Already Know to Help You Confidently and Happily Meet Your Mate will be on the e-bookshelves. I’m pretty excited. I think it will help a lot of spectacular, deserving women find love…or at least have fun looking.

The book shows you how to use gifts you already have that, when applied to dating, will bring new perspective to your search for your special man. As independent and accomplished women, these are the 7 gifts you already have:

1. You Are Kind to Others, and to Yourself
2. You Know Yourself
3. You Like and Respect Yourself
4. You’ve Lived and Learned
5. You Know What You Want and How to Get It
6. You’ve Slain Dragons
7. You Know Love Matters

Here is an excerpt from my chapter on Kindness.

The Four Commandments of Kindness to Men

1.  Hold your judgments.

Quick judgments are often in response to a lot of things that have nothing to do with the man sitting in front of you. You would want him to judge you based solely on what he sees in you. You owe him the same kindness.

That means when you meet a man who has a job, a haircut, stature, or a sense of humor that you “instantly” don’t like; stop and take time to see him as a complete person. Show him the same initial acceptance and generosity that you would show an acquaintance or the woman you meet at a business mixer. Doing this not only shows kindness, but it makes your chances of meeting a fantastic man far greater.

2.  Be empathetic.

Empathy isn’t just about relating to someone, it’s about being willing and able to consider what they want and need outside of what you want and need. When they say “put yourself in their shoes” it means looking at it from their perspective; not yours. To do this, you need to do the work to understand how men think and feel differently than we do.A great example of this is something I hear constantly from my clients. It’s a first date, and the man asks her to pick a place to go for dinner. She’s irritated, and I hear: “I want a man to take charge” or “He can’t be that interested if he’s not willing to plan our first date.” She’s decided he’s a putz, and the poor man has very little chance of recovery. The fact is he probably did this because he wants to please her, and he figures the best way to do that is to take her somewhere she really likes. In this case, empathy would mean forgoing the kneejerk reaction and instead trying to understand the man’s motives. To do that successfully, she’d need to be willing and able. To do this, many women need to invest some time in learning more about how men think and feel.

3.  Online dating is still dating.

If you’re dating online – or as my friend calls it “meeting online” – the same rules apply. Just because you are sitting behind a computer, or you have men queued up, it’s no reason to forgo the niceties.Take this story recently shared by my friend Jan. She’s been online dating for some time. A man emailed her recently and the content was just a copy-and-paste of his profile. Jan instantly took offense, thinking he should have taken the time to send a personalized email. So she shot back an email asking him if he “even knew what he was doing?” I know where that was coming from: she was burnt out and frustrated that she hadn’t met a special man yet. But that was unkind, and lacked empathy (which she knew after she clicked “send”). Turns out it was his second day online. Imagine how he felt after receiving that email.

4.  Be kind to yourself.When you really go for it and put yourself out there, you may act or feel a certain way or make a decision that you later regret. Show yourself the kindness you deserve by giving yourself second chances and allowing for mistakes. As you already know, there can be some difficult times during your search for love. Like other times in your life when you’re working toward a better future and positive change, you have to allow yourself room to learn and make mistakes. Not doing this simply sabotages your efforts, or worse yet, paralyzes you.

 

I have two tips: 1) be your best cheerleader and, 2) build a support squad. Have those needed conversations with yourself about how much you know and can do, and what a deserving and remarkable woman you are. Remind yourself that as an accomplished and independent woman you are not defined by one act or what one man thinks of you. And always have friends to call on when you need a little support. They want to be there for you.

Gotta go.  Be good to yourself.

Enjoying this blog? Subscribe in the upper right column of this page so you get our upcoming newsletter with stories, resources, tips, and techniques on how to date and romance like a grown-up.  Also, so I can send you access to my Free Man-O-Meter! Be among the first to test your readiness to date like a grown-up by taking my Man-o-Meter test.  I’ll also send you a free copy of my eBook How to Succeed in Your Search for Love: 7 Things You Already Know to Help You Confidently and Happily Meet Your Mate. (http://aphainventions.com)

Sometimes You Just Can’t Get it Up…

… a new post, I mean.

I’m tired. I’m ending an 18 hour work day. I’m just too damn old for this.  But I did dash off my new eBook “How to Succeed in Your Search for Love: 7 Things You Already Know to Help You Confidently and Happily Meet Your Mate.”  You’ll be able to get it as a bonus when the wonderful and talented Lisa Steadman launches her new book campaign on May 19th. (More to follow.)

But do not dismay! I’m reposting one of my most favorite, and it turns out, most popular posts. It’s great advice for any woman or man who is looking for love or even just someone nice to date. Especially if you happen to be dating over 40 or 50; you may need to change it up. This will tell you how. You really should read this. Enjoy!!

Go on…click on it now:
Do Something, Just One Thing, Different Today

It’s Not Your Height – It’s Just…You

I had a great four hour lunch with my friend Jan this weekend. Among other things we talked about her love life. She’s been doing online dating for quite some time. She’s met a lot of men – mostly very nice – but hasn’t yet found her special one. She will.

She told me about a man she went out with last week; we’ll call him Scott. During their phone conversation before their meet-date Scott told Jan about how much he loved his last girlfriend but after two years dumped her because she was older than him and he “couldn’t stand her aging body.”

I know, big red flag!! Why did she even meet this guy? But that’s not the point of my story.

She goes and meets him and he continues to talk about how fabulous his ex was, and all kinds of crap like that. Just improper and not nice stuff. Uh, b’bye Scott.

So Jan tells Scott she doesn’t want to see him again. He asks her:

Is it because I’m short?

Really??? He had no idea. No idea what an immature creep he sounded like. (And probably was.)

Poor Scott reminded me of myself; all those years of first dates and I was convinced it was only because I wasn’t 5′10″ with legs to die for.  

Scott has to learn what I did: It’s not your [fill in the blank] -  it’s just you. You need to work on yourself as a person and as a grown-up dater. Once I finally realized my issue was the way I thought about myself and was approaching dating, that changed my life.

Scott needs to do some introspection.  How about you?