Do Men REALLY Hate Drama?

What does it cost you to just accept the conventional wisdom that:

“Men don’t like drama.”

Well, I can suggest this: it costs you one or all of these two things:

1) The ability to express your authentic feelings to a man because you’re afraid he will run, thinking you are a “drama queen”. Pretending everything is ok rarely makes everything ok, does it?

2) It costs you a very important part of yourself: the drama queen part of you that actually makes things/problems/events BIGGER than they really are.

With number 2? It’s in the nature of the feminine energy to make things BIGGER. You didn’t need me to tell you that.

Otherwise, where did the words “drama queen” come from?

Do you know who ACTUALLY hates drama from women? Or uses the term “drama queen” as a way of putting a woman down?

Women.

And that’s two types of women:

The first type: the woman who thinks she needs to be strong, tough, STRAIGHT, right, ‘head screwed on’, ‘never needy’ and totally awesomely LIKED by all men. But, usually, in a relationship with none of them (alarm bells?).

The second type: The women who HATES other women for being drama queens, when really, they just feel jealous or threatened inside.

Why?

Well, because they perceive that drama queens steal attention from them. Or perhaps that drama queens are getting attention: something they don’t feel they have.  The drama queens seem to get all the attention. Doesn’t mean it’s a good type of attention, but it’s still attention.

Might I suggest, it’s WOMEN who perpetuate the idea that men don’t like drama. And we’re good at it, aren’t we?

After all, if we keep telling all our friends not to be drama queens, then we can reserve some of the attention for ourselves. And, TALKING and bitching about another person who is a drama queen in effect, is still bringing attention to ourselves, right? It’s just from a different person.

There’s a purpose to being a drama queen:

There’s a purpose for why the feminine energy actually makes things bigger: it’s because people pay attention when you dramatise things. The Anthropologist Helen Fisher has said in her book ‘Why We Love’, that tears actually serve a purpose. It’s very hard to fake crying, according to Helen Fisher, and it serves a purpose because historically, when women are upset, and crying, people would come to their aid, and the tribe would not like that one of their women is not happy (one unhappy woman can affect dozens of others in a group, wouldn’t you agree?) and they would rally together with that woman and get revenge.

On the other hand: when there were no laws, the MALE way of dealing with pain in a relationship (especially when he’s been cuckolded) is to kill. Women have not been known to use that strategy as much. Women use tears, bitching, dramatising.

And, it works.

It serves an evolutionary purpose. That’s why we are so annoyed by it (because we are naturally compelled to react to it) and also so driven by it. I’d suggest to you that it’s much like hearing a baby cry. If you’re anything like me, you can’t help but respond to it by either wanting to take care of it, coo to it, or get irritated by it. Babies don’t have such high pitched wails for no reason. It’s so that we would do something to stop them from wailing, otherwise it will drive us crazy if it keeps going.

Feminine energy NEEDS Attention to shine

Feminine energy NEEDS attention to shine. If we don’t have it from a man, we look for it. What we FEEL we don’t have, we seek out. The LESS attention we have, the more we want it, and the more desperate we can seem to get it. (Note: often, we already have attention, we just don’t think we do, or we take it for granted).

On the other hand, if you were to say to a masculine man: “YOU need more attention!” he’d be confused, back off, or be OFFENDED. Annoyed. I did say masculine man. Lots of men these days who are more feminine CRAVE attention.

See, masculine men make things smaller.

Ever tried to tell a man your problems and he cuts you off short and says “well, just do this.” or “well, why did you do THAT?” or “Why don’t you change this?” Problem solved, right?

No! Problem not solved! Not at least in the mind of a feminine woman.

Good or bad Attention?

Now, is it a good attention? The attention that drama queens get?

Not if you’re dramatising things because you want validation. Because then people just feel like you want to TAKE from them.

Not if you’re doing it because you want to take. Not if you’re doing it because what you’ve learned along the way is that you can get attention around the CLOCK if you’re dramatising and making out that there is something wrong all the time. I don’t blame you, I have made this mistake, and it’s a mistake that’s easy to make when you’re feeling down and don’t want to get yourself out of the rut.

But, hey, if you always reject the drama queen inside you, then who’s going to take care of her? Nobody, right?

If you reject her completely, then how can you have any fun at all?

She’ll just be sitting in the corner, feeling unloved, and feeling unappreciated. And most of all: feeling judged. And feeling worthless.

What I really don’t want you to do, is reject the part of you that is a drama queen. We all have one. The longer you suppress it, the more ‘tight’, rigid, and controlling your whole aura will be to men. Because you’re spending all the energy just making a part of yourself wrong.

So do some men hate drama queens?

Some men don’t like drama queens, yes. But only if they don’t understand it. Only if they don’t get that the feminine energy makes things bigger, and more serious than they are. Those men can be frustrating to deal with because they don’t want to understand your feelings, they just want to get the conversations over with ASAP.

So if you are wondering how a man could fall for a drama queen at all, and how “drama” can actually serve your relationship, I’ll give you a good example. Julia Roberts in the movie The Mexican. It’s a funny scene at the start of the movie, you can check it out here:

What men really hate – and it’s not Drama

What do men really hate?

They hate being a scratching post for gossip and hateful talk that doesn’t make them feel like you care. That doesn’t actually involve you giving him any energy, or trust, or openness.

When he’s in the living room, and you enter, not even looking at him, talking in the opposite direction about a woman at work who is a total bitch to you and how much you wish she would leave the office and never come back (how does that involve him again? How does that even involve your relationship together?)

A man wants to feel YOU. If he’s your man. If he likes you at all.

And the thing men really hate is feeling like you are just taking from them. Just blaming him without giving him any energy or openness about your feelings. Just taking, taking, taking.

The solution?

Express yourself, express your real, raw, emotions, whilst being totally THERE with him. Involve him. Don’t BLAME him and therefore SEPARATE you both.

Make it so he knows you’re a part of him, a part of the team and that yes, you might actually need him around. That he is important to you.

TELL him you’re hurt, that when that happened it made you feel afraid, unloved, ANGRY, shocked.

I’ll tell you a secret: men like your authentic expression of emotions, even if your emotions seem out of control – IF they understand it and IF they are attracted to you.

Why?

Because, it means she is invested in HIM. Here’s the best way to look at it: what’s the first thing you do when you lose interest in a man? You stop caring. You stop investing any emotion in HIM. So you ignore him, stop replying to texts, or just use him for company every now and then.

Women don’t really hate it (drama) either. We just hate people wanting to take from us.

That’s why we gossip. Gossip serves a purpose for us humans, and for communication.

What if you’re still in the first 3 months of dating a man?

If you’ve only had a few dates with a man, don’t think you’re entitled to a whole bunch of attention just yet. Remember what the point of dating is? To build attraction and connection. We teach you how to do that in our Home Study program Commitment Control. That’s right here: http://commitment-control.com/

Don’t be like a lot of women who feel desperate: act like a man should be committed to you after the first date and if he doesn’t call you 5 times THAT week, that he is “making excuses” or “avoiding you” or “being selfish”.

It takes time to EARN the opportunity and the right to be that dramatic.

You need to prove your value to him first, when you are dating. If you don’t like that, don’t be in a relationship with a man. Don’t even bother with them. Be by yourself. (which never works out, by the way, because deep down, we all crave the joy of being in a relationship with lots of attraction and connection). After all, he has to prove your value to you, too.

One more example…

And, some of the most popular and well loved movies of all time are based around a dramatic storyline. Take the movie Vicki Cristina Barcelona for example. Penelope Cruz’s character was very dramatic. She was an extreme example of an emotional woman. But she’s also endearing, on some level. We can relate to her. It’s interesting that in the movie, her ex still kept allowing her back in to his life and rescued her and spoke to lovingly of her even after they broke up.

I think there’s a message in that.

If you liked this article, leave me a comment below telling me what you think! -XxX-

Quickly find out Why Men Talk About a Future With you, Then Disappear

Imagine a long-lost friend you really liked but haven’t seen in years. Imagine you bump in to them on the street while you’re shopping on a Sunday afternoon.

You stop in your tracks. “Heyyyy! Oh my goodness!! It’s been YEARS! What have you been up to? What are you doing here??”

You guys talk and talk continuously for almost 10 minutes, and at the end, you are so happy to have bumped in to this friend and you say: “hey, let’s exchange numbers so we can catch up”.

Your long lost friend says “sure!” And she pulls out her cell phone, takes your number down, and then you do the same – you type in her cell phone number in yours.

You guys part ways with a warm, friendly smile and a promise to catch up for “coffee” soon.

Question:

Does it happen? In real life? Does it actually HAPPEN?

Does the long lost friend call you?

Do you call him? or her?

Sometimes, yeah.

But mostly, no.

My guess is that the breakdown of times when it DOES happen is about 20%. And 80% of the time “stuff comes up”, and you guys don’t catch up again.

Do you get home and plan “I’ll call her in a week or so for a catch up”….and a week later, you remember to do it….but…you don’t know…you just didn’t feel that motivated to contact her. Or him.

And now it’s been 3 years and you guys still haven’t done that “catch up”.

Have you had an experience like this?

Yes?

Well, you just got the answer to your question: why do men TALK about marriage and babies with you and then disappear.

Yes, what happens with a friend IS different to what happens with men, but principal is still the same:

People make PROMISES when it suits them at the time, and then they do not deliver on them.

It happens a lot. “I’ll call you”. And nothing. Not a sound.

“We’ll catch up next week”. And you don’t.

It’s because we would LIKE to me Mr or Miss ‘Promises and Performs”, but, as it turns out – doing what you SAY is much harder than saying what you might DO.

NOW here’s the real, key question:

Why did HE do that? Why do MEN do that?

I mean, why SAY they want marriage and something long-term and then disappear off the face of the planet?

There are only TWO possible core reasons.

1) Because he wanted to feel more passion, and attraction in his life, and he really DID want to provide that to you, (he DID have good intentions) but in the end, he just  felt too incapable.

He might have SAID something like:

“I can’t do this anymore” or

“I’m so busy” or

“You need someone better”

BUT – what he really MEANS and what won’t TELL you is this:

He’s scared. He doesn’t want to not be able to make you happy as a woman, because as a man, he’d rather DIE, or lose two legs, than feel like a failure in front of you. Or feel like another  man could provide so much MORE.

See, what I’ve learned through counselling hundreds of women from all over the world – and learning and observing men, is that MEN intuitively SENSE that they need to be able to PROVIDE.

If they can’t provide, they have to live with the feeling that they have failed.

Question: if you were a man (and I mean a man, not a woman – so really see it from a man’s perspective right now, not just your own, feminine thinking)…

Would you feel just  LITTLE BIT like death inside if you had to face the reality that you couldn’t provide for a woman?

Whether emotionally, spiritually, emotionally, physically?

If you answered yes, great – you’ve just got inside a man’s mind.

2) The second reason:

Because he wanted to have sex with you, and he thought he could get it if he promised marriage and babies. Does that sound bad? Yes?

If it does, can I make a suggestion?

I know it sounds bad – but here’s the thing: if men didn’t have a desire to seek out sex, you wouldn’t be here.

You wouldn’t have access to chocolate (wink). AND – your mum and dad wouldn’t be here.

AND – you would NOT be attracted to him. You know bad boys? And alpha males? Well, I don’t care how much you try to say you don’t want one of those – it’s in the female human’s DNA to SEXUALLY mate with the bad boy.

You might reject that sexual desire in yourself – but you can’t deny the sexual attraction to a bad boy, even underneath all the attempts to resist them, because you’re really afraid that they will just leave you if you get involved with them.

That’s why some men become the bad boy. There would be no purpose to being a bad boy if there was no benefit with women.

So, give yourself a gift: start having some compassion for men and their desire for sex. It’s not wrong. Once you skip along with their desire for sex in your arm, allowing it to be an acceptable part of your life and an accepted fact about men, instead of pushing AGAINST their desire like you’re pushing a 2-tonne truck off the  highway (hint: you couldn’t do that, just as you can’t push a man’s sexual desire off the highway) – you’ll attract way more FAITHFULNESS and COMMITMENT from a man, because he’ll feel safe with you.

Just because a man wanted sex with you doesn’t mean he JUST wanted sex.

What he was really seeking was the feeling of attraction.

Men WANT sex, but what they NEED is attraction.

They want to feel something in their lives – some aliveness, some attraction and energy – something that gives purpose to their life, because guess what? A masculine man’s life is pretty straight-forward and one-dimensional. Not much feminine energy in a man’s life. Which is what he’s really seeking.

Why He Can TALK Marriage and Babies so Easily:

It’s not you. It’s not men.

It’s evolution.

If you are really SEXUALLY attracted to a man, when you first meet him, do you try to put your best foot forward?

Imagine for a moment, you happen to meet, in PERSON, the most sexually attractive, successful, charming, handsome, loving and masculine man you can think of. Who is he?

Name him quickly in your head…

Do you try to smile and be happy and exciting and seem healthy, maybe even COOL?

Or do you sit opposite him at the dinner table burping and farting and spitting?

Exactly.

(Hint: if you chose the last option, there’s no hope for you).

That is sexual attraction at work. That’s evolution at work.

Human beings are compelled to unconsciously put their ‘best’ selves forward when they are sexually attracted to someone.

So, yes, we’re basically liars.

Because what happens 2 years down the track if you get in to a relationship? The other parts of you start to come out.

You don’t try to put your best foot forward all the time anymore.

Because there’s no need to.

The less sexually attractive someone is to you, the less you care to make any promises or put your best foot forward.

So, why do we do this?

Well, because if we didn’t, we wouldn’t pass our genes on. You and I wouldn’t be here today.

If we can ‘hold out’ and be our best selves long enough for mating to happen, or long enough to keep a relationship to raise a human baby until it is at least 4 or 5, then we’ve done our job.

At least according to that evil dude named Evolution.

So as a woman who wants to have a family, and a loving man in her life, what do you do about this?

I’m glad you asked, because you really DO need to do something about it. You don’t want to waste your life away attracting men who run off on you.

Here is what you do:

1) You STOP ignoring your intuition.

Look at a man’s body language as he’s speaking to you.

Don’t just listen to his words.

Watch his body. Watch his eyes carefully, and not so much that you look like a stunned rat.

Trust yourself. You were born a woman, and you are smarter than that.

Right off the bat, I can tell if a man is genuine or not, by reading his body language. And you need to get good at that, rather than buying in to your own story in your head that he means what he “says”.

A WARNING: A lot of men KNOW to SAY they want a long-term relationship if they want to get easy sex.

They know the trick. Many women are suckers for men who seem like the ‘reliable’ ‘father-type’ – a lot of men already know that and play on it to get sex.

Just like women dress in mini skirts and barely-there fabrics when they want some easy attention. Most men can’t help but stop and stare. Those women got what they wanted. The attention doesn’t last, but hey, the men looked, right?

Here’s the truth I want you to know:

You KNEW he didn’t mean it when he said he would give you babies and marriage.

You just WANTED to believe him, and that’s ok. I understand.

Sometimes in life, it’s better to believe in something than to sit around with doubt. And that’s not a bad part of you.

It’s GOOD that you have the ability to believe. Just got to balance it with some practical thinking.

But let’s admit: it made you feel good to believe him. To feel hope, for a minute. And that’s ok.

Only, it’s not ok if you want a committed relationship, is it?

That’s where step 2 comes in to it:

2) You get REALLY good at attracting a selection of mature men in to your life.

You need to know that not all men are worth your time.

Learn to ELIMINATE the men who are not genuinely wanting something long-term. And that also means you need to stop “going with the flow” and trusting every man on his word.

Do you want kids?

Do you want your daughter and your son to have a father who is SERIOUS, who will stick around, and who will be a dedicated Daddy? Or do you rather go with Mr “Good Enough” – only to see your children’s father disappoint them because he just wasn’t truly committed?

Do you want to have a kitchen with bright lights and a family sitting around the table, enjoying being together?

Then don’t ignore the need to attract a mature man.

Don’t settle for a man who seems ‘ok’ enough because you think you might not find anyone BETTER.

You WILL.

My students have done it, and they do it over and over again.

See, it’s JUST as easy to attract a bunch of mature men as it is to attract the low value, un-committed men, if you just start thinking differently.

It’s not rocket science.

By now you may be wondering if these kind of men exist.

Of course they do.

Not just in my fantasy, but in real life. And, in my life of course. J

Only, these men come at a price: that price is: YOU getting better at attracting them; because these men only want high value women.

The best only want the best. The idea is as simple as that.

The one thing you need to do is this:

Increase your value so you find better and better quality men entering your world.

High value men only want high value women.

Ask yourself this question every time you feel desperate and weak, like you’re about to lose him:

Where would I WALK – where would I GO – how would I HOLD MY BODY – if there were 1,000 men waiting outside my front door right now?

I guarantee that your whole aura will be different.

Your posture will be tall, you’ll feel more OPEN and feminine from the eyes of men, and they’ll start to WANT you like bees want honey.

The idea is simple: men love to be around women who hold themselves as high value.

It’s like anything – we run from the desperate and give to the grateful, the wealthy, the happy, the people who are truly giving inside.

And here is how you know when you are getting it right: when you will seem more high value to men, using this visual of 1,000 men standing outside your front door:

You’re getting it right when your breathing starts to slow down, your heart stops beating so fast, you take a deep breath in, and your body is not so full of tension.

You’re REALLY getting it right when you start to feel a big smile creep across your face instead of being so scared.

You’re free then, to be the best version of yourself.

I have much more on building your value in my video tutorial series in my home study program Commitment Control here:

http://commitment-control.com/

And to instantly tell if a man is mature or not in your first few conversations, I have several unobvious, INNOCENT QUESTIONS to ask a man in conversation to find out if he is mature or not in my home study course Understanding Men.

Your friends will wonder how you can be so good at reading men.

If you want to stop wasting your precious time on men who don’t give you what you want, Understanding Men will alllow you to stop doing that.

Skip over to check out Understanding Men here:

http://understanding-men-live.com/

Take care.

By the way – I have two great stories of women who have taken my information in Commitment Control and stopped getting bad results in their dating world. Their stories are humbling and heartwarming. You can find their short stories here: Eva and Diana’s story.

One last thing! Share your opinions and thoughts on this below. I love hearing from you! xox

How to Talk so he will Listen to You

Have you ever gotten involved with a man, and 1, 2, 3 or more months down the track, you just couldn’t help asking him where the relationship is going?

Maybe you got involved with him sexually, and he kept coming close and then pushing you away.

Well, if you’ve tried to voice your feelings and be honest with a man only to feel like he just disappeared, it’s not your fault. And no, it’s NOT needy to have the desire to know where the relationship is going.

Why it’s ok to Want Security

It’s what you naturally want as a woman. Just like men try to push for sex, and they naturally want sex, you want to know where on earth a relationship is going! You want security.

And, there’s good reason. If you, as a woman, didn’t look for security in some way, then how would you and your children be protected and safe?

Our ancestors needed security for us to be here today. They sure seeked it out, and that biological NEED for a woman to seek out security is still there within you.

So there’s nothing wrong with it!

Men and Women don’t “Communicate” Very Well

Only, here’s the only problem with getting that: men and women  don’t “communicate” very well. That makes expressing your feelings and needs to a man difficult.

I’m absolutely SURE you know what I’m talking about.

You’ll go ahead, be totally honest about something you feel, and tell him what you feel – and at BEST – he’ll  look at you with a blank face, not even acknowledging what you said. Silence.

This is hard! And the more blank and quiet he IS – the more your heart beats faster, the more angry and scared you get – and then what happens? You keep talking, because HE isn’t talking!

Did he not hear you? Does he not get it? Why can’t he say anything back to me!?

At that point, you’re probably thinking inside your head “ok I obviously haven’t explained myself properly and he doesn’t understand what I’m saying so I better explain it in a better way until he GETS it!” and so you keep talking some more – right?

Constantly talking until a man understands is a natural desire of women, but rarely works in creating a deep bond with your man. A good example of this is in the recent movie ‘Crazy, Stupid Love’ where Julianne Moore is trying to tell Steve Carrell that she cheated on him and he doesn’t say anything, so she screams “why aren’t you saying anything! You know that only makes me talk more!” and he responds by throwing himself out of the car.

So, even though talking more about your feelings makes you think this will help him “GET” you – this is FEMININE Logic. When you actually do this, he just shuts down even more. And it’s NOT because you did the WRONG thing (you can’t do the wrong thing, at least not here, in the feminine woman community. You can only make a MISTAKE, which is very different to doing the wrong thing), so it’s not because you are flawed (you can’t be flawed,  that’s impossible!), it’s because HE IS A MAN.

No matter how much of an asshole he is – no matter how COLD that look on his face is, it STILL is not because you have done the wrong thing or because he hates you.

He’s just a MAN. Something you are not. And never will be (sorry to disappoint)

He is built for a totally different thing than you are as a woman, even though you are both human. You already know this, intuitively. It’s time to start acting on it.

**********************************************************************

So what I have for you today is one of my best kept  secrets of making a man relax and stop everything he’s doing and listen to you. Most of my best stuff is kept for members of my programs as it’s taken me literally months, even years of trial and error and expensive seminars to get a hold of this knowledge.

But, I know it’s important for you to feel like you can express your feelings without feeling like he’s going to get angry at you. So I’m about to share this strategy with you, and hope that unlike most women, you have the courage to put it in to practice.

It’s only a small thing, but most women wouldn’t do it, because they’re too selfish and blinded by their own false ideas of what a man SHOULD be like.

I’ve kept this strategy with me for so long because I wanted to get it tested, and I use it myself (I never give you advice I don’t use and have not tested myself) and so do all my close girlfriends with their man, and it works wonders.

YES, there IS a way to communicate your feelings without pushing him away

To DO this though, you first have to realise one thing:

He is most likely going to feel BLAMED and CRITICIZED even during the times when you are not blaming him or criticizing him.

Expect that he will feel like pulling away from you and that he will feel criticized at least 3 out of 4 times you try to communicate with him. Until you prove to him that you are not like other women and you won’t BLAME him. If that’s too much to handle, then perhaps you should try a relationship with a woman instead?

That he will feel like you’re complaining, or that he will feel criticized or blamed is the RULE.

Your best bet is to understand it, and expect it. Not because you’ve done anything wrong, but because of the way you, as a woman, communicate. He doesn’t communicate the way you do, so even though you’re making sense in your own head, and you feel innocent, he doesn’t quite get it.

So, remember that as a rule. It’s as true as 1 + 1 = 2.

Any man who has ever had any kind of a relationship with a member of the female species in the past will naturally feel blamed and start to pull away when you try to bring something up about your relationship, UNLESS you do what I’m about to show you.

That’s WHY it’s so hard to communicate your feelings to men. Because they hear your words and feel that you are complaining, or criticizing, or blaming, when all you’re trying to do is hope that he would take a moment to UNDERSTAND you as a woman!

And the worst thing is – the more you genuinely try to express yourself, and he doesn’t understand, the more emotional you get.

I’ve done this so many times and ended up bursting in to tears just because I wasn’t trying to do anything BUT express myself to him, hoping he would understand.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way with men. And I learned that enough times through seeing the love of my life’s face go blank and cold and seeing him walk away after I innocently tried to express my “Needs” to him.

This kept happening until I discovered this simple sentence to say to my man (whom I like to call my superman, if you don’t mind me sticking a word of admiration for him in here, because he is just THAT amazing)

So, knowing all this, how do you go ahead, express your  feelings and emotions and needs in a way that he would be more than willing to hear you?

Well, unlike what pretty much all other experts say, which is “don’t have the talk” or “don’t ask where the relationship is going” – which just leaves you clueless because then you start to think the ONLY  alternative is to shut up and go quiet, and say nothing at all – which NEVER works because you’re still fuming and hurting inside with stuff bursting to come out…

True?

There IS a way.

This is what I want you to do:

BEFORE you say anything at ALL to him. Stop yourself,  and say this simple sentence first:

“Hey, it’s not your fault, and I’m not blaming you, because nothing is EVER your fault, but because I love you/because I respect you, I feel it’s important to let you know that I feel [insert authentic feelings ie: anger, scared, fearful, hurt, sad, out of control]“.

This disarms him. He can relax and feel that YOU understand HIM first. You are meeting him where he is at, as a man. You’re effectively getting inside his mind without him knowing, and saying what he needs to hear from you before you go ahead and share your feelings.

And, if you do this in a genuine way, he will RETURN your gesture by being willing to understand you, too. As I say in my program Understanding Men, understanding men first is one of the quickest ways to stop wasting precious time and youthful years and get men to line up outside your door, waiting to date you. And you can bet your knickers that your girlfriends do not understand men as you do after you take the program.

So here’s the catch to using my sentence: don’t USE that line as a justification for actually going ahead and blaming him. Don’t point the finger. Don’t sell yourself short like that. You are a woman of high value, so don’t DO that!

HE is never to be Blamed, and you are never to be Blamed

By the way: is it true that nothing is ever his fault? OF COURSE IT IS. And you truly have to believe that with your soul. Just like nothing is ever YOUR FAULT either.

If that sounds weird…I know how you feel. After all, you felt so blamed for so much, growing up. And not to mention how much at fault you feel for your past relationships going wrong.

But think about how FREEING it is to no longer have to blame anyone – most importantly YOURSELF.

If you can’t NOT blame anyone – at least start by not blaming yourself.

See, this is what I believe, without a doubt in my soul:

Nothing is ever a man’s fault. Nothing is ever MY FAULT. Making someone at fault is to tie them up with chains, because you’re trying to control them and push them in to a corner. Do you really want to do that to a man? Or to yourself?

This doesn’t mean you don’t take responsibility -not at all. You should always take responsibility.

But by responsibility I mean CARING for your man, and caring for yourself. That’s what responsibility is. It’s caring.

BLAMING and saying someone is at FAULT is just a LIE. Would you go to the police office and say you murdered someone, when you didn’t? Would you lie like that?

No?

Well, don’t lie and blame yourself or a man.

Make it a policy that there is no pointing fingers at his hurtful actions, or at yours.

It’s only a way to make yourself feel secure when you feel like you are not good enough inside.

When I was much younger, I used to blame people – my parents, my man, myself – until I realised -

1) I was actually a miserable, angry wreck by doing that; and

2) I was lying to myself. Thinking it was everyone’s responsibility to make me feel better.

That rarely ever comes, and if it did, if someone did say that to me, I wouldn’t feel good anyway. It’d last 5 minutes and then I’d be back to my miserable, blaming self.

Anyway, back to my point:

You can’t claim to LOVE someone and blame them.

Simple.

Just like Nelson Mandela said:

“Blame is drinking the poison and expecting your enemy to Die.”

Coming from a man who came out of prison, being falsely imprisoned for 27 YEARS. If he can say that, if he can have that viewpoint after everything he went through, so can you.

After all, you probably haven’t had people come along and falsely imprison you.

So there’s another thing about this:

You have to believe what you’re saying. Don’t get up after reading this email and go: “oh YES! A way to trick him in to listening to me talk about how he shouldn’t have done this – and how he was WRONG to do that!”

Don’t do that. Don’t be a loser like that.

Don’t search your memory bank for all the things he should not have done that other time at that

place when this happened and that happens. Unless you enjoy being a low value woman.

What you SHOULD do is express what you’re actually feeling. Which is usually something like anger, hurt, sadness, guilt, lonely and scared.

If you stop for a minute and think, you’ll realise that is the truth of it all. It doesn’t matter how much he has hurt you or how much you have hurt him or how much your ex hurt you – the truth is still in your actual feelings at the moment.

Anger is anger.

Fear is fear.

What to Say to Him Next…

A word of warning when you say this simple sentence to him:

When you do this, it’s possible that he will do something that frustrates you. Something like this:

Which is, offer suggestions of what you can DO, even  after you’ve expressed that you’re simply feeling scared or lonely.

For example, if you say: “I feel lonely”, and he says something insensitive along the lines of:

“Well, why don’t you just call your best friend Sally?”

Or “Why don’t you go out and make some new friends?”

If he does that, say this (again, in a genuine way, DO NOT say it if you don’t truly believe it. Wait until you really feel it inside before you say it. You’ll be pleased with yourself if you do.)

“Thanks, I love that you’re so willing to go out of your way to help me – but you know, there’s actually nothing to be fixed here. It’s just my feelings as they are, and my feelings will pass as quickly as they came.

I know that sounds crazy, maybe it’s just because I’m a woman and we’re naturally crazy, but there’s actually nothing to be fixed right now.”

This might make him laugh or smile.

It might mean he’ll look at you with this confused look on his face. Whatever.  At least you get to feel more in control of your communications with him.

So go ahead, and use it, and also let me know how you go!

-XxX-

Also! Share your thoughts on this article with me below. I look forward to hearing from you. 

As a woman, you'd rather be labelled a "selfish bitch" than "Boring". Here's Why...

I’ve been thinking; and when it comes to bad labels, you much rather the people you care about label you a selfish bitch than label you “boring”. Why? Because boring people are last in line when it comes to reproductive success. At least that’s the impression boring people give. Uninteresting, unstimulating, “safe” people are rarely sexually attractive. They’re just boring.

In my experience, they also command the least respect and the least popularity.

At least a selfish bitch might be selfishly exciting or at the very least; cause someone to have strong feelings about you. That’s better than someone not caring about you altogether.

But BORING? No thanks.

Have you ever noticed that some of the most selfish, crazy, egocentric or even arrogant people still have people gravitating toward them? Whereas so called “nice” men and women end up alone. Does the phrase “too nice” ring a bell? To me, too nice = boring.

By the way, a selfish person is rarely a selfish person with everybody. Even the most selfish people have unselfish sides, but it usually takes a certain type of person to “bring out” their less selfish side.

Now I’m about to get a tony bit ‘evolutionary thinking’ on you in the next paragraph. If you choose to pay attention I promise it will pay off:

From an evolutionary perspective, the ‘nicest’ people (especially nice MEN); the people who like to please people, only have to be nice because they don’t have too many mating “options”. Why is this? Well, because, people who have many, many ‘options’ and potential suitors at their door rarely even have the brain space to go out of their way to please people. There simply is no need to please, because there is always a 10/10 option out there for them. Their life is far too exciting, and the other high status people they hang around are far too engaging.

So, whether you truly are a ‘bad catch’ (you’re not!) or a bad potential mate or not, being overly ‘nice’ and agreeable STILL sends this subconscious message to people: I don’t have too many options at my door.

And here’s the thing: sex is at the bottom of pretty much everything we do. It’s the underpinning of why we do what we do. Survival and reproduction created us. We are here to continue to survive and procreate. Without these two drives, we are nothing. And these are the two strongest drives within us.

As much of a bitch as you may seem when you publicly slap a man and walk off after he said something demeaning, you are also exciting. (a woman named Stephanie who emailed me recently proved this. She slapped a man she met at an art gallery for telling her she has a ‘very nice hourglass figure’ the first time they met. And in fact, it was the MAN she slapped who e-mailed me for advice. I later got talking to this lovely lady as well, who is full of depth and a strong sense of self worth). By the way, they later started dating and roughly 2 months later, are STILL together as we speak (thanks for the updates Stephanie).

So, having said all this – it’s ok if you’ve been boring before. I went through that stage; and I think we’ve all been through it. Sometimes fear gets the better of us and we become ‘paralyzed’ and can’t be alive and present with life.

But here’s the question: what actually makes a woman boring?

I’ve done a lot of thinking about this subject, because I intuitively knew that boringness is the last thing you want to be as a woman. So I’ve narrowed it down to 5 simple things that make a woman boring, just for your reference:

1) The tendency to avoid being noticed in social situations for fear of people judging you.

2) Having the mindset that “mistakes are bad”. This belief usually goes under the radar, in your subconscious. You may not think you hold this belief, but your actions show that you do.

Just in case you’re interested – this belief is not really YOURS. You picked it up at School.

Mistakes are one of the most valuable things in your life. Every time you make a mistake, you give yourself a beautiful gift – the gift of becoming an even more experienced, wise and interesting woman because you’ve learned more about what ‘works’ and what doesn’t work in life. If you choose to, you become more, as a person.

In reality, you don’t need to avoid doing the wrong thing with men - what you truly need, is to fail faster. But not use “it’s ok to fail” as an excuse to constantly devalue yourself for a man! It might be a hard thing to do – but it works.

3) Holding the belief that you shouldn’t ever say ‘bad’ things about others. I know your grandma meant well when she said: “if you haven’t got anything nice to say don’t say anything at all”, and there definitely IS truth in that (thanks nanna). But the problem comes when you take it to the extreme and don’t ever voice your honest opinions on another person’s way of acting, or another person’s belief.

In order to be a valuable person socially – your thoughts on another person’s values and habits actually set you apart – and show that you have the energy, and the PASSION in your life to actually stand for something. Passion is an incredibly attractive thing, in case you haven’t noticed yet.

And of course – the other valuable thing about having an opinion is that it bonds you further to other people who share your values too. If you’re an “agreeable” person and give “equal respect” or “equal kind treatment” to EVERYBODY, you’re hardly going to develop a connection with many men – or even women, because there’s no depth to the relationship or friendship.

A lot of us want to avoid being the ‘mean’ or judgmental person, but that’s boring, because you’re rejecting a part of yourself. In the end, what excites us, and what draws other high value, high status men to YOU is what’s exciting about you. And when you think about it; what excites us humans is the juicy, controversial stuff.

So you don’t have to be a woman who beats up her man or torches his car – but there’s a reason why the media hardly ever runs and articles on the ‘happy couple’ – because those stories are too boring to us. Sad and a bit sick, but true.

So should you sit there bagging other people? No. But you SHOULD express your honest, authentic feelings and opinions, and use that as a way of bonding to others. Don’t just bitch with bad intentions because you’re green with envy or like to see others fail. That makes you the low value person.

4) Talking about yourself all the time. Gosh it’s frustrating to hang around people who can only ever muster up conversations about themselves, isn’t it? Especially when you are in a group. And the problem is, most of these people don’t even realize they are doing it.

You want to aim for conversation that adds value to YOU as well as others. If you want to talk about yourself, fine – as long as you have interesting, great stories to tell.

5) I saved the best one til last – a lack of passion. If you’re not passionate, you’re not alive. If you’re not alive, you’re not very engaging or energetic; you’re boring. Which means that less men will want to commit their life to you, and people will not find value in spending time with you. If you want your phone to be buzzing at least sometimes and if you want men to pursue you – get passionate. Start giving yourself the gift of feeling alive. Imperfect, but alive.

So, How Not to be Boring?

There are a few actions steps. But I’m only giving you one to start with.

Become a passionate person.

How do you become a passionate person? It’s simple: Care. Go first. Just care about the things you’re not used to caring about. For example, other people. Or just care more about learning from people. Learning from their life experience. Or even sharing and talking with other people whose stories you can learn from.

You want to experience something in your relationship, like for example, more fun? Give it first. Add that value first. You want a friend to appreciate you more? Appreciate them first. You want people to notice your efforts more? Notice other people’s efforts first.

Counter-intuitive, but it works.

You want a man to approach you or be warm to you? Smile at him first. Don’t expect him to know what you are thinking. (He’s a MAN!)

So how does doing any of THAT make you passionate?

It makes you passionate because you’re putting yourself through what is hard. You’re not doing what most people do – which is to sit there and complain or DEMAND that something happen TO you – you’re moving through your own comfort zone and demanding more from yourself, which automatically makes you FEEL more. It moves you.

People aren’t passionate not just because they’re not passionate – but because they never make themselves DO anything. So they are not ALIVE.

And when you do that, it makes you passionate because it’s a physical thing – moving through emotional difficulty is also moving through physical difficulty. You experience it physically and even if your MIND does not remember that it was hard – your BODY does. And the energy you put out to the world will be more passionate.

So I’m curious: Do you agree? What do you think makes somebody boring?

Learn what is even MORE Important than the "RIGHT" time to have sex with a Man

We live in a politically correct world right? In other words, it doesn’t matter how soon you sleep with a man, right? Wrong.

But, not for the reasons you think. Not because men have double standards. But for your happiness and relationship success.

Men will ‘categorize’ women in to either one of two categories, whether we like it or not. They still do it. You are either a ‘just for a good time’ girl, or wife material. This doesn’t mean that men are right, or that this is a good way or categorizing women; it’s just what commonly happens, on a surface level, and you need to be aware of it.

Pre-framing your relationship with a Man

And, the sooner you sleep with a man without building ATTRACTION first, the harder it is going to be to develop a committed relationship with him. Why? Because the beginning stages of a relationship or courtship are when the FUTURE of a relationship is pre-framed.

What I mean is; if you sleep with a man early, it’s highly likely that he will only see you as someone he sleeps with, not someone he marries; and he might be more likely to keep expecting that. When it’s done, it’s hard to change the original ‘terms’ you created for the relationship at the start. There’s a reason for this, and it has to do with how men are built; how their brains are wired, but I won’t go in to that stuff here.

Is this fair? Not at all. It’s downright painful at times, for a woman to be in this position, or to make such a move and then find herself in a position she never intended to be in, but it’s how it is.

I don’t believe in holding back sex out of fear that he will run. That decision is coming from the totally wrong place. And more importantly, I don’t believe in feeling guilty over sleeping with a man too early. Neither of these two things are in the least bit relevant, or useful in your life. We’re aiming for happiness and passion in your love life, not feelings of guilt or just becoming overly controlling about what the “right” decision is.

So what is best for you as a woman, is to start off with awareness of how men think in this area, and then make the right decisions for your own life, through true awareness.

When it comes to men and your choice of when to sleep with a man, you need to be aware of only these two important things:

1) Men want to have sex, but they actually NEED is to feel attraction. That is what they are looking for, underneath the many cries for sex, sex, sex.

So, sex is rarely what they really want. As a woman, its your job to remember that, for your own happiness, and not expect men to tell you that.

Because too many women do not know this, and then they don’t know what else to give a man, so they feel pressured to have sex with him (which they do), and then the man leaves, which is very hurtful the day after, when you are left feeling used.

2) If there is not enough attraction between you and a man, he will be more likely to push for sex, and with much more urgency.

If you want to be a High Value, High Status woman, you need to realize that if you are not focusing on building attraction with men, you will find yourself having slept with men, but most of them would have run; only because there was not enough attraction.

Is the Question: How Soon is too soon to sleep with a man?

To be frank: the question is not WHEN should you sleep with a man, or how SOON is too soon to sleep with a man. The question is: how much attraction is there between you and the man that you are dating?

That’s the simple secret to men: Attraction. It’s not sex. After all, if it was sex, why would men actually turn DOWN offers of sex from hookers? I was recently in Singapore, and mistakenly ended up in a hotel in the red light district after a mistake in booking a hotel (a long story) and to my dismay, for the two nights I was there, every morning and evening I would look out the window, and witness many young women approaching men with offers of sex (at a price of course), and a majority of men turned down the offers for sex.

Most single men can afford a night with a hooker, especially in parts of Asia where I was, yet I personally witnessed one man after another, turning young women’s offers for sex away.

Men must just want sex, right?

No.

Men want to feel attraction.

What if YOU want casual sex with a man?

So, what if YOU just want to sleep with a man, you ask? Well, that’s up to you. That’s your decision. Perhaps, if you have already decided that a man is not marriage material, that you want to just have casual sex with him. That’s your choice. But you DO have to be aware that, even though this might seem safe and convenient, what you are doing, effectively, is tarnishing your own ‘associations’ with sex by settling for what’s comfortable and convenient at the time. A 5/10 experience.

At our core, what we want, is not just some sex, or just a good time. We want something deeper, something infinitely passionate, something that makes us feel alive. The longer you go with just a sex friend, rather than opening your heart and being vulnerable to the right man, and the longer you have sex with someone you are NOT passionate about and would NOT die for, the more you imprint associations in to your brain of mediocre, ‘ok’, experiences, and that in turn effects the energy that you put out in to the world, to another man who may be worth spending the rest of your life with.

So what is the solution?

This is the solution: keep your focus where it benefits you and your future relationship the most: focus on creating attraction with men.  Then, everything else will fall in place naturally, and it will all feel ‘right’ to you.

Become that woman who is irresistibly attractive, playful, fun and fascinating, so that men are more interested in committing themselves to you than just having sex with you.

The situation is right when a man is compelled to keep contacting you even when you haven’t had sex.

And this is ESPECIALLY true for a man whom you want to spend the rest of your life with. Attraction is the truly valuable experience that a man wants, not just sex. If you want to become an expert at doing that with men, join Attraction Control Monthly.

Attraction and passion FIRST; then sex. Once there is enough attraction, sex will happen at the right time completely NATURALLY, without you having to beat yourself up with guilt over ‘sleeping with him too soon’ or laying awake at night wondering when is the ‘right’ time. It’s for your own future and benefit.

And when you prioritize the feelings of Attraction between you and a man, you let the tension build up slowly, and everything will be a much better experience for both of you.

Now over to you: what are your thoughts on sex with men? How soon is too soon and what recommendations do you have for other women who are unsure about when they should and shouldn’t have sex with a man?

If a Man is sending you Mixed Signals, read this.

The following is a question I received from a Commitment Control member named “Angel”. Both David and I share our responses. Enjoy it. If there’s anything you feel Angel should do or know, feel free to post your thoughts in the comments section below the post.

>>>>>>>>>>>> QUESTION

HI, David and Renee,

I have been receiving Renee’s emails and has subscribed to Commitment Control. Although I didn’t finish all the videos yet, it is really very helpful for me in understanding men and relationships in general. However, with my “man”, it is just difficult to understand him because he’s sending me differing signals.

For a better understanding, let me share with you our story:

We were previous co-workers but when we both ended our previous relationships last year, we started a long distance dating (I was in Afghanistan and he was in Iraq).

He is American and I am a Filipino. We are deeply attracted to each other and I feel we connected well too. Until I requested for some more time with him.

He said he only wanted a light (read for him: open) relationship, which I didn’t agree. I told him, I am looking for a serious relationship that could lead ot marriage and have made it clear to him from the start, which he made me believe is what healso wants. So when he persisted and still met me when I moved to Dubai in Oct last year, I thought he already agreed on an exclusive relationship as he dropped his other girl that I know he was seeing when he was in Dubai (his FWB girl).

With his work as a Business Development Manager, he came to Dubai from Iraq four times between Oct 2012 – February 2012. In his 2nd visit in December, he told me the magic words, I love you. And while he was with his family in the US, he told me that his visits to Dubai is incomplete without him passing by to be with me. And although I haven’t met any of his family and friends, when we go out together, he refers me as his girlfriend and even when he visited me at my work, he introduced himself as my bf, although I only introduced him on his first name. He even trusted me as his business partner in his new e-marketing business. This made me believe that we are bf/gf already.

However, on his 3rd visit in January, things changed when he met another Filipino girl at a bar (he asked my permission to give her his number as he said he can convince her for a 3-some). I jokingly told him if he can convince her, I can try. (he’s been asking me if I could as he said it’s his fantasy).

When the girl met him at the Sisha bar the next day, and I joined them (I was suprised but acted cool). He asked me if we can have a 3-some. At that time, he was under extreme stress (he lost $10K in Boston on his way here from his Christmas vacation), I gave in and said if it will help him de-stress, I could. But when I was alone at the massage parlor after his sisha (he arranged for a massage for me and the other girl, and I was the first since there’s no available slot), I changed my mind and told him via SMS that I can’t take it. When he didn’t respond, I followed them to our hotel room. I didnt see them making out but I felt they did as he was upset when I cancelled the massage. But since he knew I was upset, he told me to rest and he let the other girl go. I thought she’d never come back.

But he told me that night that she’ll come back the next day. He said he just want to have sex with her for a night and told me that we are friends with benefits only. I was crushed. I told him all along we are bf/gf but he said we are not. And even when I told him I am hurt with what he is doing, he told me I am selfish and all.

Anyway, because I don’t know where to go (I didn’t want to go home yet as I know my friends will suspect and I couldnt face their questions yet), I paid another room and stayed at the same hotel while him and the other girl was in our room. I left my things in the room since he promised that it’s just a one-night stand. I agreed on the set-up. And I left my things to let the girl know that I am still with him, although he may have told her otherwise. But the girl was cool with that. To me, she’s just a slut who’s looking for an American, hoping one will take her seriously for her American dream. (I’m always good a seeing one). I know he won’t believe me though, so I didnt bring it up to him. He said she’s just cool with an FWB and it’s a one-night stand anyway.

It was a difficult phase in our relationship. But the next day, the girl did leave and we are back at each other. Although this time, he made sure we are just friends with benefits. He told me that he’s dated 3 girls in Boston where he is planning to move after his work in Iraq ends this March. He is leaning more on the surgeon from Harvard although he admitted they didn’t have great sex.

I was crushed but I stayed, hoping he’ll change his heart.

While in Iraq, we stayed in touch and he even apologized to me and sent the girl whom he had a one-night stand an email telling her he has deep feelings for me and that he shouldn’t have done what he did. So I thought we were ok again.

In his last visit here in February (4 Days) from Iraq to move to US permanently, we still met. Physically, we are very attracted to each other and we connected spirtiually (we meditate a lot and he shares his dreams to me). So I am not surprised that after a misunderstanding before he came here, he still asked me to be with him.

But then again, the next day after he arrived, he asked me if he can meet the other girl for movie. I was so furious and reminded him of his apologies and how sorry he was that he hurt me and yet, here he was again asking me to see her. He got mad tooand blamed my being eedy and selfish.

It was the worst we had. We threatened each other. But when he noticed how hurt and angry I was (I never showed anger towards him, as by nature, I am patient with those I love the most and is not easily angered.), he changed his mind and even called the other girl that he can’t hurt me again and cancelled the date and we went to a dancing class where we had a blast. But in the evening, he was so furious he said he could have been enjoying with the other girl instead of putting up with me who is tired and needy and selfish. We fought again and he ony subsided when I let him call her to join us for dinner. She accepted so we went to see her.

But the next day, I left. Because I know he will ask the other girl to be with him again, which he did. But the next day (his last day before his flight thefollowing day), he invited me for lunch and we had a very emotional parting (I told him I am letting him go and I will be happy if his relationship with the surgeon will lead to marriage). He was emotional and he apologized again and promised me he will take retreats and see a psychiatrist as we both believe he’s being addicted to women (he is an alcoholic but he managed to stay sober for 3 yrs and is now a non-smoker for 3 yrs too). He has this “addiction” but now it is with women. Before he left after lunch, he told me I am the most beautiful thing that ever happened to him as I can handle his anger (his another issue since childhood) and his addiction to women and I love him unconditionally. He told me he does love me but couldn’t marry me. He however promised to stay in touch and that we will remain good friends.

With us parting already after lunch, I didn’t expect him to ask me to stay with him on his last night but he did. I was with him at his favorite sisha bar and we went back to his hotel together and even went with him to the airport the next day on his flight back to US. He kissed me and asked me not to change. That he’s ashamed of what he did to me and that he’s really very sorry.

We continued communicating like a couple in a long distance relationship and just prior to his 10-days retreat earlier this month, he told me again that he loves me. He even said that he told his parents about me, about my simple but happy childhood, and his favorite story about our family’s dog hero, when he cried while I was reading him that story I wrote.

However, he surprsied me again when he asked me if I can be his secret lover, no matter who we end up with in marriage. He told me he needs me and wants to keep me as his lover. I said no, that I deserve to be his wife. I told him I’d rather leave if he must insist. He said he can’t make me happy and I deserve a better man, not someone like him who has hurt him and couldn’t love me the way I love him.

But when I asked him to see the possibility of having an exclusive relationship as w are clearly attracted to each other and that we somehow connects, or we need to stop if he doesn’t want to. He promised he’ll think about it during his retreat. Then he started to act like my bf again, keeping in touch, telling me he misses me and telling me he loves me. He even sent me photos of him on the airplane prior to take off on his flight to the retreat center.

But when he came back the other day from the meditation retreat, he told me he’s decided to give his potential relationship with the surgeon a chance. That although he loves me, he can’t see us being married because I am too needy. When I responded to him that I accept his decision but that it’s goodbye, he still stayed in touch and he even asked us to be intimate again as if I didn’t said goodbye to him. Unfortunately thugh, although my mind tells me to let go, I couldnt resist him.

But now, I am feel all confused and hurt. I really love him but I ask if he just wants me physically. He even brought up the 3-some again and asked me if I am still ok with it if we date long term again. I of course told him I can’t do it.

I don’t know what to do. Is there still a chance with us or are my girlfriends right to tell me that he’s just using me or keeping me as his option if things don’t go well with the surgeon?

I will really appreciate your advice. From David, as man, you can give me more insight as to what his real intentions are or why he acted that way, apologized, did it again, and still comes back to me and yet couldn’t see us as a married couple.

With Renee, was it right that I stayed? What must I do?

Confused,

Angel

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> RENEE’S RESPONSE

Hi Angel,

This man is marriage material. You should keep him.

I’m kidding.

Honestly, this man is not sending you “differing” signals.
He is sending you a clear signal: he is not committed to
you.

That does not mean that he can’t be, it just means that he
is not fully committed right now.

Now, as BAD as that sounds, and as much of a complete
prick this man seems like he is, in all my time working
with women, and talking to men and studying male psychology,
I’ve learned this:

No matter how THIN you slice the pancake, there are always
two sides.

So it’s not just that he’s a jerk.

You are running your patterns and he is running his.

Right now, you deserve each other. And I say that with
good intent.

Just a small aside: I HATE when internet dating experts
get a question like this and spend several paragraphs
basically just saying “he’s a prick. Leave him”. Because
that is not advice.

Anyone can give that advice and that doesn’t help anyone
long term. Because their mindset has not changed. And
mindsets are stubborn buggers, because humans are creatures
of habit. We think bascially the EXACT same thoughts we
thought yesterday.

Clearly, you COULD have left him ages ago, but you haven’t,
and there’s a reason for that. So me saying leave him is
not going to help.

First of all, this man is playing low value, and so are
you. He is willing to settle for any girl who seems somewhat
willing to have sex with him, and you are willing to settle
for a man who does not take your feelings in to consideration.

In fact, this man doesn’t even really know what it is he wants.

I think the most painful part of all this if it was me, is
the fact that he is accusing you of being selfish when he
himself does not appear to be aware that you have feelings
too. Although, from what you have told me, you are not really
communicating your true feelings to him anyway,
since your actions say to him that you are willing to
“go along” with whatever his heart desires.

So, what to do? Three simple things:

1) Ask yourself: what is the FEELING I am looking for
when I keep running back to him EVEN AFTER he apologises
and makes the same mistake again. And again. And again.

Do you feel special, to be the one forgiving him?

Do you feel finally acknowledged?

Is this what LOVE looks like to you?

Is it a rush of excitement that you get from all the drama
and the uncertainty?

If you can sit down with yourself in quiet and just think
until you get to the bottom of it, you will probably find
that inside, you don’t feel worthy enough for real love,
and a real commitment.

I have no judgements here. I have felt like this before.
I just want you to aim higher than this.

2) Once you’ve figured the answer out; find another way
to meet your needs. The best way? Give the feeling you
are looking for – whether it’s appreciation, praise, the
feeling that you are special and important – give that to
YOURSELF.

The only way to do this is to get to the bottom of it,
take step 1 (above) first, and then reassure YOURSELF.
Don’t wait for somebody else to do it, althought it’s
always nice.

When you do this, you will find that you can cradle yourself
and take care of yourself far quicker than this man
could, at least right now.
3) Regardless of whether you decide to stay with this man
or not, start saying a big fat “NO”. “NO THANK YOU”.
“THANKS. BUT NO THANKS”. And say this in response to his
requests for threesomes.

Or say: “No, I am not interested in a threesome. The
idea scares me. And it would hurt me.”

That’s the truth isn’t it? Of course it is. So, do say
that to him.

Why would you want to be honest?

Because then he will see that there is actually
something to take care of.

Right now, he can’t see much. Because you’re pretending.
So stop pretending.

Be honest. You’re telling ME you don’t want to – and
you’re dishonoring your own true heart desires just to
feel loved.

Little do you know the number of men out there waiting
in line to love you in a way that will light up your
heart…

See, this man is attracting a bunch of pushover women; women
who don’t really care about him anyway – so it’s not good
for HIM for you to be doing this and needless to say, it’s
also tearing you apart.

So stand up for yourself. I understand that standing up
for yourself is something that is easier said than done,
so here’s what I want you to do.

Think back to a time when you really did stand up for
yourself. Maybe back at school? When you were a kid?

What did you do?

Did you say something? Did you throw your fists in the
air? Maybe yell at someone?

Or perhaps if you were a very boisterous kid like me.
When I was only 10 years old I yelled at a stranger on
the street for insulting my mother (I’m protective of
the ones I love).

Perhaps you haven’t done that before, but I am CERTAIN
you have stood up for someone you love before. Maybe
your mother or father, or a sister or brother. Or even
a pet.

You need to realise that this woman I’m talking about -
this woman who stands up for YOU – for ANGEL is there,
inside of you right now, waiting for you to hear her
and acknowledge her and trust her to know that there
is better for you.

That it will be ok, even if you do let this man go
and even if you DO have to live through the fear that
there may not be another man around the corner ready
to take care of you (that’s not true but I respect
that you might feel that it is).

There are times in my past when I felt weak and didn’t
stand up for myself because I felt hopeless. You
probably already know about this. My ex boyfriend was
cheating on me. I tried to push the relationship
forward even after I found out.

Just because I didn’t trust myself to find someone
better. And most importantly, I didn’t feel I was
a great catch (this is many years ago now).

And I can say now, with great pride, that it’s
a nice feeling to know I have all the options in the
world, and so do you.

So think on to a past event where you stood up for
yourself, and tap in to the drive within you, and
use it now. You don’t have to tell him off. Just say
a simple no.

What you want and what you NEED as a woman
(stability, security, along with a number of
other things as well of course) is COMPLETELY
OK.

IT’S NOT SELFISH.

What is selfish is you playing along with something
that you don’t really want, and wasting your time
and this man’s time.

Don’t delay.

Don’t read this and then just fart around. Do these
things now.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> DAVID’S RESPONSE

Hey there Angel.

Ok, the first thing I do when i look at a problem,
is to simply it. Make it less confusing. As long
you’re confused, it’s hard to see what’s going on,
what’s happening and it’s impossible to solve anything.
You need clarity.

When I read your email… It was obvious to me what
is happening. You are running patterns that women run,
which is to ask for commitment and a secure future,
and he’s just doing what men do best, which is resist
commitment and seek out freedom.

It’s not your fault, it’s not his fault, that’s just
the basic level of how men and women operate. There
are huge differences between men and women, HUGE.

But it’s your job to udnerstand the dynamics of men
and women, so that you can become more evolved and
no longer get caught into these relationship patterns
and traps.

To make it worse, there are parts of all of us that
contradicts with the other parts of us. He is saying
one thing, but also saying another with his actions.

A mentor of mine once said, see the pattern, don’t
just hear the story. The pattern here is that he
would probably never be exclusive with anyone;
with the patterns he is running right now with
women.

His true intentions? Here it is… he wants to feel
the attraction and desire. He intuitively knows that
if he enters into a committed exclusive relationship,
then attraction and desire may fade and disappear.
That’s why he has so much resistance to commitment!

He is a high dopamine person who gets his high from
seeing and meeting new women. And the way he acts…
it’s just to preserve and protect his own feelings
of attraction.

If you ever want him or any man for that matter to
commit to you in an exlcusive relationship, then you
have to work on building attraction. I know I’ve
probably said that a billion times, but it’s the
simple truth and dont overlook it.

If you can make him feel deep attraction, then he
won’t have a need to go around seeing other women.

But of course that’s the hard part. It would take a
lot of energy and understanding in order to know
what to do. And it’s not a simple case of
“should I leave” or should i Stay…

What you really need, Angel, is to keep growing
and learning about men, and relationships. Keep
practicing your knowledge and skills in attraction
and connection. This man will come and go, but
your skills and awareness will stay with you for
a lifetime.

As we say in our program “Understanding Men”,
knowledge is power, knowledge in men is power
with men.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Final message from Renee and David:

If you want to join Commitment Control as well, here is all the information you need: http://commitment-control.com/

Got something to say about this? Think Angel could do with your opinion? Share it in the comments section below. 

Become the real you...

“What is Femininity?”

The fact that we have to ask that question says a lot about how difficult it can be to begin letting your femininity show. Most us who are over the age of 5, for example, don’t need to ask “what is a foot?” or “what is an apple?” because it’s obvious to us. Femininity isn’t obvious to us. And it’s frustrating.

Many women find it easy to start the surface version of femininity: buy lots of dresses, wear make up, buy lots of shoes.

But what does this do? It merely makes us LOOK feminine.

All some women need to do after that is just open their mouths and speak, and the label of “femininity” can disappear. That’s right, being a woman doesn’t mean you show up to other people as a feminine woman.

Does every man seem masculine to you? I doubt it.

Femininity and masculinity is an energy that you give to others.

So what is Femininity?

I have been meaning to write this post about what femininity is for so long. I wrote about 5 drafts of it and it’s been sitting in my drafts for months and month on end. In fact I think I started the first draft over a year ago.

Then I scrapped it, put my head in my hands and said what I usually say to myself when I’m trying to answer a question I don’t yet have the answer to – which is:

“You can’t truly know and understand what something is until you’ve earned it.” And by earned it, I mean, truly LEARNING something, through my own life experience. So that it’s authentic.

I’m happy to say I learned. But in case you don’t want to know all about that….

Here is the short answer to what femininity is and how to be your feminine self:

Femininity is what you show to the world through your actions when you no longer feel like you are not enough. 

The Long answer…

It’s you being more of yourself. The real you. The authentic you, beneath the layers of walls you’ve built up to protect yourself from pain.

Femininity is what you show to the world through your actions when you no longer feel like you are not enough.Not beautiful enough, not strong enough, not smart enough. Not sexy enough. It’s the energy you give out when you are not trying to be something other than yourself.

Because for as long as we feel like we are not enough, we always wear MASKS. And it’s these masks that make us act fake and try to prove ourselves to men, or make a naturally more feminine woman act masculine when that isn’t really her true nature.

As for how to show up as your feminine self: stop trying to GET love from men. Know that you are already worthy of it. And stop trying to get love from women. And stop trying to GET love from your parents. You ARE already enough. And give love first. When you give it first, you are the real you. You are vulnerable, and authentic, and you are living true to your feminine essence.

The only way you can give love first, is to feel like you are enough.

By the way, the same is true for a masculine man.

If a man stops focusing on what he has to do to be ‘enough’, to be the strongest, fastest, funniest, richest, biggest, most successful, and maybe have the biggest penis, and instead knew he was enough already, then his true masculine essence would show up. Because he is being more of HIMSELF.

There’s nothing worse than being with a man who thinks he has to keep trying to prove himself to women, no? How can he be your man if he keeps thinking he needs to do this and that to get your acceptance?

                                                                                           ******************************************

Here’s how I learned what femininity really is

I always knew that true feminine energy shows up when you remove your ‘masks’ and get to your true feminine core. But I didn’t know what those masks were. The idea sounded great. Years ago, maybe 4 years ago, I started becoming more feminine by wearing ribbons in my hair. Then I started speaking softer.

That was great, but it didn’t really do it for me.

It was only when I had a really, really bad few days that I “got” it.

I was feeling lonely. Of course, I wasn’t actually lonely. I was feeling lonely.

And the worse thing was, I had everything I wanted. My career was where I wanted it to be. I have my lovely dog, Lady. I have close and amazing, treasured friends. I have an amazing relationship. I have a fiancee I am in love with; and we have a passionate, wonderful life together. But something was missing and it was driving me crazy.

The Problem of Emptiness…

I was feeling so EMPTY of love. Empty of praise. EMPTY of acceptance. And appreciation. But I didn’t have the answer as to WHY. I just knew I felt really, really bad. And the longer I ignored it, the worse it got. You probably know what this is like. And really, I just feared the emptiness. I didn’t want to feel it and be reminded that I might not be enough for those around me.

So what did I do? Well, as disappointing as it is for me to say, I started taking it out on the ones I love most. My parents. My man.

I made up a story in my head of how this was wrong and that I wasn’t getting such and such from them that THEY should be giving me. What a joke. I thought they owed me something. They owed me acknowledgement. They owed me praise.

But the truth was: I was in pain because I wasn’t giving my gift. And my true gift comes from my feminine core which is love. I wasn’t being true to who I really am. And I realised that, I was looking for outside reasons to stop FEELING. Feeling pain, and fear.

But the problem is…..actually FEELING things fully, and through….and breathing through the worst emotions we have…and allowing them to well up in our bodies…is KEY to being more of your feminine self. 

We might think we feel jealous, angry, and critical and taken for granted….but all it is, at the core of it, is FEAR. Fear that we are not enough. That’s it. And when we feel like we are not enough….man or woman, we cannot be truly feminine or truly masculine.

So this is what I was doing: I was running around, trying to make others pay for the loneliness I had created within myself. Which, by the way, is a complete illusion. No one is ever truly lonely, are they?

Are there a hundred people out there you could find right now to start a conversation with? Absolutely.

Are there thousands of people waiting for you to remind them that they are enough? For sure.

Are there hundreds of people you can touch with a life story of your own? Yup.

Are there thousands upon thousands of men out there, waiting to connect with a woman who has the courage to truly be herself? Who has the confidence he craves to just let him be a man? Why, YES.

***********************************

So I started making up in my head that I wasn’t getting enough from the people around me. And my relationships got lonelier. I felt LESS love from everybody around me, and I felt less and less love for myself.

Which is the most painful thing to experience, isn’t it? Because others can always love you, but you still don’t feel loved because you don’t love yourself. And then it’s only YOU who can take responsibility for this.

It wasn’t until one day, it got so bad, I actually woke up for two days in a row, and first thing in the morning, I called my man up and started complaining and crying down the phone about a problem in my life outside of our relationship, that he knew nothing about and that wasn’t his responsibility that I realised: I was making up a problem out of nowhere.

There’s nothing wrong with calling a man up and crying, or even making a problem out to be bigger than it is (women do this, it’s in the nature of the feminine to make things seem bigger and more dramatic. Masculine men make everything smaller).

It wasn’t that I was making a problem bigger; it was the fact that I was making up stuff to avoid facing the fear that I am not enough, and actually feeling that.

I was trying to take from my man, hoping I’d get the praise and appreciation I wanted; but really should have been giving to myself first.

So when I felt myself getting way out of hand, I excused myself, got off the phone….and finally LET myself feel the emptiness and fear I was feeling.

Women and Avoiding Emptiness

And it is this EMPTINESS that every single feminine woman on earth is trying to avoid. We hate emptiness when we are in our feminine state, we hate the emptiness that makes us feel lonely, because the feminine energy is all about filling up with love. And the loneliest women, the ones who feel the most empty, are the ones who read romance novel after romance novel to try and fill that emptiness up.

Or we eat ourselves to numbness, trying not to FEEL the emptiness. Or we blame others, making THEM not enough and making THEM wrong, just so we can MAKE ourselves feel something other than emptiness.

Or we spend too much money on clothes only to forget that we even own that beautiful blouse just a week later.

Or we hate on other women for experiencing the love that we want for ourselves.

Or we try to bring down another beautiful woman, finding any flaw we can in their make up or clothes, so we don’t have to face the pain that we feel when we don’t feel like we are enough.

And it wasn’t until for the first time in a long time, I let myself feel the pain of emptiness, that I actually started to fill up with love and joy. Why? Because the emptiness allowed all the past fears that I had ignored to come up and be heard and felt.  I started to fill up with love….I went back to my true state. I went from being a numb robot to being more free and when I was free, I was able to be feminine.

I started to feel free. And when I felt free, a funny thing happened. And this is true for every woman.

Suddenly, I could give my gift. I could GIVE love, instead of trying to GET it from others. I felt attractive. I felt loving, I felt resourceful. I didn’t feel numb or desperate. I didn’t need to tell my parents about every single achievement I had; I could instead, simply just make them laugh, or share happy memories with them.

Suddenly, I didn’t have to buy new clothes, subconsciously hoping that I would be more loved by my man that way. I could simply buy new clothes just because I wanted to express more of myself, and give more of myself. Not take more approval.

It didn’t matter, because what makes me enough, and what makes me be myself, and what makes me my true feminine self, is me feeling like I am enough. Then, all the masks are stripped away.

See, when we feel like we are enough, as human beings….

We no longer try to not call a man back for a least a day….ONLY because then he will not think we are a lunatic and then he might love us more.

We no longer try to prove that we are not like other women and not crazy by being in total “control” of our emotions.

We no longer feel that we have to ACHIEVE something before we are worthy of being loved.

And then we can just be who we naturally are, whatever that is. Masculine or feminine.

And as a woman, when you can just be – you can connect with ANYONE you want to connect to. You can form relationships and friendships easily. And that is when your femininity will really show, because for femininity to survive, it is all about CONNECTION, being connected to life, and to existing as love, rather than trying GET it and take it from people in the form of approval from others.

So here are 3 Action Steps to becoming more of your Feminine self

1) Any time during the day or night, if you feel lonely, sad, or angry, instead of instantly going to eat something, bury yourself in work, or call someone up to get them to make you feel better and end the conversation abruptly when they DON’T, or start looking through people’s facebook photos to see how you compare to other women….let yourself FEEL. Feel the fear, feel whatever anger it is that you feel.

Let yourself feel by crying. Go somewhere private where you can be with yourself. By the way, I don’t mean, just go write in a journal or just sit in a dark room staring in to darkness, I mean, scream, cry, breathe through the PHYSICAL pain that you feel. Yes, it will be physical. AND the longer you’ve rejected your emotions over the years, the MORE physical it will be. So let yourself feel that. You don’t have to cover it up, and it’s not wrong. And, no, you won’t die. You’ll still be here tomorrow and no one will curse you for feeling….or screaming…or crying. or just being angry.

If you, as a woman, do NOT let yourself feel anything or cleanse yourself through crying, you become a robot. You get sick. Your feminine organs go tight, you can’t be yourself, you lose your sex drive, and you hold resentment in places in your body, and all signs of life start to disappear. Your face no longer lights up. Your smile becomes fake.

And then your energy shows up as more masculine. More controlled, More directed, instead of free and flowing. And believe me, when you’re free, you will attract more men than you can handle.

2) Every morning, make it a ritual before you go to work or go to college, to put on some music and dance. Don’t do a routine! No Routines. This is what I HATE about dance schools and teachers sometimes. Everything has to be about a result. You have to dance and make some routine, even if you don’t perform at a concert! What a terrible way to learn dancing and express yourself!

Just dance in whatever way your body feels it should dance. It’s simply about letting your body move. You don’t have to perform! You just need to be, and flow.

Do it every morning. Use the kind of music that you know will make you want to move your body. Some days you’ll feel more crazy and want to dance like you would at a club. Some mornings, you might want to dance slowly and sensually. Whatever your body wants to do.

3) This is the hardest step.

Remind yourself that it’s your task to consistently keep opening more and more to your own fears, and let yourself be present with life. Be present with fear, Be present with joy. Be present with ecstasy. Be present with shame. Allow those things to flow through your body and be real to you. Don’t stuff everything down just so you can keep pretending.

It’s a journey. And it’s a journey you will be on for the rest of your life. Luckily, it also allows you to grow more and more beautiful every day.

That’s all. Leave me a comment below, telling me your thoughts, and your experiences. I look forward to hearing from you. xox

Is it wise to choose a man who is more in love with you than you are with him?

On a primal level, it benefits women to pick a man who is far more in love with her than she is with him, because that FEELS like he will stick around, and so we (and our babies) can have all his resources.

However, this is the exact thing many men hate about a relationship, and commitment to a woman. Research shows that men fall in love faster, and way harder than women do. And, research done by the well respected Anthropologist Helen Fisher, also shows that MEN are far more idealistic about love and relationships than women are. Are you surprised?

Research shows, also, that women on the other hand, are more pragmatic: “hm….is he willing to give me marriage and babies?” “is he the tallest and smartest one I can get?” “is he rich enough to get us through the 18 years of all our children’s lives?” “Is he the richest one I’ve got on my contact list?” “Is he willing to spend money on me?” “I’m in love with another man, but he is nuts and doesn’t stick around. A safer bet would be to go with the ‘cute’ one who will stick around.”

“I’m not as passionate about him as I am about Daniel, but at least he’ll stick around.”

The problem is, this makes men feel like crap. It breaks hearts, it makes them never want to commit to another woman again. If I could count the number of times I’ve heard stories about men who fell in love, and it was their first love, and they were willing to give her everything, and they DID….but then, after 5 years of marriage, they find out that she’s run off an gotten pregnant to the bad boy, I would at least be half-rich. If you’re interested to see this for yourself, start with this discussion page here.

Men need to fall in love from an evolutionary perspective, because it encourages them to shell out their resources to just one woman for the long term. If they are not in love, they are not likely at all to shell out any resources. They have sex with the women and then leave.

But if he is in love, he shells out more than just dinner and a movie. A little bit of money is easy to shell out. But falling in LOVE makes men shell out a bunch of other resources that normally feel unnatural to him – emotional resources. For a number of years.

At least the children will have a caring and involved daddy. Good for wife, and good for children.

When I was 18, my mother and her friends told me to pick a man that loves me more than I love him. I scrunched my nose up. Something didn’t feel right to me, hearing that. It felt selfish. It felt so guarded and such a miserable way to live.

Many years later, if you were to ask me: is it wise to pick a man who loves you more than you love him?

Well, my answer is, yes, and no.

Yes, if you treat relationships as a transaction. (“what is this man worth to me? What can he GIVE me?” “is he willing to have a long term relationship with me?”) Hey, many women do this.

No, if you want to live a blissfully happy, passionate and fulfilling life, where other people look at your relationship and envy you.

I choose the No.

You might be wondering why I give that reason for the ‘no’ answer.

My answer is because: it is only through YOUR emotional vulnerability to a man that YOU get to feel the full pleasure and bliss of what an intimate relationship has to offer: magnifying your emotions. And it is this way that HE gets to feel great with you too.

It can’t work long term unless you both have INTENSE emotions towards each other. After all, that’s the purpose of intimate relationship: to magnify our emotions, and make life more delicious.

Being completely vulnerable to a man, being completely in love, actually give YOU incredible pleasure, and provided he is also in love with you, you both get to grow together and develop a loving, beautiful, lasting and passionate relationship.

When you are choosing a man completely pragmatically, or logically, and not because you are truly in love – and not because you just want a RELATIONSHIP for the sake of a relationship – it’s you who eventually suffers. We don’t live only 15-30 years anymore, like our ancestors. Back then, the strategy of picking a man who loves you more than you love him worked. It got the species procreating, it allowed you access to resources that helped you and your babies live.

But, here’s the problem: We live some 60-120 years now! Now, it’s not the transaction, and what we can GET from a man that makes us giddy and happy in our relationship. Now, we want happiness. Transactions between a man and a woman aren’t designed for happiness.

We are evolving beyond this transaction thing now. At least that’s the way I would like to see the world moving. And that’s what I believe in.

To be happy in a relationship, you have to be vulnerable to a man. not logical about his WORTH to you. That takes courage, though. Because, with vulnerability also comes pain. I’m ok with that, aren’t you? Pain is a part of life. We try to avoid it like it’s the devil. Actually, it’s not: it’s a gift. Without allowing yourself to feel deep fear and pain, you cannot experience deep love and passion.

I suggest you value your long-term happiness, rather than what’s easy; and choose a man who you are obviously  in love with, and whom is also obviously in love with you. Of course, as a woman, you will always choose the best man, who has the better provider qualities, to be in a relationship with. There is nothing wrong with that, and that’s instinctive whether you like it or not. It’s there to help you.

The question is though:

why are you really choosing to commit to him long-term? Are you making the decision to commit to a man for the long term because he loves you more than you love him? And are you looking to just keep the man around, because if he loves you more, then he WILL stick around?

Because he won’t. Soon, he’ll be another male statistic that feels used by women.  He’ll get tired of desiring you more than you desire him. Being more invested in the relationship than you are. He’ll want something else.

I choose to say it is not wise, for your own long term happiness, to choose a man who is more in love with you than you are with him. I don’t want to make my values your values, too, though. So what do you think? Would you prefer to choose the man who is in love with you while you like him just ‘enough’ to be with him?

Why Heidi and Seal Grew Apart

I have always been a big fan of Heidi Klum, she’s a busy woman, always doing something, a woman with great energy and a genuine love of life.

So I am sad to see Seal and Heidi divorce; I have been inspired by their relationship in the past. It is one that has been frowned upon by jealous white men and some groups because of the racial difference – but what I always loved about them was that they looked so passionate and loving.

On ‘Growing Apart’:

On another note, they’ve said that they have had ‘the deepest respect for one another throughout our relationship and continue to love each other very much, but we have grown apart‘.

When it comes to relationships, the truth is that, it is rare for any long term relationship to work out – not because they cannot work out, but because people aren’t truly educated about how to make a relationship work. To make a relationship work, you have to know consciously what will make it work. You can’t just do what you’re used to doing for the last 25 years of your life.

You can’t just do what Sex and the City has taught you.

For instance. I spoke to a lady a while ago. She told me about a fight with her husband.

He said: “GOD! You are sounding JUST like your mother!”

She says:

‘Well, what do you expect me to sound like?!!”

No. It doesn’t work this way. This is her saying: “well, I have habits that I’ve gotten from my mother, and I’m set in my ways. Accept them.”

No.

If you want love, if you want lasting love and passion, subconscious bad habits are worth nothing to you.

You have to always be consciously bring MORE love, joy, sensuality, passion, attraction, and sexuality to the table.

Most of us are ruled by our subconscious 

Most of us are ruled by our subconscious, and our subconscious makes up a myriad of experiences and associations from the past. For most of us, it’s made up of the BAD experiences. And we react to an innocent current event, or a really good current situation with memories of past bad experiences.

This is the power (albeit a sometimes bad kind) of the subconscious. And it is in the subconscious mind that associations with our partner are built. And in the end, it’s inevitable that that man or woman we were so infatuated with in the beginning becomes the person we want to be apart from.

Why?

Because we are not consciously putting in the passion, the love, the playfulness and the time and the compassion to make it work.

The ONLY reason Why Seal and Heidi Grew Apart

There is only one reason why Heidi and Seal would have grown apart, at the core of it.

The only real reason two people grow apart is bad associations.

What do I mean by associations?

I mean this:

Have you ever had food poisoning?

Did you want to eat that food that ‘poisoned’ you again?

When I was 11 years old, I went to an All-You-Can-Eat restaurant for my birthday. And, you know, when you’re a kid, you compete with all the other kids at who can eat more (well, at least that’s what we did anyway).

So I got in to the pumpkin soup. I ate 5 big bowls of it. By the end I had pumkin soup all over my face.

I went home, and felt very full. I didn’t sleep well that night. I kept tossing and turning until amongst the dozens of tosses, I tossed up something unexpected – pumkin soup. All over my parents’ carpet, in the middle of the night. They were the unlucky ones who had to clean up my vomit in the morning.

Do you know how long it took me to eat ANY kind of pumpkin again? NOT just pumpkin soup. ANY kind of pumpkin.

12 years. AND – do you know the reason I ate it?

Because David’s (my fiancee’s) mum made it, and he was there with me. So it built up a WHOLE new association with pumpkin. Now, I roast pumpkin, I make pumpkin soup….I LOVE pumpkin.

But I never would have if I didn’t have an opportunity to build up positive associations with pumpkin again, through my enormous positive association with my hero, my fiancee, David.

In fact, for 12 years, just looking at pumpkin in the supermarket made me feel sour in the mouth.

And, I had to turn away. The association was that bad.

The ONE thing to focus on to make it so that your partner doesn’t want to leave you

So what am I saying?

I’m saying, the exact same human mechanism of bad associations occurs in our relationships.

I’m saying that, when it comes to intimate relationships, your associations, and your MAN’S associations matter more than anything else, in making sure your partner never leaves you.

In the first 3 months, IF you’re madly in love, and your partner is madly in love with you, and someone comes up to you and asks:

“So do you want to break up with this person?”

You would look at them incredulously and say “no! Are you crazy!?”

All because your associations are great. He’s madly in love with you, he’s bringing his best self to the table daily you are madly in love with him, you are bringing your best self to the table daily – of course your associations are great.

You are BOTH filling each other up, meeting each other’s needs at the highest level, making each other feel loved and significant and desired – the associations that are being built at this stage are all positive, beautiful associations.

But, a year down the track, and all the other parts of you and your man come out.

His plates aren’t cleaned like you expected them to be from the previous night. He said he’d clean them. So you blame him. He feels unappreciated, hurt, disrespected, or worse of all – BLAMED.

What happens?

He thinks of you = he feels blamed.

It’s not so bad if it happens once.

But, over time, these things start stacking. And blame may not be the only bad emotion he associates with you. Now it’s blame, hurt, disgust, EVERYTHING.

This is why we can still LOVE someone, but grow apart.

Now, with Seal and Heidi, I don’t know what their patterns were that lead to the breakdown.

I’ll be really daring and hazard a guess. I say that the most likely case scenario is that the bad associations were partially built up through either one or both of them not feeling like they are being put first by the other. And that was a large contributor to the bad associations.

Heidi is a busy woman, Seal is a busy man. Both of them have demanding careers. They have a life outside of their relationship, which is fantastic.

But it’s when your partner doesn’t feel the like the most significant and important person to you – when work seems to come before you – that you really start to associate them with different and worse feelings.

And what happens is this:

At the beginning, you were 0% likely to leave your partner.

After 3 years, you are 30% likely to break up with them. But you still have positive associations; enough for you both to get through.

After 5 years, you’re 60% likely to break up with them, or leave them.

After 7 years….all it takes now, is one fight.

One remark of disrespect.

And we decide it’s over.

Who want’s to be in a relationship where they associate more bad feelings than good with their lover?

Nobody.

The non significance of marriage vows

Many people in the media have been saying that they thought Heidi and Seal would last, partly because they renewed their vows every year. Well, this is why marriage vows count for nothing, when up against past bad associations. I wrote a post about it once, here.

It’s the daily conscious, compassionate and loving commitment to making each other’s associations positive, and not bad, that matters.

Leave me a comment below, I’d love to know what you are thinking. Maybe let me know your thoughts and experiences with bad associations in relationships. xox