Online Dating; it was the best of times, it was the worst of times...PART 1

Dear lovely,

You hear it all the time…

 ‘”you’ve got to put yourself out there”

        “Have you tried online dating?”

  “ You have to kiss some frogs before you meet a prince”,

"EVERYONE is meeting online these days”

“I met my husband/wife online!”

Ennnnnter screen shot of a random unsolicited dick pic or someone being verbally abusive because you did not respond quick enough online. WTF?!?!? 

So, do any of these people (the great and wondrous ‘THEY’ who say ALL the things) have the EXACT number of frog its going to take??? Cause darlin’ its starting to feel like the second plague of Egypt up in this piece!!!!

But check it; I am one of the not so mythological beasts who met my partner online. It CAN and DOES happen, I assure you.  HOWEVER, woman oh woman, did I wade through some frogs, locusts and a whole lotta other biblical like madness to get to that prince.  And the worst plague of all, was on my confidence and sanity. You know the online dates I am talking about.  The ‘wow, this is going amazing, but then GHOSSST’, um' did he die after that date???’ ones.  The ‘dear lawwwd, whatever I did to deserve this suffering, I will make up for it if you just set this restaurant on fire so I can leg it out of there RIGHT NOW’ dates.  The ‘dude, sorry, I am not feeling it, then they start blubbering’ date. The ‘OMFG another dud date, I can’t. I just, CAN’T’, dates.  Or my personal favorite ‘the chatty cathys who never EVER want to actually meet in real life to go on a date’ people.  (I cannot unravel that mystery for you. Those people are just weirdos, seriously just get a prison pen pal, weirdos).  You start to lose your confidence. And by confidence, I don’t mean about how you look but actually losing faith in your ability to choose someone, your ability to read a situation, gauge interest, hell even begin to question what the F%@k is going on with you that you attract these nutters in the first place?  That’s about when the sanity starts to slip and reality as you have always known it?  Utterly questioned.  You own (like a boss) your career, your social life and yet, your confidence to truly own your romantic life??? Plummeting!   And, everyone is so jaded. Dates feel like interviews. time is somehow this newly minted, highly limited, commodity and judgements are made in the moment it takes to SWWWWIPPPE! 

AND, You are beginning to wonder if its you?????

And, it is.      And, it’s not.

I suggest you focus on what you CAN change, the part of the puzzle you can unpick, unravel and unlock.  And it ain’t them. It’s you, doll.  And that’s okay. More than okay, it’s GREAT NEWS! Cause YOU have power over YOU.  And spending a single minute trying to sort someone else out, is a total waste of your smarts, your love and your time. And no, taking your ball and going home AKA taking a break from dating, is not a viable long term solution. Not if you are in this love game, to win. Not if you know deep down, that you want and deserve love. The poet, Pablo Neruda wrote ‘of all the fires, love is the most inexhaustible one’.  As human beings we are hard wired to seek out love, companionship and human connection. So you will cycle back around, find yourself chasing this innate and basic human desire again. However, if nothing changes, nothing changes. So, cycle back… or cycle forward, my dear?  The choice is yours…

Forward we go, then! 

Do you know what you are looking for in a partner?  Do you know what you need? Let me guess… funny, kind, attentive, affectionate, tall, short, easygoing, on your list?

What does funny mean to you? What's your idea of funny?  How about affectionate? What’s your definition of affectionate? What’s it look like, feel like, sound like? TO YOU.

Hey! Put down that article with it’s latest Top 20 things you need from a partner list this very minute, girl!  No one, not a magazine article, no guru and not even your very well intentioned mother can nor should define this for you. 

Step one, with almost every client I take on, is defining their search for love. And it’s multi session big ol’ lump of time we spend on it because, the chemistry IS in the details. The chemistry, not the catalytic spark of butterflies (which although essential), is NOT chemistry by itself.  Love, real forever love, the kind that lasts… is in the details. And darlin’ its high time you sussed out those details by defining your search for love.  When I talk about taking charge in love as independent kick ass feminista’s, I am NOT talking about heading out there and bossing potential partners about, taking names and making demands. Not on them. I want you to do it FOR YOU.  Take charge of you. Make demands, boundaries, defined lists of what YOU are worth, what YOU want and what YOU need. Feel counter intuitive? Feel like that doesn’t belong in the magical unicorn arena of love?  I get it. Here, lemme write you out a permission slip; It lets us enter unicorn country. Okay? Now, let’s trample some frogs and get unicorn hunting! They exist. I have seen them. I even bet one of your best friends just married one. Tell me what your unicorn looks like? Sounds like? Smells like? Feels like?  I need all the DETAILS, babe. ALL OF THEM!   You keep asking where to find the good ones?  We need to define exactly what a ‘good one’ is TO YOU before we go out there into the wide and sometimes surreal world of online dating. You are not doing this dating malarkey as social experiment into the full diaspora of the human race.  You are not doing this dating malarkey for free dinner across from yet another the dud (or jerk) of a date. And you are definitely not doing it add to your Instagram collection of random body part images messaged to you on tinder from losers.  You are seeking a winner, like you. A partner, a companion, someone amazing to share your life with. You are anything but beige, doll. Generic searches, net generic results. THAT IS SO NOT WHY YOU ARE HERE! Define that search.  Stand up and own that search. The benefits??  Start spending time with quality people AND Stop the dud dates, the offensive messages that are threatening your will to live and love.  Start filtering out the ones who are not compatible, not on the same page as you and stop finding yourself months into seeing someone that is not right for you. Start seeing people for who they really are NOT who they want you to think they are... AND Start kicking ass out there in love! WOOT!

Creating Generosity In Relationships AKA The Great Italian Smash Job of 2016

Creating generous safe spaces for one another, is a tool I speak of often with clients, and witness working wonders in their relationships, and in even dating client’s quest for love.

Recently on a trip with my husband Mark, I had the opportunity to implement this real super star tool in my hefty coaching box. To consciously create a generous and safe space for him to come home to after making a mistake. To reject my own fears and frustration in favor of being a nurturing and welcoming landing pad.  AND to not relish in said mistake. Cause, sometimes I really do like a big ol’ relish at his expense.   

Mark’s mistake was not monumental, not one of those epic deal breaking mistakes we hear of blasting marriages to bits upon impact, like cheating, gambling or physical violence, for example. The big bombs create immediate havoc, leveling cities and marriages alike in the blink of an eye. However, make no mistake about it, the #1 killer of long term partnerships, ain’t the big bombs.  It’s the everyday instances; the way we speak to one another, the way we care for one another, how we show respect for each other and live in congruence with each other, that are the insidious often barely visible missiles that bit by bit, tear love apart. AND once those silent but deadly daily missiles build up, they are wayyy harder to come back from. A leveled city, is much easier to build on anew. A place where every other window is broken, every third board is rotting and god knows what happening behind the walls … definitely much harder to renovate.

So in my best Sophia from Golden Girls impression… Picture it! Italy! 2016! We’ve  just picked up a gorgeous rental car, a zippy 2 door convertible, for 4 glorious days of driving around the incredible scenic Italian countryside. A blissful holiday we have been planning for months.  It’s been a rough few months. We have both been working hard. Both sharing that similar, THIS trip is the light at the end of the tunnel holiday vibe. (Oh expectation, you sneaky devil). We get an hour or so away from the car rental place and into some tiny Italian village back street… and CRUNCH! CRACK! BAM! ! There goes the mirror on the rental car. And BOOM! There goes the 1400euro deductible flashing before my eyes. The money gremlins, the ones who always whisper to me “You’ll never have enough!” and “Where you gonna get the money for that, sister?!?”, are on me. I look over at my husband, and his whole face is crestfallen. He has his own money gremlins. Sometimes we take them on play dates together and boy do they make a mess. He also has slow methodical perfectionism gremlins. The annoying measure twice (or a hundred times) and cut once OR ELSE the world as we know it will end’ gremlins. Those little bastards, do not play, barely ever giving him a moment of peace, to be human.  And right then, in the picturesque Italian alley, they’re crawling all over him.

Sometimes, we get really lucky, and life freeze frames for second. I know, I got lucky that day. And in that freeze frame, two roads present themselves.  One, I know well. HATE STREET; Fear, anger, shame, self-righteousness and downright petty meanness live there. They throw epic dinner parties and my face is well known in those circles, I’ll have you know. And on the other road, LOVE STREET; is where faith, vulnerability, compassion, kindness, empathy, solace and unconditional love, live. I know that road too, though admittedly nowhere near as well as the other.   Mark was standing on Hate Street, trying to decide which house he deserved to go into first for doing something so stupid. Shame? Fear? Self-loathing?  All doors on Hate Street were wide open to him.

In the freeze frame, I thought…Do I join him?  Do I pile on with the rest of the hate crew?  Or do I grab his hand and make a run for Love street? In theory, on screen as I type it, the choice seems obvious.  But we all know, in the moment... with the gremlins about, it’s so not. I took a deep breath, made my decision, held up one hand to hate street, grabbed my husband’s hand with the other and said come with me, my darling. I did not tell him how he should have done it different, how I would have never made that same error (lemme’ tell you, I was never so glad to NOT be the one driving!), I did not make the comment that was standing proud on my tongue “well there goes 1400 euros we don’t have” and instead I said, “hey cookie, its only money”, that I loved him, then I looked deep into his eyes very seriously and thanked him being the one to crack up the rental car, first. Smirk. And we laughed. And the gremlins, that were just seconds ago badgering him, started to disappear. Then I hit those bastards right where it hurts and said to Mark, “come on pal, let’s get you some gelato” and that sent them running!  Was there self-preservation in there? Sure, I also saw in that freeze frame, in that crestfallen little boys face on my husband, that this silly accident, could totally shoot this holiday down in flames, for him AND for me, by association.  But more than anything, I wanted to live on LOVE STREET. I wanted to show this incredible man, that I had his back and was rooting for him, even when he wasn’t. I wanted to be his best friend. That we were there to fight the good fight, shoulder to shoulder, together.  

AND, when the following day he cracked up the side panel on a curb, I only let out one, single, solitary “JESSSSSUS MARKKKK!”  Whoopsie, missed my freeze frame for a hot minute there.

Now, just because it’s a super star tool that saves and revives partnerships every day, it doesn’t make it any more intuitive to reach out for,  and definitely no easier to harness firmly every time.  I find for me, and the people I work with, making the conscious decision to do something different, to create a space of kindness and safety for our partner to come home to when the everyday world is playing it’s little shit show, very hard indeed. But these little sacred spaces we create for one another, these small moments of generousity... matter. And the impact on the dynamic, HUGE.  Like anything else, with practice we make progress, and with practice we make new habits.

Or hey, maybe it was just how FAB I looked in that scarf and sunglasses that turned his frown upside down???? 

www.jessicaelizabethcoaching.com

 #Generouswithlove #relationshipgoals #relationshipcoaching

You (yes YOU!) are way too cute to keep yourself waiting, darlin'.

photo credit; Tim GouwUnsplash

So, there I was, at a female entrepreneur event, surrounded with boss, fierce ladies who are being brave daily, taking charge of their destinies and risking all for the dream.  The conversations are centered heavily on owning your voice, female driven startups, daring to be seen and demanding success. It’s thrilling. I am happily gorging myself of Wonder Woman-ness. This is the kind of lady vortex of ferocity I live for. 

My turn comes at the round table, so to speak, and I tell the ladies what I do. “I am a dating and relationship coach. I help strong woman take charge in their love life, to navigate the swipe swipe nightmare that can be dating today, to find real lasting love, AND keep it.”  CRICKETS. And a room of terror filled, wide eyes all staring at me. 

One woman, this real goddess I have been eyeing all morning ‘cause she is on FIRE with what she is doing in business speaks up,  “I REALLY want to find someone amazing, but ughhh it’s so hard out there… I am just going to wait, when it happens, it happens.”  Before she can move on I ask… “Wait? For what exactly?” 

MORE CRICKETS.  Everyone is holding their breath.  All these fantastic, SHE-RA ladies who have been kicking ass and taking names all day, now peer at me, like Bambi in headlights. 

I do not say that to be unkind. I get it. I’ve been there.

This is some deep rooted, highly publicized, tender shizzle.  Every day, I read and re-read articles, or overhear conversations on the train, and have chats with my own clients where I face-off with this undercurrent of pervading thought that says, in one way or another, we, as woman, shouldn’t take charge and own this area of our lives; either in a painfully obvious let the man pursue you way or through endless harassment of statements like ‘when you are not looking, then IT will happen’ OR ‘you can’t rush love’. OR 'playing coy is what they want' OR ‘the heart does what the heart does’, what can you do? kinda' way.  Oh and the magazine covers I see (but often refuse to touch) screaming out from the stands or blaring from my screen,  “What Men Really Want?” , “Get in his head and in his bed”  “50 ways to seduce a man”… It’s no wonder so many of us hesitate and waffle when it comes to love and WHAT WE WANT, WHEN AND HOW WE WANT IT! 

At a time when we are out there as CEO’s, starting our own businesses, hell even running for president all while nurturing families and dedicating more time than ever to our physical health and well-being; our hearts, our romantic life and even our sex life remains taboo, wrapped in mystery kitten paper and the bow on top is that the dialogue in the mainstream is nowhere near getting on side with what we as woman are ‘allowed’ to want, need and even demand out of love.

So I decide to go a bit full press on my fellow goddess at the event, not in a mean girl way but just enough to make a point, to create that head explosion, breakthrough, what the what moment.  Just enough to poke a single hole in the facade so vulnerability and love could pour through. Or enough for her to hit me. It can go either way some days.  

 “Can you tell me what you're waiting for?  And why exactly are you're keeping yourself waiting? 

You are not 'waiting' with your business… with your bank account… with your career… and I am going to guess you don’t do it with your social life?  Who selected, planned and booked your last holiday? 

Did you wait to be invited out with your girls last Saturday night? HECK NO?! 

So why? WHY?!?! Are you keeping yourself waiting for love? You are way too cute, way too amazing to keep yourself waiting another moment, doll.”  
 

She's naturally got a bit defensive, ego and fear love that particular cape and don it proudly…  “I don’t need a partner to make my life fulfilled!” 

AND SHE IS RIGHT! Of course you don’t, but this isn’t just about what you need, it’s also about what you want AND why you think you can’t chase it boldly like you do everything else in your life. 

The feminist rally cry of “I don’t need a a man to fill in the blank” is one I know, use, AND honor but only when it truly matches what YOU want, not what you think you can have or worse, are allowed to openly desire. 

So I placed my hand on her hand and said “Tell me why you think you need to wait? What will happen if you don’t wait and treat this area of your life like every other area of your life, and take charge?”

Here's a top 10 list for ya'… the top 10 answers I have gotten to those two questions;
 

1.     I don’t think I have any real power over this area in my life.

2.     I am afraid of getting my heart broken, AGAIN.

3.     I always pick the wrong ones.

4.     The good ones are all taken.

5.     I don’t want to be distracted by a relationship right now.

6.     I don’t have the time to date.

7.     I can’t seem to meet any decent guys/gals.

8.     It should just happen! Like in the movies!

9.     Love is a magical thing, the rules of business and/or success don’t apply.

10.  I want the dream, the whole enchilada and it just doesn’t seem to exist in today’s world.

All of these replies are valid and real. HOWEVER, I find framing this in contrast to how we behave in other areas of our life, the areas we take no issue empowering ourselves in, really helpful. 

Would you say… you don’t have any power over your business being successful or not?

Would you not go out and look for a job or a better job because you might be fired or be made redundant, again? 

Have you always picked the wrong holidays to go on? And even if you have made a vacation booking mistake (lord knows I have) in the past, has it stopped you from ever going on holiday again?

Do you not even go to the car dealership because all the good cars area already sold?

Or stop yourself from taking care of your health or well-being by passing on yoga or the gym or hell even eating well because you don’t have the time? (ouch! that’s a tough one for some of us, AND definitely for me, cause the gym seems to fall low on my priority list)

Do you not go to networking events to achieve more contacts or go out looking for new clients because you have had a run of bad ones? Or a few rejections? 

Do you sit back waiting for your dream job or business to fall like manna from heaven?

How about, ask anyone in a real, long term, happy, relationship how it works… do they hand you a secret spell book or box of magic potions?

When you were starting your business or your first job out of school… didn’t you want the whole enchilada dream?  How far would you have gotten if you just took ‘it doesn’t exist in today’s world’ as gospel and stopped dead in your tracks????  

I am not saying let’s take all the unicorns or butterflies out of love, (NEVER, EVER would I say that. Cause unicorns and butterflies make life and love worth having!!) And please do not run off to flow chart or Power Point your quest for love!  However, what I AM SAYING… It’s time to take back your search for love.

Define it.  Empower it.  Own it.  Be bold.  Be seen.

And yes even open yourself up to the possibility of being hurt because it’s through that very same breach in your chest that LOVE WILL GET IN! When we close ourselves off to the possibilities of success, happiness and joy because the opposite MAY happen… we let fear win. And fear is not a very sporting fellow about winning. Fear is also not satisfied with winning just one race, and will look for ways to invade and conquer ruthlessly from that foothold of a win, into the rest of your life. Time to up that bravery level!!

Oh, and tell naysayers, the haters, the glossy mag covers, wistful internet memes,  the ‘oh no, you can’t do that with love’ peeps… to suck it. 

I am talking #BeMoreBeyonce and run the world, the whole damn world! Even the world where your wanton, crazy, heart resides, because she is also, WAY too cute to be kept waiting another minute longer, darlin’. 

#datingcoaching #lovecoaching #empoweryoursearch #bebrave #wonderwomanIT