In our last two sessions we discussed a letter from a woman who said that she had been in many romantic relationship that had gone badly, and I suggested that she had been trading Imitation Love with those men. Now back to the writer of the letter.
So what can you do to change your life? You absolutely have to quit trying to catch horses with worms, to use the metaphor from our last session. You have to change your bait. Period. It’s not about finding a different sort of partner, although that will happen naturally in time. In short, you have to change who YOU are.
First you need to learn about the principles of Real Love. That part is easy. You can learn all about those here on the website and in all the books and DVDs and such. But those are just words. Words don’t change people. Love does.
You need to spend time telling the truth about yourself with people who are capable of loving you unconditionally. You need to spend time especially with WOMEN who can love you, where you feel no distraction from any sexual attraction to the people you’re talking to. You need to fill up with Real Love for quite some time, so that your need for Imitation Love gradually fades away, because until it does, you’ll naturally tend to be attracted to men who offer it to you in relationships. You won’t be able to stop yourself.
Next, you need to make a commitment to stay away from dating for a considerable period of time. Not a few weeks, but probably a year. Now, that sounds harsh. It’s not meant to be. It’s simply a period of healing. You’re worth it. If you needed to recovery from an operation, you’d take the time. You need this time to recover from a lifetime of not feeling loved. This will allow you to become the kind of person you want to be, the kind of person who will be genuinely happy. THAT is what you want. That is your primary goal in life. Finding a loving partner is your SECONDARY goal.
Almost everybody on the planet sees this backward. They go looking for a partner while they’re NOT happy, hoping that a partner will somehow fill them up and MAKE them happy. As a result, they go hunting for a partner while they’re unhappy, so they’re armed ONLY with Imitation Love. They’re hunting with worms. So what do they get? They get miserable relationships every single time. And then they’re surprised. Wrong. First get loved, so that you’re already happy and not hunting with worms. THEN you can’t lose. Then you’ve already got the happiness you want, and you attract into your life the kind of partner who can ADD to your happiness, instead of looking desperately for somebody to MAKE you happy—which isn’t going to work anyway.
So, when will you be ready to date? How will you know? Ask the loving women you’re telling the truth about yourself to. If you consistently tell the truth about yourself to these women, they’ll tell you when you’re ready. Really, they will. If you say, I think I’m ready to date, and two-thirds of them fall on the floor laughing, you’re probably not ready. That would be a good clue. Listen to me closely. Get all the love you can and spend all the time you can with loving people. That will change your life and all your relationships.
