Life is like a puzzle but without the picture on the box to guide you. Slowly over time you put pieces together to see if they fit. You try different pieces, you turn them around, you look at the colours on their surface and their shape. If they don’t fit together you start the search again. Over time you start to see a picture emerging but often the full picture is not clear until you triumphantly slot the last piece into its place.

Part of my nature is to automatically see the big picture in every situation – it is what comes with choosing a visionary archetype. This quality is revered by today’s society as everyone looks up to the visionaries of each generation, yet there is just as much value in seeing the little things and loving and appreciating them. (continue reading…)

“Let’s just be friends”…the four words that many people dread while dating. They’re used as an easy escape – a way out of a difficult situation where one likes the other more. They’re spoken by cowards who are too afraid to hurt the other. They’re uttered when there is no intention of seeing each other again. This is sad because there’s nothing “just” about being friends.

Dating sites are interesting playgrounds. All types, including the shy and downright socially anxious, can get to mingle with others in total anonymity, often not even revealing what they look like. They can chat, flirt, propose meetings and fantasise (which is often what the proposed meetings are anyway).

Yet there are those who get upset by the playground. I have heard of people who throw malicious comments at others when they are rejected honestly. There is frustration when they have not found “the one” after being on the site for a “more than reasonable length of time”. Then there is that moment when you pluck up the courage to meet someone and they look nothing like their pictures, or the pictures are from the days before they put on 20 kg and 10 years. There is deception everywhere: we deceive ourselves daily otherwise we would not be living in this illusion we call life. And yet we expect everyone to be completely truthful…there are always skeletons in the closet! Sometimes that skeleton is 20 kg.

Playing the single game on dating websites (okay, that’s not entirely correct because some couples play the game too) should be fun. How do you make it fun? By making it completely goalless. The stress is only introduced by expectations, created by you, to meet the one you’ve just written to, to date the one you’ve just winked at, to have sex with the one who just winked back and/or marry the one you just had an awesome chat to. (The “and/or” is intentional because often all these expectations co-exist at one time).

Have you watched two toddlers meeting for the first time? Notice how they relate with no expectations. They giggle, cuddle, smile, kiss and sometimes push and bash in innocence with no expectation of friendship, marriage or sex. Notice how it is so easy for them, devoid of the anxiety of losing the other, upsetting them or never seeing them again. They just have their fun in the moment and then they part. Just like that. Simple.

The whole spectrum of relating is special and if we can play in this space, including the online dating space, like toddlers then we’ll begin to see just how simple it actually is. Have fun, whatever your definition of that is, and you’ll get everything that you desire because all you truly desire, deep down, is happiness and fun.

If you’re a user of an internet dating site I’m sure you will be able to relate to my experiences. Everyone who uses these very important platforms of modern relating has stories to tell, some worse than others, but then “worse” is relative: to the person experiencing it, it is the worst! My friends and I often compare experiences over a glass of wine.

Which one shall I start with? There was the guy with only the now common torso pic of tanned and toned body (the thumbnails of those online are littered with these sorts of torsos). I liked his profile (I usually choose not to go for these types of profiles) and sent him a message. Usually I don’t get a response from these sorts of guys for reasons I haven’t quite worked out. He responded and said he would like to chat so we went into the chat room and did that. It was a general chat that was flowing nicely and then he was gone…never to chat again even though he has been online since. No reason. Nothing. Just gone. He is “looking for decent people”….

Then there is the one who was all keen to meet up as he believes in chemistry and timing. We battled to coordinate diaries and so a couple of days went by. I sent him a message saying when I was available and I got no response…ever again. Obviously the timing was off.

And there’s the story of another guy who I exchanged numbers with. We get on like a house on fire via text message. We have arranged to meet for drinks once – he had work so had to cancel – and then the chatting fell quiet. Then I got a message from him asking why I’ve been so quiet. I messaged him back and heard nothing! When I re-initiated the chatting he couldn’t remember who I was! Me – the unforgettable!

Finally there’s the one who messaged me first and spoke of meeting me for days, while we chatted over msn. Then he decided that he wouldn’t meet me because of his fear of being hurt. I was frustrated that here is someone I get on really well with and whom I may never meet. Yet we continue to have the most awesome chats. Mmmmm….

How do I deal with the rejection and some of the behaviour that eludes my understanding?
I see that I end up meeting the ones I really (deep down) want to meet and chatting endlessly to those I want to chat to.
I meet people when the time is right to meet them and that it is often not when I arrange to meet them.
I see that we all have our secrets that lead to the perception of deception.
I want to meet that “perfect person” but, at the same time, am afraid of that perfect person and the vulnerability that is required to love them.
I have to really push myself to always tell the truth to the people I meet…especially when it is to tell them that I do not want to see them again.

Every experience is special in some way and this is what makes it all so much fun. Even when I hear those words…”Let’s just be friends…” because friends are fun too!

Valentine’s Day 2010. How was that day for you? Did you try to ignore it, ignore it with vehement purpose, or indulge in all the schmaltz that is commercial Valentine’s in the modern world?

I had a mix of a day. I had lunch with a guy who is special because of the chilled easiness with which he approaches relating. We had great fun. Then, in the evening, I joined a group of gay single boys (and one couple who managed to sneak in, along with a fantastic girl) for a non-Valentine’s party. We socialised a little and then went to watch Hollywood’s latest version of what I call “American vomit”: the movie “Valentine’s Day”. Interestingly most of my group loved it. It made me sick.

I have often wondered why romantic comedies (American ones in particular) do not appeal to me. Okay, that was polite, repulse me is more accurate. It’s because they symbolise a lot of what I do NOT want in a relationship.

Firstly there’s the “what are we?” aspect. Seeking to define something so special and beautiful does not sit well. (Okay, I also do it but try to keep it in the head where it originates and not let it out into the world. )

Then there’s the “I can’t tell him that because that will hurt him too much” element and all the drama that goes with it. Lying is not an option when I relate because I respect people as the strong resilient beings they are who can take the truth with the love with which I give it. As can I.

And then there is the “our love is for ever and ever” component, which is so misunderstood. Love is forever…but that doesn’t mean that you will remain a devoted couple for the rest of your life. In love, and because of love, it may be best for you to part. Why is that always made out to be the worst thing on the planet?

Surprisingly, after having said all of this, I am a romantic and I know I will relate with many special people along the way. But it will always be me relating and not the me that the world expects. Everyone’s world would be a better place if we all did.

Check out this news clip from my favourite news source. I love The Onion! Satire identifies the truth and puts it out there for everyone to see. People laugh because they relate and see how ridiculous the truth is but few, sadly, do anything about it.

Have fun!

New Law Would Ban Marriages Between People Who Don’t Love Each Other

Sometimes music just pops into my head for no reason. I will not have heard the song recently and there is no apparent external prompt. This time it was “Getting to know you” from Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “The King and I”. The reason this is bizarre is because it is not a favourite of mine (although if you knew me then a show tune popping into my head would not surprise you).

I then thought carefully about the words and related it to the myriad of relating that is happening in my life. When we meet someone and immediately “click” with them we know them already. We often say that we recognise them from somewhere or that it is like we have known them all our life. They are easy to talk to and understand us like few others do, even though we have just met.

We then embark on a process of “getting to know” them: what work they do; where they live; are they married?; do they have children? Yet these things do not alter our perception of the other because we know them. I have to correct the last sentence: these things should not alter our perception of the other but sometimes they do. When we learn things about the other that make us uncomfortable, because they reflect something within ourselves, often our perception of them does change. I know that I can get very uncomfortable with people who are very much like me because of the very fact that I see a lot of me in them.

“Once I got to know them I realised they weren’t for me,” I’ve heard myself say on occasion. This isn’t entirely true because in hindsight I knew deep down that they were never for me right from the start. The ego just needed to work it out for itself. If you have ever read Malcolm Gladwell’s “Blink” then you would see my point that in the very instant that we meet someone we already know whether we will get on with them, how special they could be in our life, and whether we would want to spend more time with them. Conversation is not necessary.

This is not to say that conversation is not important in a relationship of any kind. On the contrary, communication with the other is necessary and healthy but only to minimise confusion by the ego, the Soul does not need this communication. The Soul knows.

Also, please understand me when I say “they were never for me”. We can never make a wrong choice and there is never an experience that shouldn’t have happened but, in this case, the reason for the experience may have been purely for the ego.

Every day we are relating with someone very special in our lives; someone more important than anyone we will meet. That someone we call “me”. The same observations apply to this relationship: we already know who we are, why we are here, and everything we need to know in order to get there. The constant chatter to ourselves is our ego and this is what changes the perception of ourselves (only our perception of ourselves can change). However, we are so used to the ego as it is the very world around us (I’ll explain this in more detail in a future discussion) that we battle to hear our Soul or sometimes even choose not to hear it. Any internal voice that is justifying and analysing is ego; the Soul just knows and does not have to justify.

Listen to what you feel deep within. Listen carefully. You already know the people you meet. You already know you.