Here Are 5 Reasons To Choose Being Single, Than In a Bad Relationship.

Did you know this past January 8th, the first Monday of the New Year, is considered “Divorce Day.”  It’s the day where individuals that already cracks in their relationship inquire about divorce because the holidays are now over.

Even though most individuals that are ecstatic to no longer have the albatross around their neck, some of you  after a few days of singleness are contemplating your decision.

I’m here to tell you, do not be discouraged with your decision. Click here to read 5 Reasons Why Choosing To Be Single is Better Than A Bad Relationship.

 

Your Marriage Can Say a Lot In a Picture!

What does this picture say about Marriage?

What components do you need in your marriage, so you can insert you and your spouse’s face on these two figures?

S2S Question of the Day! – Healthy Relationships

The question of the Day has to do with Healthy Relationships!

In a study from the University of Chicago, researchers found that when a husband has a high level of positivity, there’s less conflict in his relationship. Likewise, the way partners respond to each other’s good news matters too. In a study published in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, researchers found that the way couples react to each other’s good news—either with excitement, pride, or indifference—is crucial in forming a strong bond.

So the question of the day is What does a Healthy Relationship look like? What components are necessary?

#Throw Back Thursday #1 – 5 Being Single is Better than…

This article I wrote appeared courtesy of Yahoo Style and Your Tango.  I hope you enjoy it.

Whether it’s the holiday season, wedding season or just time for your annual office party, it’s open season for FINALLY (maybe) meeting the love of your life. Or it means that after everything’s said and done, you’ll be starting a whole new year once again checking “single” on your 1040-EZ form.

Fear of being alone can cause people to make bad choices when it comes to relationships. In fact according to a study by the University of Toronto (U of T), the fear of being single is a meaningful predictor of settling for less in relationships among both men and women.

“Those with stronger fears about being single are willing to settle for less in their relationships,” says lead author Stephanie Spielmann, postdoctoral researcher in the University of Toronto’s Department of Psychology. “Sometimes they stay in relationships they aren’t happy in, and sometimes they want to date people who aren’t very good for them.”

She adds, “Now we understand that people’s anxieties about being single seem to play a key role in these types of unhealthy relationship behaviors.”

“In our results we see men and women having similar concerns about being single, which lead to similar coping behaviors, contradicting the idea that only women struggle with a fear of being single,” says co-author, Professor Geoff MacDonald of the University of Toronto’s Department of Psychology. “Loneliness is a painful experience for both men and women, so it’s not surprising that the fear of being single seems not to discriminate on the basis of gender.”

So if you’re feeling the pressure to settle, here are some things to remember before you make a bad choice:

1. You are ENOUGH.

The mainstream media is filled with really unhealthy messages regarding relationships. For example, many say that you need another person to make the holidays complete or to make you happy. These romantic notions work great in books and on the Hallmark Channel, but when taken literally, these ideas are super destructive.

You are always a whole and indivisible being, capable of immense self-love, self acceptance and self sexuality. Appreciate yourself and know that you’re not alone in your singleness.

2. You made a choice to be single because you WANT to be single.

Although it sounds ass-backward, this is a paradigm shift that will help you in the long run. By consciously making the choice to be single, if will shift the way you view your life and how you live it when it comes to sharing that information with your co-workers, family and friends. YOU are making this decision, so be proud.

3. You are in control of your life.

Instead of remaining the victim of your own fear of being single, take control! Tell yourself that you are actively remaining single for a the holidays. If you do plan to date every once in a while, make sure the dates are fun and give you ample time to get know someone. There’s no rush and no pressure – JUST fun.

4. Do WHATEVER you want.

In the end your relationship status is a personal choice – there is no right or wrong, no good or bad. Instead of being the victim of cultural assumptions and societal norms, take the time to find out how you really would like to engage with other people.

What kind of status would you choose if there was no pressure, no assumptions? Take your time and find what’s best for you. If you think something is a good idea, then there have already been many others who think the same, and have most likely blazed a trail for you to follow.

The way you engage in relationships (or don’t) is not what’s important – what IS important is doing it consciously, and doing what’s right for YOU!

5. It’s ALWAYS better to be single than in a bad relationship.

Getting into an unhealthy, bad relationship simply out of a fear of being alone is a really bad idea. It takes a lot of courage to take that leap into being single, but it’s always, 100% of the time worth it when the relationship is causing more harm than good.

Guys Explain How To Win On A Date

Do you agree? Does this win over the ladies?

 

5 Reasons Why Saying “I Love You” On Valentine’s Day Could Be A Bad Idea!

 

Valentine’s Day couldn’t have been more perfect. You and your date had a romantic dinner. You bought a card that truly expressed your feelings and the night ended with a wonderful night of sex.

Then you said it! I Love You! Deep in your heart you knew you weren’t ready, but you got caught up in the moment. Now that the words are out there in the open, here are 5 reasons why your mouth may have written a check you’re not ready to cash.

When you say “I Love You,” you are telling your partner that the physical attraction and unique bond is so strong, no side-chick can come between you.

When you say “I Love You,” you are telling your partner there is a promise of things to come. You are ready to talk about more than just what movie you are going to see or where you are going to eat for dinner. You are ready to talk about serious topics like marriage and raising a family.

When you say “I Love You,” you intend to stick around. This tell her that you ready to do the little things that make her smile, not just the normal “grand” gestures that usually happen strictly in dating relationships. You are also ready to COMMIT. This is huge especially if you are used to living life.

When you say “I Love You,” you are telling her you plan to put in the work to maintain and strengthen your love despite how crazy or emotional she gets. The more time you spend together, you more time you will get to know each others weaknesses and button points. It will be important that you acknowledge them and not use them to put a wedge in the relationship.

When you say “I Love You,” you are not just checking off the box in the relationship manual. A relationship is a marathon and not a sprint. Even though most days will be filled with love, there are some days not so much. You can’t just throw in the towel when you hit a rough patch. The two of you will have to sit down, communicate and figure out how you make it work.

Valentine’s Day is not just about cards and gifts.  If you tell your woman “I Love You,” you are giving her so much more. Make sure you are ready.

If you are unsure if you are ready to make the next step and you want to make sure, contact me for a free consultation at info@strive2succeedcoaching.com.

 

Coach Keith

The Secure Couple’s Guide to Conflict Resolution.

 

In the final installment of the Attachment series, we will deal with the subject of conflict resolution. One misconception about marriages & great relationships is that these couples’ don’t have conflict. Quite the contrary! It’s not the that they don’t have conflict, they just have the right tools to handle it. According to Attachment researchers conflict can serve as a way for couples to get closer and deepen their bond, not drive them apart like in anxious/avoidant relationships.

Individuals have a distinct way to deal with conflict that could be helpful to individuals that have a different attachment style.

These five distinct practices can help diffuse and resolve conflict.

1. Show basic concern for the other person’s well-being. (Our happiness is dependent on the other and vice-versa.)
2. Maintain focus on the problem at hand. (When there’s a willingness to resolve a specific problem, people feel that they’re being heard and it brings both parties closer together.)
3. Refrain from generalizing the conflict. (By keeping the argument restricted to the topic they avoid making disparaging remarks and blowing things out of proportion.)
4. Be willing to engage (When you are both willing to stay and deal with the issue do you find a resolution that you can both live with and the process helps them be more in-tune with each other.)
5. Effectively communicate feelings and needs. (Effectively expressing your emotional needs is even better than the other person magically reading your mind. By being an active agent it opens the door to a more emotional, richer dialogue.

Why can’t insecure couples adopt these practices.

Individuals who are anxious, or avoidants have several aspects that make it difficult for them to adopt these conflict resolution principles.

An anxious partner will have their basic concerns about their partners responsiveness to their needs about being rejected or abandoned. When a conflict arises, they experience many negative thoughts and react by using any behavior to get their partner’s attention. Their response is often dramatic, but ineffective.

An avoidant person is also concerned about their partner not really being their for them, but they will deal with concerns in a totally different way. They will suppress their need for closeness by shutting down emotionally and adopting a sense of independence. The more personal the conflict becomes, the stronger their urge grows to distance themselves from the situation.

Secure Principles can work for any relationship.

If you or your partner has an anxious/avoidant attachment style, you will have to work harder to make the relationship work especially when conflicts arise. Being centered on your own needs and hurts can cause a lot of trouble. You must keep these truths in mind when dealing with conflict.

• A single fight is not a relationship breaker.
• Express your fears! Don’t let them dictate your actions. If you’re afraid that s/he wants to reject you,say so.
• Don’t assume you are to blame for your partner’s  bad mood. It is most likely not because of you.
• Trust that your partner will be caring and responsive and go ahead and express your needs.
• Don’t expect your partner to know what you’re thinking. If you haven’t told him/her what’s on your mind, s/he doesn’t know.

I hope that this series will help you restore your faith in relationships and that they shouldn’t be left to chance. Relationships are one of the most rewarding of human experiences above and beyond other gifts that life has to offer. If couples can understand that a mismatched attachment style can lead to a great deal of unhappiness in relationships and work hard to tend to each other’s relationship well-being, you will give yourself the best shot at finding deeply, gratifying love.

Coach Keith

 

Material based on the book Attached. The New Science of Adult 
Attachment and How It Can Help YOU Find and Keep Love.

Everyone can have Secure Partner! The question is do you want one?

Before I met, PG there was someone in my life that I actually adored. I really thought that she was “the one”, and I never could figure out, why she wasn’t.

We are good friends to this day and she was able to find the person that was right for her, but with the invention of FACEBOOK,  I was curious why we didn’t work out? Simply put, she wasn’t ready for the type of relationship I could provide; stable, secure, BORING.

Everyone can have a partner that is very secure about the relationship. The question is, do you want that type of person in your life? In this age of reality TV, and constant news coverage, it may be hard to fathom being with someone who has a secure relationship style. Due to the lack of drama in their life, it can be perceived they are emotionless, even boring. Quite the contrary, if you have an avoidant attachment style, or and anxious attachment style, a secure person is exactly the person you should seek.

Here’s why:

People that are secure have Buffering Powers.

According to Patrick Keelan as part of his doctoral dissertation from the University of Toronto found that individuals with a secure attachment style are more satisfied in their relationships, but what is even greater about them is they are able to decrease their partner’s insecure relationship satisfaction level.

What you see is not usually what you get!

Individuals with secured attachment styles come in all shapes and sizes. The might be the life of the party, but also the biggest wallflower in the room. One thing is for certain, they can handle any relationship as if it’s by magic.

They possess these superpowers that other attachment styles just can’t master.

1. Can diffuse most conflicts – during a fight, they don’t get defensive, and don’t try to escalate a situation by injuring or punishing their partner.
2. Mentally flexible – not threatened by criticism and can revise their beliefs or strategies if necessary.
3. Effective communicators – they are naturals at expressing their feelings freely and accurately.
4. Don’t play games – They want closeness, so if you are down with that..Step up.
5. They enjoy closeness  for what it is. – And aren’t afraid of it, which is difficult for the anxious if the closeness isn’t t their standards, or the avoid ants, who will bolt at the nearest indication of it.
6. Find it easy to forgive – Feel their partner’s intentions are good, even when they mess up.
7. They don’t try and separate intimacy and sex.
8. If you are in their inner circle, you are treated as such.
9. Secure in their power to improve the relationship.
10. Responsible for their partner’s well-being.

You won’t have time to make up you mind.

A person with a secured attachment style will naturally gravitate toward those people who make them happy. They will not fall prey to the emotional highs and lows that plague anxious individuals and they will not project a false fantasy that you are “the one” and then pull the rug from under your feet when you decide to show your true feelings.

Because they are effective communicators, they will let you know how they feel about you. It will be up to you to determine if you are ready to go the distance. They will take the chance.

So if you  are one of non-secure attachment styles, you must decide very early into the relationship if you can handle that because they will not be around very long for you to make up your mind.

Don’t take Secureds for granted.

You make think you have hit the lottery, when you are able to finally have that secured stable man/woman that you have longed for all your life. But don’t be fooled, you will have to make a concerted effort to move to a more secure frame of mind, which will take some work on your part. You will know if you have pushed things too far, if your once secured partner has taken on the traits that you possess. Let’s hope that never happens.

What do you think about this topic? Have you ever pushed someone who seemed secure out of your life based on your attachment style? If you were able to get them back, how did you do it? I would love to hear?

Coach Keith

To Avoid or Not to Avoid: 8 Tips You can do NOW to Learn to Love!

To avoid, or not to avoid! That is the question, for I have done it all my life because I just can’t meet the right person, or the person I do meet wants me to be “tied down” immediately. Oh, never have I reached down and searched my soul to determine if it was me that could not, would not love.

That is about the change. These 8 tips will help avoidant attachment style individuals take that one step closer to achieving true intimacy instead of relying on severe loneliness, a major accident, or a life changing event to get you there.  Before you begin to practice these steps while you are dating or in a relationship, you will have to acknowledge and understand that you are avoiding love first before you begin. These steps will be a little challenging at first because  it will require that you live in the moment and acknowledge these behaviors in order to change them.

1. Know and understand what deactivating strategies you use. – Look back and figure out why a relationship(s) ended. If you need to speak to your past boyfriends/girlfriends. When these strategies come up again, you will have to stop and think, “Am I doing it again.”
2. Stress mutual support with your partner. If you have a partner that falls into the anxious category, you will have to work so you partner steps back and creates a more secure base, while you  work on not trying to distance yourself. Knowing your styles is crucial at this moment.
3. Find a secure partner. – The more secure the better. It will mean less defensiveness, less fighting and less stress.
4. Don’t always focus on the negative. – When you have a tendency to want to gt out of a relationship, you will focus on any negative behavior in order to get out of it. When you recognize this, remind yourself that your partner isn’t perfect and that you are choosing to live with them as part of what makes them special.
5. Focus on what’s right about your partner daily. At any moment, you are ready to pull the parachute on the relationship. By focusing on what is right about your partner, will help shift your thinking more positively.
6. Stop using your EX as a pawn! They have moved on. – When you are in a different relationship it easy to compare the positive qualities your ex to your current partner. The problem is, while you where in the relationship with your ex, you never acknowledge their positive qualities, so why do it now.
7. “The one” isn’t going to fall out of the sky. A person becomes the one by choosing that person and actively engaging in their life and allowing that person to do the same.
8. Focus on activities and not just emotions. Allow activities to fuel your feelings of love. By doing things together that you both like, will allow your feelings of intimacy to bubble to the surface.

If you implore these coaching tips, you will be on the path of love in no time.

Coach Keith

5 coaching tips for the Anxious to be successful in dating!

People that have the anxious attachment style feel they are usually at the mercy of the person that chooses to date them. It’s understandable to believe that because your emotions usually go into overdrive after every successful date with that special person. The magazines and all of the self-help books don’t help in your journey cause you to act in a way that isn’t authentic to your nature. The books usually tell you to play it safe and don’t show too much emotion in the relationship. So what happens is you continuously attract those individuals that you need to reject, avoidants. Avoidant attachment styles will enjoy the aloofness you are trying to project, because that’s their style. As soon as you flip the script on them and bring out your true personality of wanting to get close, they will run for the hills.

In this coaching session, we will give 5 tips that will help you feel empowered on your next date.

1. Acknowledge and accept your true relationship needs. – You are who you are. If you clearly understand what needs you have an any relationship, it shouldn’t take long to decipher if your partner will be able to meet those needs. If he/she can’t, move on.
2. If you recognize your partner has an avoidant attachment style, cut them loose. You will never be satisfied and will expend a lot of negative energy trying to do so.
3. Be your authentic self and use effective communication.  – The play it cool attitude, the let’s just let the chips fall where they may mantra doesn’t work for you. Set your expectations up front, so there is no guesswork required.
4. Do the opposite! – Instead of thinking that every date you go on, he or she is “the one”, try dating several people without settling on one person very early on. This will allow you to evaluate partners more objectively and rule out those that can’t or won’t meet your needs.
5. Don’t overlook security. It may not be as exciting on the surface because there won’t be a lot of drama, but in the long run the relationship may be the most satisfying. So if you find a secure man/woman they may be a keeper.

By utilizing these 5 tips, you will empower yourself to be more successful in your dating life and will help you take your relationship to the next level.

Coach Keith

How dependent are you? A case study!

This excerpt is taken from the book Attached – The New Science of Adult Attachment and How it Can Help you Find and Keep Love.

A few years ago, our close friend Tamara started dating someone new:

I first noticed Greg at a cocktail party at a friend’s house. He was unbelievably good-looking, and I found the fact that I caught his eye very flattering. A few days later we went our for dinner with some other people, and I couldn’t resist the glimmer of excitement in his eyes when he looked at me. But what I found most enticing were his words and an implicit promise of togetherness that he conveyed. The promise of not being alone. He said things like, “Tamara, you don’t have to be home all by yourself, you can come and work over at my place,” “You can call me an time you like.” There was comfort in these statements: The comfort of belonging to someone, of not being alone in the world.

If I’d only listened carefully, I could have easily heard another message that was incongruent with this promise, a message that made it clear that Greg feared getting too close and was uncomfortable witht he commitment.  Several times he’d mentioned that he’d never had a stable relationship –that for some reason always grew tired of his girlfriends and felt the need to move on……

As we got closer, his messages got more erratic and everthing started to fall apart; he began telling me that he was too busy to meet on this night or that. Sometimes he’d claim that his entire work week looked “crazy” and would ask if we could just meet on the weekend. I’d agree, but inside I had a sinking feeling something was wrong, but what?

After a while, the ups and downs started to take a toll and I could no longer control my emotions. I didn’t know how to act, and despite my better judgement, I’d avoid making plans with friends in case he called. I completley lost interest in everything else that was important to me. Before long the relationship couldn’t withstand the strain and everything soon came to a screeching halt.

One of the reasons dating can be so challenging is because of scenarios just like this. One person becomes attached before the other partner catches up emotionally. Over the course of the week will be helping singles understand their attachment style and how they can use it to their advantage to find the mate of their dreams.

We will first start by analyzing the excerpt.

What do you think of her behavior? Is there something she could have done differently in order to receive a different result.

What about him? Was he being true to himself, or was he just playing her?

Coach Keith