Datin's advices

Making Online Dating Work

Online dating may be something very easy to get into because all you need is a computer and an Internet connection but if you want it to work for you, well, that’s when things become difficult.

Choose The Online Dating Site Carefully – there are naturally hundreds of online dating sites that you could try out but which one is really the best online dating site for you? Online dating sites that come with a price are usually better since they can assure you of better service, more online dating options but what if you’re cash strapped?

How can you determine which free online dating sites aren’t offering empty promises? If you find yourself in this dilemma, always make steps to search for information. Check out third party reviews on the Internet that discusses and rates online dating websites.

Secondly, try asking out friends and colleagues if they have any online dating site they’d love to recommend. You can also try it out for a day and see what type of people these sites are populated with. If most of the people seem to be crude then surely it’s not the online dating site for you.

Consistency and Communication Matters – Maintaining an online dating relationship with someone is similar to what a person has to go through with a long distance relationship. You have to be consistent with your efforts.

Since this is an “online thing”, make sure that you reply to each and every email or instant message your dating partner sends you. If it’s hard for you to correspond in a regular manner then don’t expect your online dating experience to be a bed of roses all the time.

Honesty Is Still The Best Policy – Because this is online dating and is done through computers, it’s very easy for people to give in to temptation and color the truth a bit. A 26 year old man suddenly becomes 18 and a college student. Someone with thinning hair describes himself as someone with more hair than Rapunzel.

Relationships: Conflict Resolution Without Words

In the last few decades, partners have spent countless hours trying to “work out problems.” Yet over and over again they often come up against a major roadblock: they just don’t see things the same way. No matter how long they talk and how hard they try, neither ends up feeling really heard and understood.

While there are some couples that just naturally see things the same way, most people have a really hard time seeing things through the other person’s eyes. What often happens when they “communicate” is that each person tries to get the other person to see things his or her way. Instead of solving the problem, each is trying to have control over how the other person sees things. This often leads to more conflict and frustration.

While I am not suggesting that couples stop communicating over problems and issues, I am offering an additional way of resolving conflict: taking loving action in your own behalf.

This form of conflict resolution is about action rather than talk. Following are some of the actions you can take that may make a world of difference in your relationship.

LOVING ACTIONS

1. Choose to be compassionate toward yourself and your partner rather than choosing to judge yourself or your partner.

Judging yourself and your partner will always lead to more conflict. Choosing to compassionately care about yourself and your partner can totally change the energy between you, even without words. If you believe that you or your partner are bad or wrong for your feelings, behavior, or point of view, then you will not be able to let go of judgment. You will move toward compassion when you understand and accept that each of you has very good reasons for your feelings, behavior, and point of view. Try compassionately accepting yourself and your partner and see what happens!

2. Choose to practice self-discipline in terms of saying nothing rather than behaving in an inflammatory way toward your partner.

Practice zipping up your mouth! Practice letting go of having to be right! Practice walking away from a conflicted or heated situation, rather than jumping into the fray in the hopes of winning. If you look back, you will see that no one wins when both people are trying to control with anger, blame, explanations, debating, defending, lectures, or compliance. However, if you choose to walk away, walk away with love and compassion – intent on taking loving care of yourself rather than punishing your partner. Walking away in anger is just another way to control.

3. Choose to accept that you have no control over your partner’s feelings and behavior, but that you have total control over your own actions.

It is much easier to let go of trying to control your partner when you move into acceptance regarding who your partner is. Trying to change your partner is a total waste of energy. Changing yourself moves you into personal power.

4. Choose to take loving care of yourself in the face of the other person’s choices.

You will find yourself wanting to talk about problems when you see yourself as a victim of your partner’s choices. However, when you accept your partner for who he or she is and accept your lack of control over your partner, you can then see your way clear toward taking loving action in your own behalf. Asking the question, “What is the loving action toward myself right now?” will lead to ideas of how to take loving care of your self. Asking, “If I were an enlightened being, how would I be acting right now?” will open the door to creative ways of taking loving care of yourself.

Loving actions are actions that support your own highest good without harming your partner. For example, if you are tired of often being frustrated and rushed because your partner is generally late leaving for an event, you might decide to take your own car each time your partner is not ready on time. While your partner might not like your choice, your action is not harmful to him or her. It is an action that stops the power struggle and takes care of your self.

Letting go of trying to change your partner and taking loving action for your self are the keys to conflict resolution without words.

Red Flag Mistreats Others

A common dating problem, and a major warning sign, is when your partner acts one way with you, but behaves very differently around others.

Example situation

John and Mary have been dating for some time now. They like each other a lot, but there is something wrong. Mary is always nice, gentle and forgiving whenever she’s alone with John. In public, however, she argues with everyone else. She’s always dismissive with waiters when she and John are on dates; she’s hostile with other drivers when she’s behind the wheel; and, she’s contemptuous of people she regards as her inferiors. She’s very unpleasant, to say the least, to everyone. Everyone but John. Why is this is a dating problem for John? After all, Mary is a pussycat with him. You might think that John has just managed to “tame the beast” in her. Maybe they really can live together and have a wonderful long-time relationship. You could think that, but time after time you’d be wrong.

What does this behavior mean for the relationship?

Dating a person like Mary is like living with Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Your partner is polite and considerate towards you, but he's hostile and aggressive at the football game. Or he waves vulgarities at other drivers. Or, he belittles wait staff for even the slightest goof. It seems as if there are two people in one body. Unfortunately, the good half of the person never overcomes the bad half.The dating problems you are experiencing are only the beginning. What is a little annoyance on a date can be a real problem when you become a long term couple.

Wonderful at first, terrible later

Your partner’s underlying personality is probably angry, hostile, and condescending. He's just on his best behavior to win you over. He's a phony. If you don’t end this relationship, sooner or later your partner won't need to impress you anymore. As the two of you become more like family, he will treat you just as poorly as he does everyone else. Your dating problems with your partner’s yelling at the waiter will soon evolve into your partner’s yelling at you.

You don't have to put up with that. Rudeness to others will become rudeness to you. It’s more than a dating problem. You should recognize this as a dating red flag and keep looking. How he treats friends, family, and even strangers, is how he will eventually treat you. Throw this fish back and keep trolling.

Dr. Alan Stafford, Relationship Results Coach I help Singles and Couples build relationships that work www.relationshipsuccessexperts.com

Click here to ask Alan a question about your biggest relationship issue http://relationshipsuccessexperts.com/askalan.htm

About The Author

Dr. Stafford is a speaker, writer, class leader, and personal coach on topics important to Singles and Couples. As a relationship coach he helps men and women of all ages find the love of their lives and lives that they love. If you're tired of being alone, or worry you're with the wrong person, call or email Alan for a no cost introductory coaching call to see how personal coaching can benefit you.

You Can’t Change Him – Stop Trying!

No matter how terrific your spouse may seem, nobody’s perfect. This may seem like an obvious statement, but it is one we often need to remind ourselves. When we’re first in a relationship, it’s easy to put someone on a pedestal. The beginning of a relationship can be so much fun that it’s hard to remember that your partner must have flaws.

Forgetting that your partner is imperfect, though, can be dangerous. It makes it hard to keep your expectations on a realistic level.

No matter how well you get along, there are going to be times when you disagree. You’ll also experience times when your partner won’t understand your side of things. Never assume that your partner can read your mind.

Communication is the key to keeping things realistic and functional. Make sure that you understand each other when you’re talking. When you accept that you won’t always agree with each other, but you’ll respect each other, you’re taking a big step.

Remember, people don’t change who they are. They may grow and evolve, but their personalities remain the same. By the age of 20, the majority of us have developed our full set of beliefs, values, and personality traits. By believing that you can change someone, your relationship will be doomed from the beginning.

Think about it, you’re expecting a dramatic change from your partner that you’d never even consider taking on for yourself. This is simply unfair to your partner.

By doing this, you’re essentially getting the relationship off one-sided. If this is the way things are going, it will never work.

Since people don’t change, it is your responsibility to yourself and your potential partner to be realistic. Build solid dating skills that will help you to screen prospective partners. You’ll need to look for people that you won’t feel the urge to change.

If a person is compatible from the start, then the odds are that this person will remain compatible in the future.

Keep in mind that compatible doesn’t mean perfect. It just means that the person has characteristics you enjoy, and that you don’t feel the need to change.

By keeping this in mind, you’ll be much more realistic when you date, and will be much more fair. You’ll end up in happier relationships, and your expectations will be more achievable. You’ll also find that you’re much happier with the people you choose. The stress is much lower when you accept people for who they are and don’t have to remodel them.

The Lost Art of Listening

How many times have you found your attention wandering when listening to a boring speaker? How many times have you nodded your head in understanding even though you may have missed the main point? There is nothing wrong or irregular in this behavior. It happens to all of us, all the time. We may hear what another person is saying but unless we listen we can’t comprehend what he is saying.

How do we learn to listen? It is not difficult. All that it needs is some discipline and self-training. The first thing is to control your thoughts. You cannot be a good listener if you allow your thoughts to wander. This happens most often when some word or statement made by the speaker triggers your memory, and you drift off. You therefore need to pull your thoughts backs, and refocus. This is not easy, because the mind is a powerhouse. It flies in all directions, many times without your bidding.

A good way to make your mind focus is to train your mind to stay focused for long periods of time. You can do this by listening to a radio or a television or recorded speech. You let the speech run for a fixed time, say five minutes to start with. If your mind loses track of what the speaker is saying, then restart the speech. Do it with different speeches till you can listen without a break for five minutes. Next, increase this time to ten minutes, and repeat the exercise.

You will find that you can concentrate better, and comprehend what the speaker is saying. You now need to repeat the exercise using a video, where the speaker waves his hands or stops for effect or rattles off sentences. You will find that very often these minor things send your mind on its own trip. You need to stop the mind from doing so. In other words, you must not allow yourself to be distracted by the dress, mannerisms or the activity going around the speaker.

You are now ready to listen to people in real life. Your mind will stay focused, and you will find that you are a better listener now. What’s more you will find that better listeners are also better understood. This is because your response will be in keeping with the expectations of the speaker.

Do You Know What Romance Is?

Romance is the spice of life. It's not difficult to visualize how dull and boring life would be without romance. Have you ever paused to wonder what it is that brings enthusiasm in life? Romance is that elixir that makes you vibrant, vivacious and full of vitality. Everyone has their own idea of romance and romantic ideas, what are your ideas of romance?

In the lines, by Shirley Bassey "I'd like to run away from you, but if you didn't come, and find me ... I would die." the essence of love and romance has been beautifully depicted. Romance is something that gives comforting touch to one's heart. Someone who's sensitive about his or her beloved's need, is romantic. Just being a hard-core romantic and not demonstrating your love openly is so unromantic. You need to put other work aside and show to your sweet heart that you care for him or her. The idea of romance can be as simple as a peck on a cheek, a warm hug or just uttering those three miraculous words "I love you." These gestures appear romantic when your beloved is least expecting them, otherwise they are the boring hackneyed way of saying that you care. Novel romantic ideas are like, "life and blood" of any romantic relationship.

For some people romance means the spirit of adventure, a sense of anticipation of the unexpected, a view of exciting spectacles at every bend of the road. For many others romance involves the mysterious and the unknown. Like 'magic casements opening on the foam of perilous seas,' as Keats would put it. Romance sweeps in all the treasured experiences from the mysterious to the magical and the miraculous. Yet for most of us romance is an expression of love. When we talk of romantic ideas we refer to all the little things that can keep the flame of love burning bright in our hearts.

We all know that it isn't enough to love a person; it is equally important to express our love in a relationship. Love without expression is as good as not there. You need to show your love, not only in words but also in gestures that speak louder than words. You have to devise novel ways of letting your love know how much you care. You have to find new ideas to express your love every day, if not every moment. Thinking of novel ways of saying 'I love you' is what romantic ideas are all about.

Everyone is not a poet, yet everyone needs to kindle the flame of love lest it fades away. This site on romantic ideas is a treasure house of fresh romantic ideas. The charm of an idea lies in its freshness, and nothing goes stale faster than ideas. So, look for absolutely novel romantic ideas to let the warm Love in!