Attracting a Mate

Attracting a mate is easiest when you begin with attracting yourself…

When I was 18, my high school sweetheart broke up with me. Devastated was an understatement. We had been together for two-and-a-half years and he was my first boyfriend. We had said, “I love you,” during our relationship, but from the depths of my pain, I believe it was more like, “I need you.”

That is a hard role to fill for anyone. "I need you" is one sided, and honestly, manipulative. The “I need you,” scenario goes like this:

My self esteem is not the best it could be, so I need someone to fill the void and bolster my confidence, to make me feel like I matter because I do not feel that on my own.

When I have found that someone that I need, I will show them loving gestures so that they will not leave me and continue to fill my need.

If there are things about my relationship that I am not happy with, I will ignore them so as to not upset my significant other and continue to have my need filled.

If my love does leave, I will be crushed because the end of the relationship is another blow to my already low self esteem.

Do you see how there is no authentic giving out of a space of love in the above scenario? The giving comes out of the need to prevent losing the one thing that is filling a void.

I played out the above a few more times in my life until I came into my own. Once I began to have a sense of who I was, what I had to offer and a stronger self-worth, I discovered how miraculous love can be when it begins with giving.

Attracting a mate begins with having enough love within yourself to be able to give love out first. The energy of self-confidence, self-acceptance, and self-love will draw loving people into your life.

How do you attract a mate? Start with stopping the hunt for love. The search for love is a search out of need. Focus instead on challenging yourself to try new things, explore your interests or take on new hobbies. Enjoy the company of your friends and most especially, the company of yourself. Get to a place where you can give love freely, where you no longer feel the need to be with someone.

Once you have someone special in your life and you have created a relationship out of a true space of love, maintaining that balance still takes personal development work. When we learn to depend on someone, we do lose a piece of ourselves.

Many relationships slip from a space of appreciation and wonder to need and frustration. Again, the remedy comes from giving love first. An outpouring of gratitude and love can reestablish the foundation on which harmony is built.

Love is a mirror…what you see is what you give.

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