Love and Relationship Advice Blog

It only takes a few minutes to know if you've found your perfect match. Well, that's the hope and an intention behind the practice of speed dating. This manner of meeting potential mates usually involves a structured and timed setting in a restaurant, bar or other location where participants have a series of 3-8 minute mini-dates with various people they don't know or have just met. Speed dating has been portrayed in movies and tv shows and maybe you're wondering if this is the way you can finally find your Mr. or Ms. Right.

Is it possible to find a partner-- even your soul mate-- in such a short span of time? Is this a good idea in the first place or are you just asking for trouble? Speed dating has been billed as a great fit for matchmaking in our high-speed society.

We confess, we've never experienced speed dating, but we can offer suggestions and advice based on what we have learned about relationships and attracting the partner of your dreams. These love lessons have come from personal experience as well as from years of coaching relationship clients and listening to our many readers.

Perhaps the biggest point we want to make is that, in our opinion, speed dating is neither the magic answer to finding love nor is it necessarily a wrong way turn in the often confusing path on which dating can take you. You never know where or when you'll attract the partner and relationship you've been wanting. It could just as easily be a slowly-developing friendship turned romance with someone you knew in high school or literally a love at first sight encounter during a speed date.

Here's Renee's speed dating experience...

Renee can't believe she let her friends drag her to this speed date night at a local cafe. Yes, Renee would like to be in a relationship and misses having a special someone to share her life with, but this just seems ridiculous.

After all, how can you find a truly meaningful relationship in a 5 minute interaction? Despite her misgivings about this whole thing, Renee finds herself nervous and feeling self-conscious. What if there actually is a man she's interested in at this event? And, worse yet, what if he doesn't find her attractive or interesting? As she takes a sip of coffee and prepares for the speed dating to begin, Renee's stomach churns.

If you're looking for love, focus more on staying open...

During those few minutes while speed dating, relax and make it your first intention to have a good time. Don't work so hard at “finding” or “looking for” love. Instead, stay open and aware of how you feel when with this person. Perhaps he or she doesn't look like someone you'd expect to date. Or maybe his or her job or life is different than yours and you just can't see yourself with a mate like this.

Try not to close down when finding out information or seeing a face that is not what you think you're looking for. Instead, suspend your judgments for these few minutes. When the mini-date is over, you can decide whether you'd like to get to know even more about this person or if you'll take a pass.

Renee manages to take a deep breath before her first speed date begins. She tries to keep her attention on merely meeting new people rather than finding her Mr. Right. This helps ease her nervousness and takes some pressure off.

Be honest and the fabulous you that you are...

Resist any inclinations to pretend to be anything other than who you are. Perhaps you feel like your life just isn't all that enthralling and you want to spice yourself up with a few exaggerations or fibs. Don't do it! In the movies it may seem easy, fun and impressive to pretend to be a doctor when you're not but is this really how you want to start a potential relationship?

Instead, be honest about who you are and proud too! Of course, nobody likes a braggart, but it's equally a turn off to be with someone who can't stand who he or she is. Before you start a speed date, give yourself a pep talk and celebrate the really unique and great things about you. You don't have to list them off to your date; they will shine through.

Towards the end of the evening, Renee feels tired but also exhilarated. She's actually had fun with this speed dating thing. She met some interesting guys-- even a few she'd like to get to know better-- and she's taken a step toward attracting the relationship she's always wanted.

Relax and have fun whether you choose to speed date or engage in some other form of dating. It's all about getting to know people, letting others know how wonderful you are, and recognizing when you match up with another. Let your feelings be your guide about the level and kind of connection you want with those you are meeting. When you feel great and alive around him or her, that's probably your cue to keep going!

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Posted by Susie and Otto Collins at 02:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This past weekend, we gave what we think was our best ever presentation on the soul mate spark--how to get it and how to keep it. As we were talking with people from the audience, it was abundantly clear that many had felt the thrill of finding a "soul mate" and only to have the relationship lapse into "ordinary" and full of disagreements.

What we told them was that once you find your soul mate, you can keep the passion and even deepen it throughout the years. Your relationship doesn't have to become empty and lifeless as a lot of long-term relationships seem to be.

One bit of relationship advice is to keep loving with abandon as you did when you were first together.

Even if you have been together for many years, you can go back to that feeling.

Here are a couple of ways you can begin doing that...

1. Remember physical touch? Try touching with the intention to connect.

So often we give someone a hug, especially those we love and see each other every day, without really connecting with that person as we hug. We're thinking about what we have to do that day. We're not even looking at our loved one!

Change your way of hugging by bringing your awareness to how much you love that person as you are hugging him or her. Don't say a word and watch how your relationship changes as you do this.

2. Make a loving connection throughout the day in some way.

If it isn't possible to physically phone, email or text your special person, simply direct your thoughts to how much you love and want to be with him or her. Actually build excitement to be with this other person. As your excitement builds, so will the other person's desire to be with you.

We often say that in order to have what you want you have to move toward it and not do things that take you away from it.

Start doing at least one thing today that will reignite your love for each other.

Posted by Susie and Otto Collins at 12:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When people talk about finding and keeping the partner that they truly want to spend their lives with, the discussion invariably gets around to the topic of "soul mates."

We talk about the soul mate spark because that's what we think people are really looking for--that special feeling of connection, like you've "come home," like you never want to part.

While many people do find this in a partner, including us, there are some pitfalls around the whole soul mate mystique.

One of those pitfalls is the belief that soul mates don't have conflicts and no major issues to work through. They have pure bliss all of the time.

We wish this were true but it just isn't for most of us.

This belief is why some people get so upset and disenchanted when they find that perfect someone who they think is a soul mate and it turns sour after a few months or even weeks.

It turns out that there are things about their soul mate that drive them crazy. There are conflicts and the specialness just seems to have disappeared.

Our take on soul mates is a little different from the mystique and it may help you make more sense out of the whole soul mate and relationship thing.

We believe that there are many soul mates out there for different times in our lives and they come into our lives not only to bring us greater joy but to help us with our personal and spiritual growth.

A soul mate agrees to walk with you for awhile to learn and also teach. A soul mate relationship is a spiritual bond and the challenges that come up are the soul lessons that you have agreed to learn together.

We also believe that just as your various soulmates can enter your life "for a time, a reason or a season"-- we also believe that soul mates can part when there's no more growth and learning.

Before you think we've gone a little to far "out there" or "woo-woo" with this one. consider this...

Regardless of the kind of relationship you're talking about, if the relationship is truly close and connected-- there's a certain spiritual quality to them. Soul mate kind of relationships are no different.

It's been our experience that when two people come together and it feels like a soul mate kind of experience, it can feel like destiny or some sort of divine intervention has been gifted to you or interceded on your behalf.

So what's the soul mate spark?

It's that spark of desire to draw closer and connect with a love and passion that keeps growing throughout the years.

Is it possible?

We know it is because we and others have it--and we also believe that you can create it.

Here are a few ways...

1. Make a soul mate commitment.

Commit the time and the energy to growing your passion and love for each other. Even 10 minutes a day of true
connection can help rejuvenate a relationship that was once close and now seems disconnected.

2. Kindness matters

We have often seen partners in committed relationships treat each other with less respect than they do strangers.

Take a fresh look at how you treat those closest to you and treat them as the special soul partners that they truly are--with kindness and respect.

3. Be curious about yourself and your mate.

When you find yourself being triggered by your partner or the people closest to you, take a moment and get curious
instead of reacting. It's easier said than done, we know, but just try it.

Get curious enough to just listen to find out what's truly going on between you. Listen to what's underneath the
disturbance. What want, need or desire is trying to be expressed for both of you? Listen from your heart.

4. Make one small shift.

Ask yourself these questions--"What do I want?" "What do I care about right now?" "Do I want to be right or do I want connection?"

What actions or words will bring you closer to rather than further from what you want and what you care about?

One small shift, like simply pausing before you email someone in anger, can make a big impact on your relationship and can make the difference between keeping your spark alive and letting it die over time.

We all choose our partners for different reasons and some we consider our soul mate and some not.

If you want to keep, grow or rekindle the spark between you, start doing a few things each day to nurture it.

If you aren't currently with any one you consider to be a soul mate, you might begin practicing as if he or she is with you in the form of the people who are in your life right now.

Posted by Susie and Otto Collins at 04:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)