Be Your Own Love Coach

Finished another book - Be Your Own Love Coach (Ways to help you find and keep your soulmate) by Ariana Gee and Mary Gregory.

When my friend (you know who you are) suggested that I buy the book, I was kinda embarrassed and thought to myself "It must be one of the cheesy self(proclaimed) help books". Even when I started the 1st chapter, I was still very skeptical about actually finishing through with it cos it sounded lame, with lots of exercises and journal that you have to do and keep.

But surprisingly, it was very enlightening, especially since I'm on a self-discovering quest right now. And I would once again suggest that you read it for yourself - whether you are single, looking for a partner, or already married with kids.

I'd say it gave me more confidence cos it helped me to become more aware of me as a person, what I want in life and how to start towards getting there.

What the book is about:
- it starts off by making you aware that you are responsible for your own life (nobody else is) and to start anew, you need to start taking responsibilty for your thoughts and your actions

- then it talks about clearing your clutter (whatever role models and beliefs you have absorbed from your childhood experience or from past relationships)

- only then can you begin to really discover who you are inside and outside (your strengths and weakness, your needs, what you want in life etc)

- Once you know yourself, you need to LOVE your own life first (review the life balance spectrum: Home Environment; Money & Assets; Learning & Growing; Meaningful Work; Fun & Leisure; Loving Relationship; Physical Health; Support Network. All of these affect a person's values & beliefs, attitudes, needs & desires and emotions.)

- to know What you Really Want (independence or interdependence in a relationship? Developing your requirements for your relationship and establishing a list of top 5 Values that you will hold through the relationships)

- so that it will help you find the right partner (you become the chooser)

- then it goes on to teach you how to love for the long haul (committment, power struggle, escape vs active participation, conscious loving, communication, regular checks, tolerations in a relationship etc.)

Some great quotes that were in the book:

- Chance favors only the open mind. Anon.

- What lies behind us, and what lies before us are tiny matters, compared to what lies within. Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82)

- Seldom or never does a marriage develop into an individual relationship smoothly without crisis. There is no birth of consciousness without pain. Carl Jung, (1875-1961)

- No one can persuade another to change. Each of us guards a gate of change that can only be opened from inside. We cannot open the gate of another, either by argument or emotional appeal. Marilyn Ferguson (b.1938)

And these two particularly spoke out to me:
- Today can be the beginning of a new life for each of us. We can choose joy right now. We can share love today. We can live in delight starting at this moment. It doesn't matter how miserable our past has been. Our present can be full of joy and our future can be full of happiness. It doesn't matter if we are eight or eighty; we can still make our lives wonderful. Life isn't over until your last heartbeat. Start today, then, to make your heart beat with joy, love and light. Joseph J. Mazzella

- I'm not willing to gamble my whole life on someone who is not quite sure. I'm still looking for something more extraordinary than that.
From Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding (b. 1960)

Some other meaningful phrases from the book that I'd like to remember:
- Commitment is about taking action, and not just half-hearted action, but action with the full intention of doing something different

- So what would it be like to wake up to who you truly are, to recognise what it is that you really want from life, to acknowledge your strengths and overcome the fears that may get in the way of achieving what you really want?

- Some of us lose sight of ourselves in a relationship because we're not altogether sure who we are and what we want and need.

- Feeling good about ourselves in our own right, not at the expense of someone else or at the cost of our own fulfilment, is important whether you are in a relationship or not.

- Have you ever noticed that when you feel good, then good things seem to happen?

- "Learning to love yourself" is the root to everything

- Our definition of a successful life is one where there is balance, where individuals are able to love and accept themselves with all their strengths and flaws, and, through being themselves, to create relationships and opportunities that fulfil them and others around them.

- Requirements are like a list of criteria that are based on your personal values and needs, which you can use to help you make decisions about whether someone would be the sort of partner with whom you could happily and lovingly live your ideal life.

- Expectations tends to close us down, whereas wondering opens us up to possibility.

- Loving someone is different from being in love with them. When you love someone, you may care for them, give to them, cherish and adore them, but you hold on to a sense of your own self as well and know that it's important to take care of yourself, too.
Being 'in love' is like falling under a spell. We become irritational, we go out of the way to do anything we can for the other person, even to the extent of abandoning our own needs.

- Entertain and hold the notion for yourself that loving someone is a far healthier and happier thing to be doing than being 'in love' with someone.

- It's a well-worn cliche that you have to work at a relationship; and yet, so many of us rarely do so with any degree of awareness. We are shocked when we face our first conflict, and may even feel let down when we find the person we were so sure was our soulmate proves not to be perfect after all. But then, you're not perfect either, nor is any of us.

- What we can strive for, is to be good enough