A relationship expert advises ditching the idea that you need to search for that person.
Most of our popular ideas about how love comes into our lives are clustered around the concept of seeking it outside of ourselves. We are searching for love and hoping to find The One. We are people who are seeking the right man or woman for us as romantic partners. When we do happen to discover or stumble upon the right person, we assume that we will be ready to give and receive love in a relationship.
But the popular self-help book Calling in “The One” by Katherine Woodward Thomas asks love-seekers to question this established approach and look within themselves instead as they begin the process of attracting — rather than searching — for a mate. Thomas herself was single and searching for a husband when, at age 40, she began to question why she still hadn’t met her soul mate: “For years I told [people who asked why I wasn’t married] that it was because I hadn’t met the right person. Eventually, though, I began to secretly wonder if it was because I’d never been the right person.”
Soon after that, Thomas began an inner process of envisioning the type of relationship she wanted and releasing old patterns from her life. She chronicled this process (which led her to meeting and marrying her husband, Mark) in her book, along with her advice for others who also want to do the inner work she believes to be essential for attracting a life partner. The book also includes some exercises based on the premise that “the real obstacles to attracting love are not outside us, but within us.”
Envision the relationship you want to be in
Thomas, a licensed psychotherapist, says that many of her clients are stymied in their quests for love partly because they cannot envision themselves being in a loving relationship with someone else. “Until you are able to see yourself living the life that you truly want,” Thomas counsels, “it will be difficult for you to create it.” Calling in “The One” offers a number of concrete exercises — such as creating a collage of lifelong dreams and writing the story of one’s life as if it were a fairy tale that ends with all of your wishes fulfilled — that helps the reader identify his or her personal vision of a truly satisfying relationship. “It was fun to imagine the ideal life that I wanted for myself,” Carly C. says. “I enjoyed thinking about my ‘dream’ soul mate, and then relaxing and letting it go rather than struggling and feeling anxious about whether he would ever enter my life.”
Release any toxic ties and let go of the past
In her book, Thomas explains that the relationships we form “have the capacity to nurture and inspire our growth” or to “block the experience and expression of love in our lives.” Thomas identifies “toxic ties” as attachments “that cause us to lose personal power.” These attachments can include prior romantic partners, friends or relatives, and when we don’t release these “toxic ties,” they can prevent us from moving forward with our love lives and keep us from attracting a partner who nurtures and supports us.
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