by Vicky Denvise
10 September 2009
Funny how we often know more about what we don’t want and what we don’t like, than what we want and like. At the same time we marvel at why we so often end up getting what we don’t want nor like.
What about you? Are you still looking for Mr or Miss Right, yet constantly keep bumping into all the Mr and Miss Wrongs?
According to one of the fads of our time, the Law of Attraction, we tend to attract into our lives precisely what we focus on. And just as the law of gravity will pull something downwards, regardless of it falling on its top or bottom, so will the law of attraction pull things, people, situations towards you in both the positive and negative ways. If your focus point is on the negative (what you don’t want or like), the universe has no concept of the suffix “don’t”. You will end up getting this time and time again until you shift your focus towards what you want and like.
Bogus? Maybe.
Personally, I think there is some truth to it. A couple of years before the film “The Secret” was even produced and the law of attraction ever mentioned in mainstream media, I put this to the test. Without even realizing that I was doing so.
At the time I had come out of my second semi serious relationship after my divorce. I had been brave and done what I thought needed to “put myself out there” in the dating and romantic scene. And I was just not getting it right.
Not that I was the only one, mind you. My social circle was increasing to include almost exclusively Second and Third Time Singles. Plus the odd Fourth Time. In the end we were about 12 - 15 women who would share our war stories and compare wounds on a weekly basis over coffee and wine meetings. Occasionally Patty would join us. She was the only one who somehow seemed to be ecstatically in love and happy in a committed relationship that had lasted for years. She was the first of the crowd to get divorced at an early age and did not have the comfort of fellow Second Singles when she was alone. While the rest of us continued in our blissful or fighting relationships respectively, she was left to figure the single life all by herself. Before any of us could even join her as the Second Single, she was already back in a committed relationship. This time around, with the Dream Guy (a status her first hubby never held, even in the early days).
Some fake it. Patty did not. Even after years and the problems they had because she had children from a first marriage and he did not, Patty and the Dream Guy really had a good thing going.
The Single Club put this down to luck. Patty was just blessed to have been in the right place at the right time.
Patty disagreed.
She shared with us her secret and urged us to follow suit. Instead of being blinded by good looks where the wrapping just didn’t disclose the true nature of the content (case of False Advertising) and complaining about the lack in our current romantic non-potentials, we were told to be specific about WHAT WE WANTED. Patty instructed us to even write a list with the qualities we wanted in our Dream Guy.
She had done this while still being single and it made her aware of the qualities that she found attractive in a man. As she became more aware of what she wanted, she actually spotted these exact qualities in a guy she had been around for the past couple of years, yet never really noticed. She was just about to switch jobs at this point and just in the nick of time, she sat up and took notice of one her soon to be ex-colleagues. Apparently he had had a thing for her for quite some time, but had a feeling that she was not even vaguely interested in him. Which she had not been, until the said List was written. The moment her eyes just slightly opened towards him, he sensed the change in the vibes and was there on the spot. At the precise perfect time, he invited her out on a date.
The rest was history. Or her story, since it was Patty who told us about it.
No one in the Single Club sat up and took any notice to Patty and her advice. No one but me, that is. While the others were still convinced that Patty and Dream Guy was nothing but sheer luck, I sharpened my pencil and wrote my list.
I wrote and I wrote.
Proudly I presented my list to Patty and the Single Club. All 37 points. Patty was mortified. “My God,” she gasped, “I have ruined you! You can never find any one who can live up to a list of 37 requirements!”
It turns out Patty had had less than 10 on her famous List.
I looked at my list. There was no way I could trim it down once I had put it all on paper. Which should I strike off? Honest? Creative? Responsible? I would die having to be with someone who was irresponsible, dishonest AND boring!
The only requirement that I had listed that was not as bold as the other 36 was the one where I put “Preferably goodlooking”. I could, if need be to get the list down a little, strike that one. As long as it only went down to “ordinary” and not “ugly”. After all, I could do “ordinary” if I got all the other 36 qualities. (I am not shallow, thank you, very much!)
Patty was still not convinced, but had no more advice to give. Merciless, I went out into the world with my 37 point list, minus maybe the one point in the spirit of not demanding too much.
Fate had it - or the Law of Attraction (?) - that a few weeks later I was sent on a conference through my job. It was held at a hotel in the middle of no where across the country. I knew no one else going there.
Already the first day I noticed some one notice me. A man. From across the room of about 100 people. I tested this throughout the day as I mingled and moved in every break. His discreet, but definite glances at me made me sure about his interest. Finally he approached me and introduced himself. The rest of the day he kept his distance, but I felt him looking and keeping tabs on me. I really enjoyed the attention.
During the dinner that evening he made sure to end up right next to me. The evening was amazing. We talked way beyond the dinner and the cleaning crew had to politely request us to leave after they had cleaned up everything else and we still sat at the dinner table talking.
We talked until the early hours of the morning and by the time the conference ended, he was telling me that he hardly slept, thinking, “She is the one that must not slip away.” I was charmed beyond my wits.
Already during those first few days I suspected this was Mr 37 (well, he looked ordinary, so my humble subtraction came through). During the weeks that passed following, everything confirmed that he indeed was Mr # 37 (minus 1).
I even made Patty and the other members of the Single Club go through the list with me and check off point by point. The verdict was clear. The List had worked once again. The doubters of the Single Club were slightly becoming believers.
So, do I end now with the Happy Ever After? Concluding my story that I joined Patty and made a club for Lists leading to Dream Guys? Well, not quite.
The problem is, and this was very clear to me already from the first minute, I had forgotten one requirement on my List. The one that turned out to be the most important one of all. My # 38: “I will be deadly attracted to him.” I had forgotten to be specific about that one and that was the only thing missing.
Mr # 37 lived across the country from me. He made it a point to call at least once a day and talk for hours. I met him several times, in the hope that maybe I was just a wee-bit damaged goods from the previous relationships gone sour and that the attraction would come given time. Good theory. Not related to reality, though.
I never went beyond holding hands with him. The few times he tried to cuttle and kiss me, my body reacted before my mind even had to mediate and force myself to give it a go. I just either backed off or pushed him away. Looking back on this, I would have thought he would have give up or written me off as some sort of nut case. That doesn’t happen, though, when you request on your list “Considerate”, “Patient”...
Apparently, he was set on not letting me slip away and was in no hurry to pressure me into anything before I was ready. This being said, he seemed to consider us in a relationship. So much so, that when I felt the need to break it to him that we never were going to be an item, it had more the undertones of breaking up.
Even this was difficult. (“Committed and will go the extra mile when the going gets rough” on the List) I had a hard time facing him and being honest about the part of not being attracted to him. How do you tell the sweetest person in the world, who adores you more than anything, that the thought of kissing him repulses you and that you probably never would stomach having sex again if you even considered having it with him? So I took the “milder” way out and lied. I told him I had been through the ups and downs of a distant relationship before and could not deal with it. I could not focus on my daily life, if I was overwhelmed by longing for the next meet. Knowing he had two teenagers who lived with him more than 50% of the time and had a great job he loved, I hoped that he would come to terms with “life being damn unfair sometimes.” (It was just as inconceivable for me to move, as far as he knew. Little did he know I would uproot and move for love at the bat of the eye, even to ends of the planet...)
Even this backfired on me. He called back the next day telling me he had discussed moving with his children and ex-wife, and had started making arrangements to relocate his job. (“Persistent”)
I had created a Monster! I had long started to hate my List of 37 points (minus 1). Not too mention, I had a slight disliking for Patty, who was following on the sideline. With no advice to give. We were both in unknown territory on this one.
In the end I had to put it to him brutally and even though I really would have loved to have him as a friend, I had to cut him totally out of my life. I missed his friendship, I really did. I even thought of him on occasion during the following years (Chapter 2 of Mr # 37 can follow if anyone is interested. “The next Chronicle of the Cursed List”). I was not sad, though, to be free from his intense hope that I was The One for him. Because he was so not The One for me.
When I years later was introduced to the Law of Attraction and saw the movie “The Secret”, I was not difficult to sell the idea to. I had first hand experience in the power of focusing on what you want and seeing it come straight at you like a bulldozer.
The lesson I learnt, though, is to be very CLEAR in getting the most important things in place. What you think should go without saying must be specifically clear. Especially if you write a list.
I have never written another list and I guess that is why I am still single. Since Mr # 37 (minus one) I have had my romantic trial and failures, but have not really put any energy into any of it. I have instead invested wholly in me. Nowadays, though, I am ready for the Real Deal and trying to prepare myself for it.
Will I write a list again? Maybe.
Will it have 37 points? Maybe.
What is not a maybe is this; the first point on my list, which will be written in bold letters: “He and I will fall deeply and magically in love, with passion and attraction, and both will joyfully and with ease commit to this rare, blessed connection.”
That might just be the only point on my list.
Funny how we often know more about what we don’t want and what we don’t like, than what we want and like. At the same time we marvel at why we so often end up getting what we don’t want nor like.
What about you? Are you still looking for Mr or Miss Right, yet constantly keep bumping into all the Mr and Miss Wrongs?
According to one of the fads of our time, the Law of Attraction, we tend to attract into our lives precisely what we focus on. And just as the law of gravity will pull something downwards, regardless of it falling on its top or bottom, so will the law of attraction pull things, people, situations towards you in both the positive and negative ways. If your focus point is on the negative (what you don’t want or like), the universe has no concept of the suffix “don’t”. You will end up getting this time and time again until you shift your focus towards what you want and like.
Bogus? Maybe.
Personally, I think there is some truth to it. A couple of years before the film “The Secret” was even produced and the law of attraction ever mentioned in mainstream media, I put this to the test. Without even realizing that I was doing so.
At the time I had come out of my second semi serious relationship after my divorce. I had been brave and done what I thought needed to “put myself out there” in the dating and romantic scene. And I was just not getting it right.
Not that I was the only one, mind you. My social circle was increasing to include almost exclusively Second and Third Time Singles. Plus the odd Fourth Time. In the end we were about 12 - 15 women who would share our war stories and compare wounds on a weekly basis over coffee and wine meetings. Occasionally Patty would join us. She was the only one who somehow seemed to be ecstatically in love and happy in a committed relationship that had lasted for years. She was the first of the crowd to get divorced at an early age and did not have the comfort of fellow Second Singles when she was alone. While the rest of us continued in our blissful or fighting relationships respectively, she was left to figure the single life all by herself. Before any of us could even join her as the Second Single, she was already back in a committed relationship. This time around, with the Dream Guy (a status her first hubby never held, even in the early days).
Some fake it. Patty did not. Even after years and the problems they had because she had children from a first marriage and he did not, Patty and the Dream Guy really had a good thing going.
The Single Club put this down to luck. Patty was just blessed to have been in the right place at the right time.
Patty disagreed.
She shared with us her secret and urged us to follow suit. Instead of being blinded by good looks where the wrapping just didn’t disclose the true nature of the content (case of False Advertising) and complaining about the lack in our current romantic non-potentials, we were told to be specific about WHAT WE WANTED. Patty instructed us to even write a list with the qualities we wanted in our Dream Guy.
She had done this while still being single and it made her aware of the qualities that she found attractive in a man. As she became more aware of what she wanted, she actually spotted these exact qualities in a guy she had been around for the past couple of years, yet never really noticed. She was just about to switch jobs at this point and just in the nick of time, she sat up and took notice of one her soon to be ex-colleagues. Apparently he had had a thing for her for quite some time, but had a feeling that she was not even vaguely interested in him. Which she had not been, until the said List was written. The moment her eyes just slightly opened towards him, he sensed the change in the vibes and was there on the spot. At the precise perfect time, he invited her out on a date.
The rest was history. Or her story, since it was Patty who told us about it.
No one in the Single Club sat up and took any notice to Patty and her advice. No one but me, that is. While the others were still convinced that Patty and Dream Guy was nothing but sheer luck, I sharpened my pencil and wrote my list.
I wrote and I wrote.
Proudly I presented my list to Patty and the Single Club. All 37 points. Patty was mortified. “My God,” she gasped, “I have ruined you! You can never find any one who can live up to a list of 37 requirements!”
It turns out Patty had had less than 10 on her famous List.
I looked at my list. There was no way I could trim it down once I had put it all on paper. Which should I strike off? Honest? Creative? Responsible? I would die having to be with someone who was irresponsible, dishonest AND boring!
The only requirement that I had listed that was not as bold as the other 36 was the one where I put “Preferably goodlooking”. I could, if need be to get the list down a little, strike that one. As long as it only went down to “ordinary” and not “ugly”. After all, I could do “ordinary” if I got all the other 36 qualities. (I am not shallow, thank you, very much!)
Patty was still not convinced, but had no more advice to give. Merciless, I went out into the world with my 37 point list, minus maybe the one point in the spirit of not demanding too much.
Fate had it - or the Law of Attraction (?) - that a few weeks later I was sent on a conference through my job. It was held at a hotel in the middle of no where across the country. I knew no one else going there.
Already the first day I noticed some one notice me. A man. From across the room of about 100 people. I tested this throughout the day as I mingled and moved in every break. His discreet, but definite glances at me made me sure about his interest. Finally he approached me and introduced himself. The rest of the day he kept his distance, but I felt him looking and keeping tabs on me. I really enjoyed the attention.
During the dinner that evening he made sure to end up right next to me. The evening was amazing. We talked way beyond the dinner and the cleaning crew had to politely request us to leave after they had cleaned up everything else and we still sat at the dinner table talking.
We talked until the early hours of the morning and by the time the conference ended, he was telling me that he hardly slept, thinking, “She is the one that must not slip away.” I was charmed beyond my wits.
Already during those first few days I suspected this was Mr 37 (well, he looked ordinary, so my humble subtraction came through). During the weeks that passed following, everything confirmed that he indeed was Mr # 37 (minus 1).
I even made Patty and the other members of the Single Club go through the list with me and check off point by point. The verdict was clear. The List had worked once again. The doubters of the Single Club were slightly becoming believers.
So, do I end now with the Happy Ever After? Concluding my story that I joined Patty and made a club for Lists leading to Dream Guys? Well, not quite.
The problem is, and this was very clear to me already from the first minute, I had forgotten one requirement on my List. The one that turned out to be the most important one of all. My # 38: “I will be deadly attracted to him.” I had forgotten to be specific about that one and that was the only thing missing.
Mr # 37 lived across the country from me. He made it a point to call at least once a day and talk for hours. I met him several times, in the hope that maybe I was just a wee-bit damaged goods from the previous relationships gone sour and that the attraction would come given time. Good theory. Not related to reality, though.
I never went beyond holding hands with him. The few times he tried to cuttle and kiss me, my body reacted before my mind even had to mediate and force myself to give it a go. I just either backed off or pushed him away. Looking back on this, I would have thought he would have give up or written me off as some sort of nut case. That doesn’t happen, though, when you request on your list “Considerate”, “Patient”...
Apparently, he was set on not letting me slip away and was in no hurry to pressure me into anything before I was ready. This being said, he seemed to consider us in a relationship. So much so, that when I felt the need to break it to him that we never were going to be an item, it had more the undertones of breaking up.
Even this was difficult. (“Committed and will go the extra mile when the going gets rough” on the List) I had a hard time facing him and being honest about the part of not being attracted to him. How do you tell the sweetest person in the world, who adores you more than anything, that the thought of kissing him repulses you and that you probably never would stomach having sex again if you even considered having it with him? So I took the “milder” way out and lied. I told him I had been through the ups and downs of a distant relationship before and could not deal with it. I could not focus on my daily life, if I was overwhelmed by longing for the next meet. Knowing he had two teenagers who lived with him more than 50% of the time and had a great job he loved, I hoped that he would come to terms with “life being damn unfair sometimes.” (It was just as inconceivable for me to move, as far as he knew. Little did he know I would uproot and move for love at the bat of the eye, even to ends of the planet...)
Even this backfired on me. He called back the next day telling me he had discussed moving with his children and ex-wife, and had started making arrangements to relocate his job. (“Persistent”)
I had created a Monster! I had long started to hate my List of 37 points (minus 1). Not too mention, I had a slight disliking for Patty, who was following on the sideline. With no advice to give. We were both in unknown territory on this one.
In the end I had to put it to him brutally and even though I really would have loved to have him as a friend, I had to cut him totally out of my life. I missed his friendship, I really did. I even thought of him on occasion during the following years (Chapter 2 of Mr # 37 can follow if anyone is interested. “The next Chronicle of the Cursed List”). I was not sad, though, to be free from his intense hope that I was The One for him. Because he was so not The One for me.
When I years later was introduced to the Law of Attraction and saw the movie “The Secret”, I was not difficult to sell the idea to. I had first hand experience in the power of focusing on what you want and seeing it come straight at you like a bulldozer.
The lesson I learnt, though, is to be very CLEAR in getting the most important things in place. What you think should go without saying must be specifically clear. Especially if you write a list.
I have never written another list and I guess that is why I am still single. Since Mr # 37 (minus one) I have had my romantic trial and failures, but have not really put any energy into any of it. I have instead invested wholly in me. Nowadays, though, I am ready for the Real Deal and trying to prepare myself for it.
Will I write a list again? Maybe.
Will it have 37 points? Maybe.
What is not a maybe is this; the first point on my list, which will be written in bold letters: “He and I will fall deeply and magically in love, with passion and attraction, and both will joyfully and with ease commit to this rare, blessed connection.”
That might just be the only point on my list.
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