Choosing Love

I think love is a choice. It is one you get the chance to make over and over, and we do. With varying success. My mentor Dr. Victor Baranco says that the love you are missing is the love that you are not giving. We can only ever be certain of the love we offer to others. The love people give us? We often miss it, because it doesn’t look like what we are expecting. Or we fail to consume it, because we are so busy, so distracted, so obsessed with our selves.

How many times has someone complimented your outfit, and you said, “Oh this old thing. I look thinner in my blue dress.” This is a classic example of refusing love. How often have you started a relationship with someone, only to find something, some reason why they were not worthy of your time?

So how do you have more love in your life? By giving it. Give it first to yourself, if you can. Look in the mirror every day, and notice only the things you can genuinely approve of. Say them out loud. “I like the color of my eyes. I have a shapely neck.” Stick to only the things you like, no criticisms allowed.

Now give that love to others. Write thank you notes. Tell everyone you interact with one thing you appreciate about them. This can be small, “I like the shirt you have on.” To big, “Mom, you have really supported my dreams this year.” The more good you notice in your life, the more attractive you become. I mean this in two ways. You will literally become better looking, to the peole you are with, and you will become magnetic for things that you want.

Do you want a mate? Pick a likely candidate and play a game. Decide you will keep finding things right about them for as long as you can. Committ to having as much fun for as long as posible, and don’t worry about whether they are marriage material. And if the relationship ends, be grateful for what you had and imagine that it lasted the perfect amount of time. Now you are ready to move onto more love, and more fun.

Anger and betrayal over past hurts drags you down and pushes people away. I believe that what you focus on grows. Focus on the bad, you get more bad. Focus on the good, the sky’s the limit.

I’m not just spouting theory here, I’m talking about my life experience. I was an extremely negative person my whole life. I thought the way to change things, particularly my relationships, was to look for what was wrong and harp on it until it got fixed. Only it never did. My men resisted me, because they felt unappreciated and like they could never live up to my expectations.

Then I learned to focus on the good, starting with acknowledging just one thing at a time. The more good I noticed, the more good I got. And then I met a man, who gives me the opportunity to choose love, and loving responses. But that's a story for another day.

Back