His kids come first! You have to get used to it! And this will most likely never change!

Why? Because his kids are his for life!

A partner or lover could come and go but kids stay!!!

So, if you see him giving his children more time or attention than he gives to you, relax and let him see that you are 100% cool with that.

Don't fight it! It's a lost cause!

He is biologically programmed to take care of his kids first.

Don't ever be jealous or upset about that one ok?

That's a big risk and I see partners doing that a lot.

They tend to start fights over parenting issues.

They want to influence their partner's behavior and the way they treat their kids!!

BIG NO NO!

It doesn't work!!!

Why? Because he is in charge of that.

Instead of criticizing or challenging him when you see something he could do differently, give him positive feed back when you see stuff he does right:

"Hey! I really liked the way you talked to your son yesterday! Spot on"

"You have such a refreshing connection with them... Nice to watch."

Etc.

Do that a lot!

It's super validating and energizing when your partner recognizes your parenting skills.

These kids are not yours, they are his…

And it will stay that way forever.

What does that mean?

That their biological mother stays their mother.

You have less power than the biological parents in the equation.

And it's essential you don't try to fight that because it's a lost cause.

You have no legal power and if sensitive decisions need to be taken concerning these kids, you might be consulted but you will notice that you are NOT the one making the decisions here.

There is a huge misunderstanding in our world!

It is the way society glorifies being in love!

Well, glorifying the being in love is good!

It is a beautiful thing!

What is less exciting and leads to LOTS of pain is the fact that abandoning yourself in these feelings is supposed to be good!

It’s not!

Really!

Look at a close girl friend when she is in love?

What do you see?

Do you see someone who is happy, singing, enjoying having a crush?

Or do you see someone who is worried and deeply troubled?

My guess is that it can be both.

Now, in my coaching practice I get lots of women who are deeply troubled!

They are confused because they have a crush and the object of their crush, a man, is not responding to them the way they want to.

They have this gorgeous romantic vision of what their love could be and reality does not match that vision!

That’s the challenge!

That’s the situation so many women face!

They are in love but hurt and worried inside!

I want to come back to what I said!

It is essential to get this!

If you look at operas, pop songs, literature, mythology, crushes are EVERYWHERE!

You have gods and goddesses falling in love with each other, armies invading lands in the name of love, endless love songs in pop charts, lovers killing themselves because their love can’t be fulfilled.

It goes on and on and on!

What does that mean?

That love matters a lot to us!

Nothing wrong so far!

The problem arises when you look at these stories deeper!

There is pain!

Lots of pain!

And this pain is being glorified as if it was a virtue!

Here are the news!

It’s NOT!

There is nothing glorious about being in pain!

This is where I believe that a big chapter in our human love stories is still missing!

Till now!

I want you to wake up and realize that there is nothing exciting or realistic about abandoning yourself in the name of love.

In 99% of the cases, the romantic ideal dream does not match reality!

Sorry!

It doesn’t mean that you need to destroy the dream of the perfect romance!

It means that you need to ad a new quality!

This is power and awareness!
It is the realization that the winds of your passion are gorgeous!
They are a powerful fire that can drive you for days or even years!

It is beautiful and exciting!

No doubt about that!

BUT!
The new goal is to tame that fire, not be dominated or enslaved by it!
Do you want to be the slave of your passions or their master?

Think about it!

Do you want to be in charge? Or do you want to be enslaved?

You start feeling the answer, right?

Ok, this is a bit conceptual, so let’s check some real life examples!

He is fantastic!

You are at a club with some friends and he wants to see you again.

Before you know it, that’s it!

You have a crush!

A crush means that your passion and imagination takes over!

You spoke with that guy for 5 min and here you are envision the next 47 years of your life with him!

Whaou!

Can you see what just happened?

Expectations!

Lots of them!

VERY big ones!

You are taken by a stream you no longer control.

And guess what?

It feels really good to be in that space!

No fears yet… No questions yet…

All you want to do right now is text your two best friends and share what you feel now.

It is exciting.

These are the early stages!

Fast forward to the next morning!

Nothing happened with that guy yet.

You are still totally taken by the feelings from last night but you feel them already dying out a bit.

This is exactly the point where doubts and fears start waking up in you…

“Does he have a girlfriend? I don’t even know…”

“Does he like me?”

“Will he call me?”

“Should I text him now?”

You see, you enter a space now where expectations are high!

You are not taking this lightly!

You don’t want to mess up and in fact you feel quite scared to get hurt.

Everything I have been describing now is quite disempowering.

Can you see that?

You are supposed to get ready for work but can’t really think straight.

In fact, you don’t feel like going to work at all!

You would rather day dream and talk about what’s happening with your friends.

It’s a challenge, really!

This crush story happens to women all the time.

I believe that the energy of love you might be feeling is a powerful delicious fire!

You don’t want to kill that but something is missing!

It is awareness, power and skills to navigate this crush zone and have fun with it!

How do you have fun with feeling in love?

How do you turn this worry zone into an energizing and thrilling experience.

Let’s check that!

You enjoy it by adding power, direction and awareness to your experience.

You ad a dimension of realism to it.

You know that he could be married, never call you back, use you for sex, behave like a control freak or anything else.

These scenarios are all possibilities.

You want to keep them in the back of your mind and have exit strategies in case it goes that way.

It’s like setting up an insurance love policy in your life.

Suppose that the guy your have a crush on happens to be a real player.

He got your number, never called you and you see him the following week end making out with your best friend.

What do you do?

Do you have the resilience to rebound on the spot and be ok with it or are you so trapped in the romantic dream that it will take you a month to recover?

If you have been fantasizing for a few days about that guy, you might have built up these high expectations and a palace of romantic dreams.

See how it works?

I don’t want you to stop building dreams!

I know how this makes you feel!

It is beautiful!

I simply want you to ad a dimension of realism to what you experience and be able to make the difference between dream and reality.

There is a big difference between the facts and the way your mind will interpret them.

For instance if a perfect stranger smiles to you on the street, your mind might interpret it as way more than what it is.

Your imagination is triggered.

Again, don’t stop your imagination!

Simply, stay awake and realize it IS your imagination.

Your imagination builds up possibilities and some of these possibilities might come true.

The moment you get hurt is the moment you invest too much too fast based on very little.

So, how do you make this shift and ad realism without killing the dream?

You simply envision all possibilities, not just the positive ones.

Once you have all these possibilities in mind, you develop a strategy for all of them.

For instance, if he doesn’t call you back, what do you do?

This happens all the time in the dating game!

What if he is really bad in bed?

What if he is still married and lied to you?

What if he forgot to mention he is about to leave for a year on Monday?

You need a strategy for every situation to feel safe.

Now, the good news is that you have a similar strategic solution for almost all the challenges you can face with a man.

Here is what I feel works best:

Take small steps at a time!

It is really that simple:

If you emotionally commit to a guy too early, you invest too much too fast.

Take this metaphor:

Imagine that a new potential relationship is like a ship.

You have a million dollars emotional capital to invest in your love life.

You put the totality of your investment in this new ship.

You start sailing.

The ship sinks because the guy never contacts you again.

What happened?

Your emotional capital is gone!

All of it!

What if instead of investing the totality of your love capital in one guy, you only invest a tiny fraction of it?

You invest something you could easily lose without getting hurt.

If the guy disappears you are safe.

I believe that’s the way it works!

Really!

What does it mean to invest a little at a time in real life?

Here is an example:

After that first meeting, you can send that guy 15 text messages in 2 days.

That’s investing a lot and taking the risk of getting hurt if he doesn’t respond.

Or…

You can send that guy a one time text message 5 days later inviting him to a party you are supposed to go to anyway.

That’s a small investment.

If he doesn’t show up, you party as usual.

If he comes, great! Even better!

The point is that if he doesn’t show up, you are emotionally safe!

Of course, you might get a bit disappointed but you are at a party surrounded by dozens of attractive guys…

Not a big deal!

You can easily bounce back and start flirting again on the spot.

Of course, not!

You must stay in charge of your life.

Love stories develop because 2 persons decide to go for it.

If you are the only one investing in this, it won’t work!

You feel like you are carrying all the responsibility to make it happen.

Trying harder can work in some isolated cases but most of the times, what works even better is to let the guy take initiative too.

Let him invest in this as well!

If he takes steps, you follow up but you don’t invest way more than he does.

You build your romantic dream as the story develops.

You don’t rush into it.

One more thing that you want to do:

Keep your options open!

What does that mean?

It means that instead of focusing all your energy on one guy, you invest time and energy in other men too.

That way, if the first one rejects you, you don’t end up with nothing.

These are safeguard tactics!
You only let go of other options once it is clear that you are both ready for a solid commitment.

If you are committed to him and he is not, you end up giving way more to this potential relationship than he does.

This is exactly where you must be careful.

You are emotionally committed to him when you start behaving as if you were already in a relationship with that guy.

In other terms, you reject other offers, you don’t respond to party invitations, you stay at home hoping that he will call.

All these are signs of an emotional commitment.

And that emotional commitment becomes an emotional dead end if your crush doesn’t respond to your expectations.

What’s the alternative?

It is business as usual!

You don’t change your plans because you met a guy.

You were planning to go on a date with someone else?

You go for it!

You were about to leave to a trip with some friends?

Don’t cancel! Enjoy your trip!

Your boss wants to send you to New York for some training?

Don’t hesitate! Go!

Staying emotionally free is an attitude you train!

It is a conscious decision.

You take that decision because you know what happens when you don’t:

You end up trapped!

Remember! Business as usual!

Don’t change a thing because a guy asked for your number or took you out on one date.

It is really that simple!

If you are the one initiating contact systematically, that’s not a good sign!

It’s exhausting!

You can take initiative and then step back to give him space to respond.

No need to go to the other extreme or complicate things either.

If you believe that playing hard to get is sexy, well, ask your male friends.

Here is what they will say:

Boring!

That’s the other extreme.

Playing hard to get can be fun if it is playful!

Don’t use that much.

Don’t cancel or reschedule dates unless there is a good reason to.

In other terms, make it easy to date you, not complicate.

I say these things here so that you don’t fall into the other extreme and overdo it.

If a guy DOES invest his time and energy in you, you CAN progress with the relationship.

You don’t have to put your life behind walls.

You CAN open up, simply don’t do it too fast.

Wait for him to take some steps too!

That’s all!