Don’t use old pictures to attract me
Don’t put them on dating websites
Don’t send them to me in regards to craigslist posts
My Grandiloquent Craig’s List Experience (aka: get ready, this is gonna be a long one)
Last week I thought I would try something new and check out Craig’s List. It was interesting and seemingly more honest than any of the actual dating websites that I have been trying. (Don’t bother with Zoosk. You have to pay for everything.)
I was going to show you part of his original posting here, but it looks like he’s taken it down. Let me just say that it was quite loquacious and leave it at that.
I will be referring to him here as Shakespeare.
Very shortly you will see what I mean and why.
“Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man”
This book is brilliant!! Steve Harvey offers up advice to women and it’s SPOT ON!!
And blatantly honest. At one point in the book he addresses cheating and how all men will cheat on their spouse if given the chance and enough reason/motivation. I appreciate that.
He talks about:
- what a man needs to accomplish before getting seriously involved with someone
- how to tell if a man is really into you or playing around
- how a man shows you he loves you
- how to communicate with men and what a man needs in a relationship
- AND how women need to actually MAKE their men take care of them! Require him to open the door for you, etc…
I’m almost finished reading it and I want to rush out buy it for every woman I know – whether she’s in a relationship or not!
For sure I am getting it for my daughters!
Monday Motivation: Silence
Again, I defer to Om Swami…
… Once upon a time a farmer lost his watch while working in the barn. This was not just any watch but his most favorite possession. His late father had given it to him decades ago. He searched for it frantically, in every nook and corner of his barn. He turned the hay upside down but it was nowhere to be found.
Somewhat distraught, hardly had he sat down when he heard children playing outside. He asked them for help and promised a reward of $20 to the one who would find it. Excited, eager and hopeful, the children rummaged through the whole area, practically combing every haystack, yet they couldn’t find it either. They gave up and went back to playing. The farmer thought he would never see his watch again.
“Can you give me a chance?” a small boy tugged at his coat.
“I don’t mind,” the farmer said, surprised to see a little contender. “But, other children and I’ve already searched everywhere.”
“I know,” he said. “I would still like to try.”
The farmer had nothing to lose so he let him in and carried on with his chores in the field.A mere twenty minutes later, the young boy went running up to him.
“I found it!” he said, and, opened his hands revealing the watch.
The farmer picked him up in his arms, and said joyously, “How on earth did you find it?”
“I just sat on the ground and listened to silence,” the boy replied. “After a few minutes, I heard the watch ticking. The rest was easy.”We are desperately searching for our lost possessions, emotions and love, turning the world upside down only to feel tired a bit later. And then we sit down, we wonder, we worry, we muse, we reflect, we accept, we relax. In that state of mind, life appears like the young boy and hands it back to us.
Sometimes, the greatest way to search is to not search at all. When you don’t search and just let it be, then you hear the watch ticking, you hear how life’s bubbling over and you see the beauty in everything. When that happens, you realize that everything you already have is a prized possession in its own right, the present moment being the greatest of all…
Gratitude, Part 2
http://www.dailygood.org/view.php?sid=6
This is a link to an article called “Love, Honor, and Thank”. It came to me through my Facebook newsfeed, but it really covers what I have been trying to say to the husband for the last few years:
I would probably care a lot more about my you if I felt like you appreciated me and my contributions.
The article states: “a successful relationship doesn’t just depend on how partners divide labor, but on how they each express gratitude for the labor the other one contributes…In our research, we set out to test this theory…”
It looks like the major problem is: Awareness, and something called a “response threshold”. If it bothers you before it bothers your partner, you will fix it first. However, if the problem never reached your partner’s “response threshold” they probably didn’t even notice it needed to be done – so they couldn’t possibly know to thank you for it! The example the article used was the trash. “…if Joan’s partner Ted is disturbed when the trash in the wastebasket approaches the rim, whereas it doesn’t bother her until the trash spills onto the floor, Ted will take out the trash before Joan is moved to do so…Joan never will empty the trash, because Ted will always take care of it before it bothers her, possibly before she ever even notices the garbage..”
It’s not necessarily the division of labor that gets to me. It’s the fact that I thank him for washing the dishes, taking out the garbage and making dinner – even though I am not satisfied even remotely with the results of his efforts lots of the time.
I am trying to be thankful! I always have – because that’s what I want my partner to be like, and I was taught to treat others the way I would like to be treated. Yet, I am so thankful for some things and so incredibly resentful of others. They don’t seem to balance each other out. In fact, some seem to cancel others out completely!
Things about my husband that I am thankful for:
- he makes dinner 4 nights a week
- he has a part-time job
- he does the dishes
- he helped me in the creation of my two lovely daughters
- he’s there to “deal with” the teenage drama when I’m at work
- he minds his own business most of the time and leaves me alone
Things about my husband that I resent:
- his dinners have really become quite unappetizing
- he has a part-time job
- he doesn’t clean up his own messes (ex: cutting boards with raw chicken…)
- he’s there to “deal with” the teenage daughters
- he still lives with me
- he doesn’t take care of himself (or me)
- he doesn’t pay his bills (take responsibility)
Here’s the deal. I am appreciative of most things he does. Because, even when he doesn’t do them 100% the way I want him to, he does do things to help. And those things sometimes kind of help me… But what about the things that I am doing (even if they aren’t 100% the way he wants them done). Can I please get a WHOOP WHOOP sometimes?
“…it’s not just the division of labor but the expression of gratitude that’s key to a strong and lasting relationship. Through focus groups, interviews, and surveys with people in heterosexual and same-sex relationships, we’ve found evidence that gratitude isn’t just a way to mitigate the negative effects of an unequal division of labor. Rather, a lack of gratitude may be connected to why that division of labor is so unequal to begin with…”
It is suggested that at the beginning of a relationship, household tasks be rotated on a weekly basis. That way one person doesn’t become “better” at the task and then it becomes permanently assigned to that person by default. It also helps the other partner understand how much work the other person actually does. 
I have noticed this one thing… Spring/Fall Cleaning – when he sees me sweating my ass off trying to get the house cleaner than clean, he will pitch in in another room and get something else done. (YAY! Small victories rock!)
Regardless, if you are feeling over-worked ask for help – you just might get it! And then say “Thank you” when they’re done.
Smitten with Him 