You may be asking yourself this question: “Why do some people have an easier time finding a great mate than I do?“
You’re not alone, I used to think this all the time when I was in the dating world.
There are two reasons, in my opinion…
1) They settled.
This almost happened to me twice. Both times I was engaged, I SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN!
The first one I settled because I felt I SHOULD already have been married and I didn’t want to start over or be alone.
The second one, I was really blinded by love and couldn’t see the truth. (And also I had just sold my new condo and moved in with him and really didn’t want to move again.)
Both would have eventually ended, but at what time and financial cost had I actually married them?
2) They have a secure attachment pattern.
Here’s a definition of it in case you aren’t familiar:
Secure attachment describes an attachment style in adults that is characterized by trust, stability, and a balance between intimacy and independence.
People with a secure attachment style may:
- Enjoy intimate relationships
- Be able to trust and be trusted
- Seek comfort when needed
- Comfort a partner when they need it
- Be comfortable sharing emotions
- Have positive self-esteem
- View others in a positive way
- Have long-term relationships
- Seek out social support
- Be empathetic and able to set appropriate boundaries
If you didn’t have caregivers that made you feel safe, seen, soothed, and supported, then you likely do not have a secure attachment style.
When you have an attachment style that is anything but, you WILL unconsciously attach yourself to partners who exhibit similar energy as your caregivers.
Such as….
- emotionally unavailable people
- people who don’t see you
- people with a personality disorder (such as narcissism, sociopathy, borderline etc)
- people who just want you to take care of them (the disempowered)
- people who want to control you
- people who judge you
- people who are dishonest
And you won’t understand WHY those people are so attractive to you.
And you won’t understand WHY you reject ‘good ones’.
Almost as if you were under some sort of SPELL…
That’s because you are.
It’s the spell of your past.
And it compels you to resolve and heal that energy from your past.
It’s Familiar Energy
There’s a piece of you that is begging to finally be SEEN, SUPPORTED, LOVED, and ENOUGH.
This piece will continue to try to get those things through your romantic relationships until it gets what it needs.
Once that piece of you is sated, you will no longer be attracted to people who are wrong for you.
The Problem
The problem with this is, it can take a very long time to heal this through your relationships alone.
The biggest hurdle most people have to get over is thinking that the problem is because of everyone else.
If you think you’re still single because there are few good partners out there, then that means the problem would be outside of your control.
And frankly, that’s why a lot of people don’t look for help. I didn’t either back in the day.
It was literally more comfortable, though still painful, to think that my problem was due to factors outside of my control.
So if you are still in this phase, be gentle with yourself, but become CURIOUS.
Ask yourself a lot of ‘What if…’ kinds of questions and start to explore your options.
The Next Phase: Awareness
The next phase of solving this problem is developing awareness.
Awareness of what your relationship with your parents was truly like (and a willingness to be honest with yourself about it).
Awareness of what the relationship with your parents made you believe about yourself, love and relationships.
Awareness enough to see who your ex really was and how they were like your parents.
Awareness to see what it was you were trying to get from the relationship.
Then awareness to give yourself what you were trying to get from that relationship.
An example
Sometimes having an example helps with understanding.
My mother is emotionally unavailable and a bit narcissistic. My father suffered from C-PTSD all his life which caused him anger issues and the inability to even connect to a dog so he was super emotionally unavailable and unsafe.
So I was not seen by either parent. I was made to feel bad for existing and asking for support. They disempowered me in every way possible.
I was always attracted to emotionally unavailable men. The more unavailable they were, the greater the attraction.
So much so that I would fall in love with my casual relationships and secretly try to get them to choose me over others and commit to me.
Unconsciously, this would validate me. I would feel seen, worthy and SPECIAL. I just wanted to be special.
Unfortunately, this sort of thing only happens in the movies. I was never going to find specialness outside of me.
Until I had awareness of this, the pattern was just going to continue.
The only way to heal it was to become aware of it, and give the specialness to MYSELF.
Next Steps…
So then what are your next steps?
If you are a growth-oriented, aware woman you DEFINITELY have already done a lot of work on yourself already.
But you still haven’t been able to shake that dating pattern.
Which means there’s still a little bit left to heal.
Start by trying to connect the dots between the energy of the relationship with your parents and the energy of your past relationships. You’ll want to figure out exactly WHAT you are trying to get from these relationships that these people just can’t give you.
And then you give that to yourself.
Everything I discussed in this article is exactly what I help my clients do.
I help them to root out that last little bit that has been blocking them from the kind of love they have dreamed of.
We spend time getting to the heart of it and then I help them to do the inner work to heal it so that they become spell-proof!
P.S. In as little as 16 weeks you can break the last of the spell that has been keeping you in a pattern of dating jerks and emotionally unavailable men. My private coaching program, Dating Alchemy, is designed to get to the root of why you’re under their spell and why you hold onto them for way too long! Follow this link to check it out and apply: DATING ALCHEMY
