Recovering from a Breakup - Breakup tips

I think it's important to remember that breaking up is usually harder than forming a relationship, so look before you leap...

It's quire concerning how women struggle with the thought of moving past a break up. With the hundreds of alternatives to go by, to move on after a break up would be as simple as moving up a grade. To forget your ex boyfriend, first you have to focus, then you utilize your resources and lastly, you don't give up.

1. Focus. The reason why some kids don't push through their studies is because they lose control of themselves. It is the same thing when moving on from a break up. You should keep your eye on the prize and work for it. Let go of any doubt or regret over things that you could have done and just keep your mind locked on the future. Establish a goal and aim for it through the next step.

2. Utilize your resources. You had things going for you even before you and your ex got together. So you'd be fine living without him now. You do not need him to survive nor to be happy. There are a number of other entertainment sources for you. It's like when you face the challenge of finishing school, you have to hit your books and take notes. You can take on a tutor and engage in a few extra curricular activities for additional credit. It's a similar thing for your life. Acquire guidance from family and friends. Find more helpful references on how to get over your ex boyfriend. If you are easily discouraged in pursuing it, take a break until you get your footing back. And of course, you have to diversify and broaden your exposure so you do not get bored easily.

3. Don't give up. Don't be surprised when you don't get everything right the first try. But you shouldn't stop pushing. If you feel like you are relapsing or getting too vulnerable, hold your ground until everything settles. If you do fall, get back up. And just keep on going until nothing hurts or scares you anymore.

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Dating - Is Your Partner Co-dependent?

Getting involved in a relationship with a clingy, co-dependent individual is something you want to avoid at all costs...

Every now and then, we see people asking if something is wrong with their boyfriend or girlfriend. It's good to take a refresher course in potentially damaging relationships.

 Here's some quick warning signs:

They never seem to have fun. Their emotions are suppressed in everything, in fact; everything is "just OK" with them.

Low self-esteem. Never feeling that they're good enough.

The slightest change upsets them.

Impulsive. They never think a relationship problem through, instead just looking for a quick fix.

Zero self-confidence, as if they still thought of themselves as children.

Clingy and insecure.

Fear of strong emotions. Especially internalizing everything that's around them, like if you got upset because your car broke down they'll think you're mad at them.

They're a living doormat.

The thing with codependents is, sure you can love them and even have a relationship with them, but they will burn you out. The load is all on you. If you think you have a codependent, consider counseling and therapy to try to treat issues, and also consider that they may be diagnosed with anxiety or depression, which tends to go together with codependent behavior.

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Belief in Love Creates Success in Love

There's no free lunch - and that applies to the world of relationships as well...

My father and I were folding laundry, the piles were up to our knees. It had been a particularly rough week in our house. There were six of us after all and my mother and he had been fighting about something. I can't remember what, most likely something to do with the logistics of raising six humans. Should Eliot really go off to soccer practice in Marietta or should he stay at the camp in Athens? Or, should the girls really go to that party at so and so's house whose parents may or may not be home?

My parents had a very unique relationship. Unlike parents I witnessed at my friends' houses, my parents would often be spotted kissing in the kitchen while preparing dinner and they would stay up late into the night talking. Not fighting or arguing, but deep in conversation, passionate conversation about their work, life, us kids, and each other. They didn't waste time with things, like television. They were in love, yes, but they were also best friends.

When my father died, part of my mother died with him. In this moment, buried in the laundry, I felt struck to ask him a bold question. "How do you do it, Dad? How do you still love Mom so much after all of these years? Even on days like this."

It only took him a moment to answer, "I always knew, even though my parents had gone through a terrible divorce, that I would find the love of my life some day and that I would be madly in love with her. I believed in love." He paused and kept folding and then added, "and so did your mother. Look at her family. Divorce, horrible, horrible things but she still believed. We both believed. And then we found each other."

It made complete sense to me, they believed in love. More importantly, they believed in their relationship. The believing being the key. Because nothing can existing without a belief that it exists. Especially love.

Belief in motion.

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Virtual Dates - Are People Giving Up On Meeting Someone Real?

Societal changes are happening faster and faster, and the changes these days seem to mostly be for the worse - including changes in the world of online dating...

Realizing that matching people via computers was a masterful marketing gimmick that surprisingly worked, the online dating industry is looking into providing singles with various autonomous digital relationship services.

Freed of disappointing first dates and having to bathe, people are leaving dating sites like Match and POF in droves, instead signing up for various virtual boyfriends and girlfriends.

Check out this new SMS service called FakeGirlfriend.co that allows men to save a phone number into their cell under whatever girl's name they choose, and then receive random, girlfriend-like responses via text.
Thank you Forbes for bringing this to our attention. Dealing with real people was getting too complicated. A few more fake girlfriend choices. Not to leave the ladies out, they can have a fake boyfriend text them at http://textboyfriend.com/.

Eharmony has been in talks with various fake relationship companies for a while now. Meetic had a prototype running for a while, but it only spoke French and was too bossy for American tastes. The PlentyofFish virtual dating system, which Markus wrote in a single weekend (actually over a cup of coffee),  remains a skunkworks project ever since they started making more money with Daily Deals than on dating.
These services are the 1.0 version of virtual relationships. I've tried them all and am now dating Siri. She's attentive, knows me well and is much for fun to talk to than these crude fakes. In fact, when I'm in the mood, Siri will go out and find me mid-30s women in Boston who like sushi and Radiohead, talk about the ultimate wing-entity. Who new Apple was going to upend the dating industry?

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Background Checks When Dating Online?

Background checks for online daters - somebody's making money but will it help or hinder the online dating process?

There are hundreds of background check companies that offer services directly to singles. They all think they
can make money in the dating market. Truth is, except for one or two companies with direct dating site partnerships, dating sites for the most part don't want to offer background checks and these third-party solutions are going to require huge online marketing budgets to get the attention of singles.

Some dating sites appear to be warming up to the idea of identity verification, which has its own set of thorny issues in terms of how people react to search results with some people being verified and others not. At some point do I lose out if I'm not verified? Why do I have to pay more just to be on even ground with everyone else? And how will free sites deal with this? A freemium upgrade or avoid them entirely?

And how the heck do you ask someone to get verified? Talk about awkward. There are actually some neat ways to go about enticing people to sign up for these services, but I'm not seeing them used out in the wild...


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Facebook Makes Online Dating Easier

Facebook for dating? Sounds like an idea that should have been implemented already...

Have you looked at the new Subscribe button on Facebook? Among other things it lets people read your updates without being your friend. This, my friends, is yet another indication that Facebook is rolling out features that can ostensibly be used for dating. They just need to read the rest of this post and figure out if more granular subscription options or group invites is the best way to go about sharing specific Facebook data with romantic strangers.

This week I've had a number of people tell me about their experiences sharing their Facebook profiles with potential dates. Here's one way to make Facebook for you in your dating life: Create a new group called AboutMe or something similar, post items you want potential dates to be able to view, and share your facebook url with them.

What would be even cooler is a link that decays over time, becoming inoperable after say 72 hours. That way you know that those creepers can't get back into your profile after a first glance.
The subscription button could also allow longer-term access to profile data, sort of like what OkCupid has been doing for years.

Is Facebook going to undermine the entire online dating industry? Of course it is, just a matter of time. Until then, singles should use their Facebook profiles to share details about their tastes, personality and preferences with potential dates. You know, the things that traditional dating sites aren't very good at doing. After all, you've probably never seen a Facebook post start with "I can't believe I'm doing this"...

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Are Your Children Starting to Date?

Should you be worried when your children start to date... You betcha!

Oh, is that ever a chilling headline for the parent of teenagers! Well, fear not, for author Lisa Jander has written a book called "Dater's Ed: The Instruction Manual for Parents". It's based on the idea of "Driver's Ed" from high school. Yes, teens will groan and roll their eyes as parents the world over read out loud from this manual and give tests.

For the teens and young singles, parents owe you an explanation. Because you're wondering "What gives with mom and dad? Why are they so uptight? Did they expect me to be a nun?" Well, it's natural to feel defensive about your kids. It's less about micro-managing who you love and why - than it is about putting you on safety watch so your folks don't have to lie awake at night with pictures of psychos and stalkers go through their heads.

That being said, any parent should acknowledge that they're going to be wrong about who their children date at least 25% of the time. How could you possibly not get it wrong? You're a parent!


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