Blog Migration

This blog has moved to LovesickLove.com. There is also a Facebook page now for the blog and the forthcoming book. If you came to this site looking for the Breakup Cleanse blog, click here.

Why is the Unattainable So Hot?

We desire things we can't get, including unattainable romantic partners. Why is the unattainable so hot? Here is the standard answer: The unattainable is in some sense rare. Rare things are valuable. As we value what we know is valuable, we want that man or woman we can't get.

All this may be true. But I think there is more to it. A number of factors play a role in making us so obsessed with getting what we can't get. Here are the top three.

Potential Affirmation
If only you could get the guy or girl that you and no one else can get, you would be very special.

The Unattainable Leaves Room for Idealization
What stays at a distance is easier to see in a positive light. You are not exposed to the real person with all of his or her flaws.

The Unattainable is Mysterious
We crave what is mysterious. It arouses us and fascinates us. In that respect, the mysterious is similar to horror. Think of Halloween's Michael Myers appearing in the doorway of Linda van der Klok's bedroom. Lynda is filing her nails, patiently waiting for her lover to return with beer. Myers is covered by a white sheet and is wearing Lynda's dead lover's glasses. Or think of the final shot in the Blair Witch Project where Mike is standing in the corner, facing the wall. Even though these scenes are terrifying, we like the feelings they generate in us.

What is it about horror that is so fascinating? I think it's the fact that we cannot interpret the horror movie antagonists in normal ways. Standard theories of mind don't apply. Horror movie antagonists are generally uncommunicative. They don't say a whole lot, and they often have no facial expressions (e.g., they wear masks). We see them only briefly. They prevent us from assessing their intentions and emotions. We cannot interpret their facial expressions. We don't know what they are going to do next. They are unpredictable and unreliable. It's the fact that we can't place them in our ordinary schemes for interpreting people that inspires anxiety and fear. They puzzle us and allow our brains to dwell on them in order to try to understand them. That is what fuels our attraction.

The 28-Day Break-Up Cleanse, Part VI

Week 4: Fill your calendar with fun

Still no word from him? It’s time to move on then. Fill your calendar with fun activities. By "fun activities" I mean activities that are bound to make you laugh (or at least smile), things that would have been fun if your ex hadn't just broken up with you. You may not feel that this is something you can do. But you really need to do it.

Laughter is the best way to survive a breakup. Norman Cousins, a layperson with no prior medical training, was the first to suggest that humor can improve physical health through its miraculous effects on the brain. When diagnosed with ankylosing spondylitis, a chronic inflammatory disease that can cause the joints in the spine to fuse, Cousins invented a healing system that combined massive amounts of vitamin C and humor. He recovered from near-paralysis and wrote the book "Anatomy of an Illness." He later used the same method to recover from a heart attack. Cousins' work has appeared in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine.

Dr. Lee Berk, an immunologist at Loma Linda University's School of Allied Health and Medicine, has studied the effects of mirthful laughter on the regulation of hormones since the 1980s. Berk and his colleagues found that laughter helps the brain regulate the stress hormones cortisol and adrenaline. They also discovered a link between laughter and the production of anti-bodies and endorphins, the body's natural pain killers. Even the expectation that something funny is coming suffices to bring about positive effects.

Humor also helps the brain regulate the brain's dopamine levels, reports a Stanford research team in the December 4, 2003, issue of the journal Neuron. The Stanford team examined the brains of 16 study participants looking at cartoons that had been previously rated as funny or non-funny. They found that the funny cartoons activated a cluster of areas in the brain's limbic system that are crucially involved in the regulation of dopamine. The findings indicate that humor can have positive effects not only on mood, but also on motivation and feelings of reward.

To get the fun going, call friends you have ignored for weeks and arrange to meet them in the near future. If you don't have all that many friends, it's time to make new ones. Get a new hobby or two. Sign up for boxing lessons or rock climbing. Learn how to paint or join a single people's network.

The 28-Day Break-Up Cleanse, Part V

Week 3: Now what?

In week 3 it’s time to realize that if you haven’t heard from your ex at this point, you probably won’t hear from him in the near future. Don’t contact him at any point, unless he contacts you first. Have some self-respect.

Then get rid of physical reminders of your him use the trashcan, not the window). If you can't get yourself to throw them out, keep them in a box that is not easy to get to. Delete his phone number from your phone directory and delete his email and other easy ways of contacting him. Do not unfriend him on Facebook. Don't be silly. Nowadays people who have barely met are friends on Facebook. You can stay friends with him. But resist the temptation to check out his Facebook page or his other social media sites every two hours. You are done with that.

The rest of this week, use mental simulation to prepare yourself for situations in which in which your ex pops back into your life in unexpected and unpleasant ways, such as if you were to bump into him with a new girlfriend under his arm or if you were to see him hitting on another girl at a party. Find ways that you can stay sane even in these unpleasant circumstances. You also need to prepare yourself for down days, days where you suddenly miss him more than you ever did and might be tempted to contact him.

The 28-Day Break-Up Cleanse, Part IV

Week 2: What If

You made it to week 2. Congratulations! At this point, it's time to review the earlier posts on mental simulation and use this technique to prepare yourself for a potential call from your ex. It may not be over yet!

The less you have contacted him since he broke up with you, the more likely it is that he will contact you. The more feelings he had for you at any point during your relationship, the more likely it is that he will contact you or want to get back together.

If you have already pleaded with him to come back, contacted him multiple times and thrown serious temper-tantrums since the break-up, you may never hear from him again. And if he was never very much into you, you may never hear from him again.

But if your ex really liked you before the breakup, the breakup occurred recently, and you responded calmly to his decision and haven't contacted him since, then the likelihood that he will contact you is huge.

People don’t fall out of love suddenly. He is still into you. But it may not last long, depending on how you behave. If you contact him, make scenes and plead with him to take you back, then you are reinforcing his decision. You are basically giving him confidence that he has made the right decision.

By not contacting him, you are forcing him to face his decision. By not contacting him, you also maintaining some form of control and some dignity. He will be somewhat puzzled by your behavior. The standard behavior, after all, is to contact the one who broke your heart. That’s how people work.

What to do if he does contact you? Don't sound unnaturally upbeat. That is going to come across as fake. Don’t bring up the relationship at all. He ended it. He can bring it up. Convey that you have accepted his decision. Don't mention it. Act that way instead.

Prepare a few lines you can deliver confidently if he does contact you. Have something to say. It could be something interesting you have read, a fun story about your family or friends. It doesn’t matter, as long as it is fun and unrelated to your past relationship. If he asks you how you are doing, then you are doing fine. Feel free to ask him how he is doing. But, I repeat, do not bring up the relationship.

If he does bring up the relationship, don't get sucked into talking about it. Do respond in a friendly way. If he says "too bad it didn’t work out," agree with him. Then move onto a different topic. If he asks if you want to get together, don't sound too excited. Sound the way you would if a friend had called and asked you. You can agree to meet him for coffee, lunch, dinner, a movie, or whatever, if he suggests it. But don't suggest anything along those lines. And if you do get together with him, whatever you do, do not have sex with him. That is not going to get him back.

The 28-Day Break-Up Cleanse, Part III

Week 1: Habituation

A simple way to become less focused on your loved one is to wear down your brain. This method is also known as "habituation." It's a well known mechanism to avoid obsessions and has been used in cognitive-behavioral therapy for decades.

For habituation to work you must do something that seems quite counterintuitive at first. You must expose yourself to the things that make you feel bad. Over time this will desensitize you.

How to apply habituation to breakups? If you are going through a difficult breakup, thoughts of your ex now put your body into a state of fear or anger. This is because you implicitly associate thoughts of your ex with something negative, for example, the fact that he is no longer in your life, the loss of future experiences with him or the simple fact that he turned you down. Thoughts of your ex automatically trigger hyper-activity in your emotional brain.

To desensitize you can't simply stop thinking about your him. That could worsen the situation. Instead you need to break the associations by overexposing your brain to the fear-triggering stimulus.

Allow your brain to dwell on your ex and the things you did together. Put on some music that reminds you of your loved one. Think about the good times you had together, or the bad. Cry if necessary. The only thing that is off limits is making explicit contact with your ex.

Though it may not feel that way, extreme exposure to thoughts of your ex will likely tire your brain neurons. They may fire wildly at the beginning. It's going to feel awful. But your bran activity will slowly become less intense.

The 28-Day Break-Up Cleanse, Part II

How do you treat anxiety and depression associated with a breakup? The radical way would be to get a prescription from your doctor. The newest (affordable) drugs to treat anxiety and depression, also known as "selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors," raise the levels of the feel-good hormone serotonin in the brain.

According to Rockefeller neuroscientist Jennifer Warner-Schmidt, not only is this class of drugs effective in the treatment of anxiety and depression, it can also reverse the detrimental effects of depression on the brain. Warner-Schmidt and Ronald Duman of Yale University found that the serotonin reuptake inhibitors increased the production of vascular endothelial growth factor, or VEGF, in the hippocampus of rodents. The increased VEGF levels led to the birth of new neurons. Conversely, blocking expression of this growth factor led to an atrophy of cells in the hippocampus. So, it seems that serotonin reuptake inhibitors can help keep your brain healthy.

But wouldn’t it be nice if you could achieve similar effects without taking medication? The serotonin diet, if followed strictly, can do just that. It raises your serotonin levels without medication. Here are some foods and drinks to load up on to raise your serotonin levels.

1. Buckwheat
2. Whey protein
3. Flaxseed oil
4. Bananas
5. Sour cherries and cranberries
6. Fish and Sea food
7. Turkey
8. Eggs
9. Dark chocolate
10. Nettle tea

Buckwheat
Buckwheat is high in tryptophan. Tryptophan is essential to the synthesis of serotonin in the brain. Your brain cannot make serotonin without the protein building block, or amino acid, tryptophan.

Whey Protein
Whey protein can greatly enhance your health. Whey regulates blood sugar levels and appetite and helps to increase the brain’s levels of serotonin.

Flaxseed Oil
Flaxseeds are great for weight loss and they contain high levels of tryptophan, which is an essential component of serotonin. Adding three to four tablespoons of flaxseeds or two tablespoons of flax seed oil each day can help to alter your mood.

Bananas
Bananas are another kind of food that contains high amounts of tryptophan. Eat plenty of them as an afternoon snack, as a desert, in whey protein smoothies and in exotic Hawaiian or Thai dishes. Another serotonin-inducing fruits and vegetables include pineapple, avocado, spinach, asparagus and eggplant.

Sour cherries and cranberries
Sour cherries and cranberries contain plenty of melatonin. Melatonin doesn’t have a direct effect on serotonin but it can help you sleep properly, something that may be difficult if you have just experienced a hard breakup.

Fish and Seafood
The good fats in salmon, tuna and sardines can decrease the symptoms of depression and regulate mania. Fish is also rich in tryptophan, which helps the brain synthesize serotonin. You can also take fish oils as supplements.

Turkey
Turkey is a high-protein food. Almost all high protein foods are high in tryptophan but turkey is particularly good as source of tryptophan. Did you ever notice how sleepy people get after thanksgiving dinner? One reason is that turkey raises serotonin levels, which makes your body relax.

Eggs
Like salmon eggs are a good source of omega 3 fatty acids, which helps stabilize brain activity. You may have to watch your intake of eggs if you have high cholesterol. However, there is no direct correlation between high cholesterol foods and high blood pressure. While egg yolks contain high concentrations of cholesterol, they also contain chemicals that lower blood pressure, reports a Canadian research team in the January 2009 issue of "Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry." In a series of laboratory studies, the team found chemicals in fried and boiled eggs that, in principle, can turn into peptides with blood pressure-lowering activity in the stomach and small intestine. The findings are still to be tested directly on humans.

Dark Chocolate
Cocoa increases serotonin levels in the brain. Dark chocolate contains higher amounts of cocoa than milk chocolate. Cocoa also seems to lower bad cholesterol levels and blood pressure.

Nettle Tea
Nettle tea is thought to have numerous healing powers, including an ability to fight coughs, remove the symptoms of arthritis, heal urinary tract infections, prevent allergies and improve moods. It comes from the top leaves of stinging nettles. You may have to get used to the somewhat grassy taste. You can also eat nettles after cooking them. They are taste a bit like spinach. When stinging nettles are cooked or dried, the stinging chemicals histamine and formic acids evaporate.

Besides these foods you might want to consider adding the over-the-counter dietary supplement 5-Hydroxytryptophan, or 5-HTP, to your diet. In many countries 5-HTP is sold under the trade names Cincofarm, Levothym, Levotonine, Oxyfan, Telesol, Tript-OH, and Triptum. Unlike serotonin itself, the supplement crosses the brain-blood barrier and is transformed into serotonin in the liver and brain.

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The 28-Day Break-Up Cleanse, Part I

What you feared most just happened. Your heart was cut out of your chest with a butter knife and squeezed through a meat grinder.

Here you are. Alone. Empty. Yet full of love that has no aim.

Yes, he really did it. He unexpectedly broke up with you. You should have seen it coming. But you didn't. Now you want the pain to end.

I have some good news and some bad news for you. Here's the bad news: Nothing can completely stop the pain. But, and this is the good news, you can learn to live with the pain. You can make the pain less painful.

How?

The remedy is called the 28-day break-up cleanse.

Why 28 days?

During any 28 day period (on average) the young female body goes through various hormonal changes. The sex hormones estrogen and progesterone change radically. Estrogen levels peak around day 14, and this triggers the release of an egg. Progesterone levels peak the last 14 days of the cycle, and this triggers the preparation of the uterus for implantation.

But the 28-day cycle is not all about reproduction. Your immune system, mental health and mood depend on where you are in the cycle. At times when progesterone and estrogen levels are high, women recover more quickly from strokes and traumatic brain injury. The high levels of progesterone during pregnancy may completely protect against extensive neurological damage. One reason for this is that the sex hormones offer protection against certain kinds of inflammation that can occur as a result of neurological damage.

The sex hormones also affect states of arousal. During ovulation women in general are more attuned to male pheromones (sweat, for example), and they are more easily sexually aroused than they are during the other phases. Before menstruation, mood changes are likely to occur, and the immune system offers less protection against foreign intruders.

So, why 28 days? Because if you want to get through your post-breakup blues as painlessly as possible, you must let your body go through a full cycle of mood changes, hormonal changes and changes in sexual arousal.

What’s the aim of the cleanse?

The aim of the cleanse is to train your brain to think of yourself as single and detach yourself from your former lover. You will learn to detach yourself from the man who broke up with you. You will also maximize the chances of him changing his mind but with you being the person in control.

To Be Continued ...

Love Chemicals

When you fall in love, your bodily chemicals go haywire. The exciting, scary, mysterious and unpredictable elements of love stem from hyperstimulation of the limbic brain's fear center known as "the amygdala". Hyperactivation of the amygdala gives rise to a physical stress response in your body.

Hans Selye, a Canadian endocrinologist, was the first to apply the word "stress" to physical and emotional strain. Before that, "stress" was just an engineering term. Selye, who did the bulk of his research in the 1930s, discovered that the stress hormone cortisol has detrimental health effects in rats. Together with other adrenal gland hormones such as adrenaline and noradrenaline, cortisol prepares the body for a "fight or flight" response.

Stress hormones are secreted in situations of perceived danger. They can be present, even when the danger isn't real. For example, they are present in generous amounts in people with fear of public speaking. They are the little bastards that make your heart break dance, your skeleton turn to gelatin and your new Mickey Mouse voice implant make little noises the first time you stand in front of a 100-person audience.

Falling in love then goes like this. Unpredictability, mystery and sexual attraction make the amygdala go into hyperactivation. This signals to the adrenal glands that something exciting, scary, mysterious and unpredictable is going on. This, in turn, results in the adrenal glands pumping a surge of adrenaline, noradrenaline and cortisol into the bloodstream. Via the bloodstream, adrenaline increases heart and breathing rates, noradrenaline produces body heat, making you sweat, and cortisol provides extra energy fuels for muscles to use.

Love is stressful. Can you quit it? Not easily. When you fall in love, your dopamine levels increase. This motivates you to continue to perform the activities that generated the elevated dopamine levels in the first place.

Love is stressful and highly addictive. It also makes you feel bad, at least periodically. Increased amygdala activation is correlated with a heightened breakdown of extra-cellular serotonin. Serotonin makes you feel good. When your serotonin levels go down, you feel bad. You become depressed or anxious. This is what happens to people in love. They feel good when they are together and horrible when they are apart.

You can now see why one-sided love makes you miserable. Since you are never together with wonder boy or wonder girl, your serotonin-levels are constantly suppressed, your body wants the dopamine-high and your adrenaline glands pump huge amounts of stress hormones into your blood vessels. When you suffer from unrequited love, you are literally at your wits end.

Mental Simulation to Change Your Behavior, Part V

Now that you have played out the scenes in your mind, it's time to play them out in real life.

But you don't want to go for the really tough situations yet.

Find some safe situations where you can practice your new behavior.

Suppose you are working on becoming more extroverted. Go to Starbucks and compliment the hairstyle of a customer, or ask a guy walking his dog a question about his dog.

The idea is to find situations that don’t matter if you fail. You are still practicing.

Now that you have done some real-life role playing, you are ready to practice your new behavior in situations that matter.

If you fail, don’t worry. Start from scratch. Maybe you will need to go back to the mental simulation phase for a while before you take your behavior out in the real world. Then try again.

Every time you are in a difficult situation, quickly play out the scenario in your mind the way you are now used to playing it out.

Act the way you do, when you imagine the situation. If you don't get the desired response, go back to the mental simulation phase.

Reevaluate your behavior. Perhaps there is a better response you can practice in situations that matter.

Mental Simulation to Change Your Behavior, Part IV

Mental simulation consists in acting out your new behavior in situations where you would normally respond in destructive ways.

But you don’t start out in real life.

Begin inside your mind.

Imagine yourself being in a difficult situation. Then you imagine how you would like to respond in this kind of situation.

Don’t do it once or twice. Do it repeatedly for many days or weeks.

The purpose of this is to train your brain to associate your new good behavioral patterns with the tricky scenarios.

When you create new thinking patterns, your brain creates new neural connections. You will eventually behave in more desirable ways in difficult situations because of the new pathways you have created in your brain.

To be continued...

Mental Simulation to Change Your Behavior, Part III

Mental Simulation Basics

Write down your exact aims.

If your aim is to settle for a loose connection with an emotionally unavailable man or a playboy you will be sharing with other women, and you have thought through your options and decided that's what you really want to do, then write that down. You will still need to change your behavioral patterns if you want to survive emotionally.

If you want to depend less on other people, write that down. If you want to become more extroverted, write that down. It's OK to have more than one aim.

Identify the personality traits or behaviors that stand in the way of you achieving your goals.

If you tend to put pressure on a guy in a relationship, if you tend to act needy or clingy, you are going to push the guy away. This is so, even if your guy is, in principle, emotionally available. So, you will need to change your co-dependent personality traits and behavioral patterns.

If your problem really is that you are too introverted to meet a good guy, then you'll need to change your introverted personality traits. What you'll need to change all depends on what your true goal is.

Once you have identified the personality traits and behaviors that stand in the way of your achieving your goals, identify the situations in which these personality traits or behavioral patterns become obstacles.

If you are too needy and dependent, this may show up as a tendency to check up on your guy constantly, texting him incessantly, continuously asking him to be with you or complaining about not seeing him enough.

You cannot change every unfortunate trait or behavioral pattern all at once. Pick one or two traits or behavioral patterns you want to change. Then focus on working on these.

Perhaps you are too introverted to meet new friends or men or too needy and clingy once you finally meet new people or too emotional to hide your destructive negative emotions. All of these traits of your personality are destructive. But you cannot change all of them at once. Decide which two specific features you really want to work on. Then work on them.

To be continued...

Mental Simulation to Change Your Behavior, Part II

When you suffer from lovesick love, you are sleepwalking through a large part of your life.

Your only concern is how to change an emotionally unavailable man (an impossible task), how to make someone who just isn't into you interested in you or how to get your boyfriend back.

Perhaps you want to know why the man in your life is emotionally unavailable, is behaving like a jerk or is not interested in you.

Perhaps you want to know why your boyfriend just broke up with you (by text?).

You may be filled with sadness and grief.

All of these destructive thoughts and emotions are fueled by your own personality traits and behavioral patterns.

You can change these personality traits and behavioral patterns.

You can choose to wake up and realize that you need to move on. You can affect your thinking patterns and slow down your inner tsunami of stress chemicals.

Slowing down this inner hurricane will make you act in more rational ways.

You can stop your own suffering.

You can stop wasting your life on a guy who is not going to commit to you or who isn't into you at all.

The most effective way to slow down your stress hormones and increase the "feel good" hormones in your body is to train your brain to think differently.

You deserve much more than an undefined connection with a guy -- a guy who isn't contacting you, who isn't really interested in meeting with you and who doesn't really care about you and your well-being.

By continuing to obsess over a guy, you are compromising. Worse perhaps: You are wasting your precious life.

You deserve better.

If your guy doesn't want to see you very often, he is either not feeling it for you, or he can’t attach to another person emotionally.

You cannot change your guy but you can change your own behavioral patterns by following a simple program called "mental simulation."

To be continued...

Mental Simulation to Change Your Behavior, Part I

"An unfortunate thing about this world is that the good habits are much easier to give up than the bad ones," said English short-story writer William Somerset Maugham.

The insight behind this quote is that deep-seated habits, or behavioral patterns, are difficult to change.

People's deep-seated habits reflect their personality, the clusters of dispositions, thoughts and feelings that make them unique. These pattern-forming features are also known as personality traits.

Personality traits can change gradually or through extensive counseling but they normally are relatively stable over time.

The thought that people can literally change their personality is controversial. The famous Minnesota twin family studies conducted by researchers at the University of Minnesota--Twin Cities, examined more than 8,000 pairs of twins to identify the degree to which personality is a result of nature or nurture.

Psychologist Thomas Bouchard found that monozygotic, or identical, twins reared apart were just as likely to have the same personality as twins who grew up together. Since twins who are reared apart are reared differently, the results seem to indicate that personality is primarily hereditary, just like eye color or height.

If personality traits are primarily hereditary, it might seem that people cannot change their personality.

However, there is room for change.

Just as childhood nutrition can make a small difference to a person's height, nurture can affect personality to some degree.

It is also possible that some of the qualities found between identical twins reared apart were due primarily to physical similarities. Two people who look the same, have similar voices, the same height, and so on are likely to get similar responses from others regardless of where they grow up. So, the environment may have played a greater role in shaping the twins' personality than the Minnesota twin studies showed.

Furthermore, the human brain is amazingly flexible. When people get a small stroke in the left prefrontal cortex, the regions around the damaged area can take over the functions the damaged area used to perform.

When the stroke is significant, the corresponding right side of the brain can take over the same functions.

Practice can make new neural connections!

If personality traits and behavioral patterns are at least partly grounded in the brain's neural networks, it should not come as a surprise that we really can change our personality and behavioral patterns.

To be continued...

What If Someone Lies About You?

By Relationship Expert Catherine Behan

"She did it! It's All Her Fault!!"

"She poisoned his mind against me. Things were going fine until he started spending time with his ex. It is her fault. He would be with me if she would just disappear."

Why is it so appealing to blame someone else for your heartbreak? Sit in any Starbucks around the country and you can listen in on a similar conversation. Frustrated women tell and retell the dramas of their love lives to anyone who will listen. And most of them stay alone, frustrating them even more.

Then if some cheerful Law of Attraction afficionado comes across your path and starts chirping that you must be creating all this drama and you are ready to pinch their head off. You can't be manifesting all of this heartbreak, all you want is Love and you have been chasing it for years to prove it!

So what is wrong? One word. Sabotage. Since starting my coaching practice nearly 10 years ago, I have met the most engaging and beautiful single women all with one common fatal flaw...a part of themselves bound and committed to keep them single, a personal inner saboteur.

This powerful force, similar to an actual force field repelling True Love, comes from inside your own heart. This True Love Saboteur has spent her life with one goal. Ironically it is the same goal for the Outer You....to be happy and feel safe. Somehow, many singles carry a belief that Love hurts more than it heals. For many, Love has been something you have needed protection from. True Love is supposed to protect you.

Every time I ask, "Do you think a part of you actually likes being single?" I get a quick no but on further questioning, many long time singles admit that there are parts of the single life that work for them.

Aha!

Inner conflict will always bring a luke warm mediocre vibration resulting in.....luke warm and mediocre results. Could this be you? Here are 5 signs that your True Love Saboteur has been working hard under the radar to keep you happy, safe.....and single.

1. Isolation. Are you spending too much time alone? Have your friendships shifted? Do you complain that you are the one who calls friends for social events and no one calls you? Is Facebook your main connection to the world? Isolation is safe, but at what cost? Besides, how can you meet anyone if you don't get out! Your True Love Saboteur works overtime providing reasons to be alone. Any little reason to miss a chance to be with people is enough.

2. Procrastination. Are you re-writing the same things on your to do list every day? Do you even have a list? Are you so busy doing the stuff of life that never gets done that you have zero fun going on in your life? The Saboteur loves using this tool, it is so easy to nurture procrastination. Look what an expert you are!

3. Self Criticism. Not only are you isolated and procrastinating, now you pick on yourself about it. Do you compare yourself to others? Do you dislike parts of your personality or physical appearance? Deep self unacceptance is one of the most powerful tools the Saboteur can use and she can wield it like a dagger. After all, if you don't accept yourself, could a Soul Mate ever have a chance? This is the Saboteur's use of victim energy in disguise. Not many recognize the victim vibe making it a sneaky block needing little maintenance.

4. Excuses. "I don't have money for the nicer dating sites." "I am so busy with work and the kids, there is no time for dating." "I hate my clothes. I would need a new wardrobe before I could date." "I hate my underwear." It doesn't matter what the excuse, it is still an excuse. Time is racing by, we are well into 2010. How long will you let an excuse stand between you and fulfillment? Your Saboteur is doing everything to keep you from making the decision you need to make. Choose what you want, make a clear decision and move forward. Do you want to be with a partner no matter what it takes?

5. Insatiable Need to Keep Trying. I love this one. As I said before, your True Love Saboteur wants the same thing you do. To be happy and feel safe. Somewhere deep inside, she as well as any part of you that is hesitant to try again, can't stop the desire to be loved and loved well. You deserve it and I am here to tell you it is possible. At 57, I am celebrating my fifth anniversary in Hawaii in a few weeks. Meeting Larry and taking the risk of getting close to a man again was the best decision I could have made. If I can do it, you can do it.

Your Saboteur is only valiantly doing the job you depend on her to perform. Her one and only purpose in life is to police your beliefs to make sure they stay true. Not talking about the wish list beliefs here or the affirmations you prepare. I am talking about the true deep secret beliefs that you hold about your self worth.

The cool thing is, once you start to recognize your self-sabotaging thoughts, behaviors and beliefs, you can do something about it. When your Saboteur realizes that you can feel happy and safe in new ways and that so can she, you will relax more deeply than you have in years.

We all want the same thing here after all. It feels amazing to be loved and accepted. Of course you are going to pursue that. Address your sabotage tendencies and take action steps to address each one. You will dramatically increase your personal magnetism as you accept yourself at this new level. There is nothing more irresistible than a person 100% comfortable in their own skin. It is always possible to deepen your sense of self worth. Make a decision, research your options and take action. As Gramma used to say, "Times a'wastin."

Wonder how strong Your Saboteur is? I have a few time slots available for my last Love Magnet Readings. Beautiful Jeanice, my assistant, will be doing the readings starting in September. She is fabulous and you will love her. If you do want to speak to me personally, however, you can register right here.


Catherine Behan
Your Soul Mate Attraction Mentor

Catherine Behan, CEO of Attract Your Soul Mate Now.com, has a single minded focus. Transformation. A leading authority in the Law of Attraction and the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT), she has helped hundreds of people discover the truth about themselves….That even though they may feel unloved, they are not unlovable. A magnet to long time singles, she delights in helping those disappointed in love to launch new dreams for love and fulfillment. Catherine is the Creator of “Seduce Your Saboteur: How To Enchant, Engage and Enlist Your Strongest Ally and Find True Love In The Twinkling of An Eye.” Through the magic of the internet, she is serving seeking soul mates with her unique intuitive abilities and co-creating transformation in clients from all over the world.

Love Is Looking For YOU,
Catherine
Your Soul Mate Attraction Mentor

Creator of "Seduce Your Saboteur: How To Enchant, Engage and Enlist Your Strongest Ally and Find True Love In The Twinkling of an Eye."

Are you ready for a little Soul Mate Magic of your own? Click Here for the First Step. See how strong your Love Vibe is right now!

Anxiety Expert

I wanted to share this link with you. It's a great site and highly relevant to the issue of obsession love. Here is a quote from the site on coping:

The issue of coping isn’t as straightforward as it might first appear. From my perspective as a psychologist, there are a mind boggling number of potential ways I could choose to assess it. This, to some extent, says something about the fact nobody has really pinned down the concept of coping or how best to examine it. Read the rest of this post >>

Adult Attachment Anxiety

Everyone has an attachment style, a part of your personality that determines how you behave in interpersonal relationships. Insecure attachment styles include attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance. An avoidant attachment style is characterized by reluctance to trust and rely on others and fear of intimacy. An anxiety attachment style involves reoccupation with the other, a need for reassurance and fear of abandonment. When attachment styles interfere with daily function, the condition is considered an attachment disorder. Adults with attachment anxiety are more often depressed and perceive and react to other people's behavior more quickly, but less accurately, than more self-reliant adults.

Depression

Individuals with attachment anxiety are more likely to become depressed than more self-reliant people, reports a research team in the July 2005 issue of the Journal of Counseling Psychology. The researchers looked at the attachment styles of 425 students between 18 and 36 years old at a large Midwestern state university. They found that participants with high levels of attachment anxiety had excessive needs for reassurance. Not getting the needed level of reassurance led to symptoms of depression. Read the rest of this article >>

Philosophy Student Reflects on his Weight Loss

My former student Adam Taylor reflects on his 156 pounds weight loss here.

The Princess Diaries

From my newest blog: There's Something about Mary: The Princess Diaries

The fairytale began on September 16 2000 when Mary Donaldson, an ordinary Australian girl, met Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark at Merivale's Slip Inn in Sydney during the Summer Olympics.

Three years later the Australian beauty and the crown prince decided they wanted to spend the rest of their lives together. On October 2003 after a long-distance relationship, a short stay in Paris and a number of private visits to Denmark, Mary and Frederik got engaged.

During the ten years from the couple's first meeting until today, Mary underwent a drastic change from a sporty, sun-tanned sales director to crown princess, fashion icon, mother of two and charity activist. She is director of the Mary Foundation, an organization focused on improving the lives of children, adults and families who are socially excluded.

The changes the princess has undergone during the ten years are astonishing. Her hair has been coloured and restyled, she has undergone a body and skin transformation, her posture is more regal, and her clothing has become more classic and elegant with a clear historic influence.Read the rest of this post >>