How I Found My Partner After Five Excruciating Years of Dating
It did not involve manifesting, a dating app, or being set up.
After five years of post-divorce dating and learning to navigate the dating space again in my 40s, I realized that 98% of everything I was told to do to find a life partner was utter crap. It doesn’t work. It was never going to work.
Last October, I met my partner and nothing about it made sense. Nothing. I was on vacation, for the love of God. He is everything I ever wanted, some things I never expected, and a couple things I thought I gave up on. This wrapped up in a tall, handsome package that wears nice shoes and is geekier than I ever imagined.
Exactly two months from today, ironically on the one-year anniversary of the day we met, we will be packing my life up into a U-Haul and moving me from my long-time home of Phoenix to the Bay Area.
So, what is the answer? What is the secret sauce? How did I do it? In a nutshell. I took control of my life and let the pieces fall where they may. One of the pieces that fell was a man names Jason.
I let go of every trite bit of advice I had ever been given
I learned there are two groups of people you should never listen to when it comes to dating advice. The first is anyone trying to sell you something.
The people telling you to make a list of everything you want in a partner and manifest the hell out of it? Manifesting coaches who will follow up with an offer for a $497 manifesting course guaranteed to bring you the love of you life. If it doesn’t work, you’re doing it work. Do better. Here’s another course to help you.
The second group are well-meaning friends who have not been in the dating scene for decades. For midlifers, this includes damn near all of your coupled friends. For the millennials, this is a good chunk of your moms’ friends.
Ignore these people. They have never had to navigate Bumble. We are not the same. We have seen things.
If the person giving you dating advice is wearing a wedding ring that existed before the original recording of Hanson’s Mmmm Bop, do not listen to them. They know nothing about finding a life partner despite having one.
Examples of the advice single people hear that is totally ridiculous:
- “You’ll find someone when you’re least expecting it.” — Bitch, please. I expect awesome in my life. All the time. Everywhere. If you are not living your life in a manner that openly invite epic shit, rethink things.
- “You have to put yourself out there.” — I was “out there” for years. There is not correlating to the amount of effort you put into dating and what you get out. This is not farming. Dating is not planting seeds reaping whole-ass human parts six months later.
There are no rules for finding a partner. This does not mean you don’t have to set your own rules. Setting rules laid the foundation.
I drew hard lines in the sand
Early last year, I dated a man for a few months that ignored a good number of my boundaries and subsequently made me take a good long look at what was acceptable and what was not. This was the only way I was going to protect myself from yet again spending a few months being disrespected by a man that was mediocre at best.
Creating a list of all the things you want in a partner is useless. Creating a list that defines how you want to be treated and feel in a relationship is life changing.
I wrote down everything I would not tolerate. I got very really about what caused me pain in the past and led me to comprise what I wanted. These were my hard passes. The red flags.
One of mine was that I will not date someone for longer than 30 days without exclusivity. After 30 days, I know whether I want to invest in someone. If the person was on the fence about me after 30 days, nope. I adopted the “if it’s not a fuck yes, it’s a fuck no” mentality.
This means that you are not wasting your time with the wrong people, allowing you to be available for the right people.
I pieced myself back together
The truth I needed to accept was that there were parts of me that were still cracked in dozens of places. I had been holding myself together with the emotional equivalent of duct tape.
I did the good therapy. The deep therapy. The EMDR therapy that made me sob for hours after. The therapy my insurance didn’t cover that I paid for anyway. It was the greatest invest I have ever made.
I knew that there were parts of me than attracted people that would hurt me. Parts that would be prone to codependency. Parts that would fear reject and compromise too much.
Fixing these parts of me didn’t bring Jason into my life. Fixing them allowed me to trust myself and to trust him and without that, he’d be long gone, either his doing or mine.
I figure out who I was and I was relentlessly that person
What came out of my therapy was a renewed understanding of who I was. I was no longer afraid of any part of myself. I rewrote my self-narratives and felt comfortable in my own skin, and I mean really comfortable.
Everywhere I went, everything that I did honored and respected that self. I became bold. Confident. Honest. Intentional. I got really got at being me. Imposter syndrome fell to the ground.
What happened next was abundance. I was able to see everything as an opportunity. I talked myself out of nothing. So, when I found myself sitting next to a man in a cigar bar in downtown Napa on a Monday night and he seemed interesting enough, I asked him to have a drink with me.
The days, weeks, and months that followed involved holding the line all the things I learned. There was no way I could have held this line, been true to myself, and been able to really see him for the great man he is, without this work. It was hard as hell but worth every bit.
This was my perfect storm. Get rid of the distractions. Get real about your wants and needs. Fix your shit. Honor yourself.
Finding someone is easy. Throw a rock and you will hit three single people. The “secret” to finding the right partner is seeing them, being open to them, existing exactly how you want to regardless of their presence, and a crap ton of hard work to be a good partner and honor their effort.
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Vanessa Torre is a writer and a midlife coach for women looking to make remarkable changes so they can live creative, fulfilling, and meaningful lives. Learn more at www.vanessatorre.com.
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