Paved Paradise and Put Up a Parking Lot

What most people call love, I call attraction. Seeing someone across a room and feeling that sense of flutter can draw you to seek them out. It's only after you get to know their particulars that you can decide to love. Yes, I called it a decision. We don't run after just anyone who catches our fancy. They might be involved or have characteristics we abhor. We use our experiences and criteria to select who can move closer.

My friend Jess lamented that her boyfriend wouldn't commit. He kept stringing her along. I felt for her, but I didn't understand. He clearly wasn't interested in her enough to make time for her. So long as she was involved with him, she couldn't seem to find someone better. So she waited.

I suggested that he was like an old clunky car taking up space in her garage. You can't put a shiny new BMW in your space until you send the old beat up Chevy to the junk yard. No reason to disparage the past, maybe that boyfriend car drove you to where you needed at the time. Send it on to someone who can use it for something else.  Honor your time together, wish for peace for future road trips and let go.

Okay, boyfriends aren't exactly like cars. Usually you want to get another car to use ASAP.  Relationships require some time alone to sort out what happened and where you want to go from here.

Start with cleaning your emotional garage. Remove everything related to a past relationship. Put it in one box somewhere out of the way. You'll get back to it later. Now start decorating your space with your true personality. If you are messy, make a meaningful to you mess. If you're organized, get some of those shelf units with hooks and peg board and all that. BE YOU, ALL YOU! That way, when you start looking for something new, you don't have to change your life for it.

Spend some time being you. Prepare yourself for a new relationship by taking care of something like a plant or a pet. You don't have to bring them into your life, but you do need to experience some attachments to living things. Start doing activities you love. Join the Sierra Club, attend science fiction conventions, take a cooking class, plant a garden or go for a walk in a rose garden. Those are my likes, tell me some of yours?

Spend a good six months finding out what lights your fire. Then go through your past relationship box and remember the good, let go of the pain and see it for what it was. I had a kind boyfriend I cared for, he was just what I needed while we were together. He served as an EXCELLENT transitional person. We got together seven months after my first marriage broke up. I'm deeply grateful for the perspective he showed me.

We were together two years and I decided to end it when I realized it was hurting me to be involved with someone I didn't see a future with. We are still friends. I wish him the best.

I started doing everything I dreamed about. I wrote down goals and plans and step by step set things in motion. After the breakup of my first marriage a friend suggested I take a wonderful trip and send him a postcard, "Having a wonderful time, glad you're not here." I went to Europe, lived in Oxfordshire for a few months and traveled in Italy and France. I bought hundreds of postcards. Though I didn't send one to my ex, I did chuckle with every purchase.

There I was busy being my happy messy self and I came across my prize BMW revved up and waiting for me. Big Murry Wow.

Your Turn!