The lovely ladies of Single Women Rule compiled a list of their favorite blog posts of 2009 and lo and behold! I was on it.  Many thanks to the women over there who enjoy my blog and voted for it.  Please check out some of the other great women writers gathered over at SWR.

Last week I had coffee with an exceptional woman who is building a business in this shaky economy.  But she believes so wholeheartedly in her mission that she is completely un-discouraged by news reports that imply certain failure.  She knows she is on to something good, and that with the right plans and preperation, she will certainly be successful.  I believer her 100%.

Julie’s website is called Heels Connect and it’s a great resource for professional women looking to take their careers to the next level.  Of course, when we met, the conversation quickly went from professional to personal and we couldn’t help but dish a little bit on striking a balance between being female entrepreneurs and single women.  Needless to say we shared a few laughs about how our goals on both sides can seem ridiculously out of reach sometimes!

She recently wrote a blog post that veered away from her usual career-minded topics, about finding true love in life only after she felt completely satsfied with the life she currently had.  She called it, “Who Do You Want When You’re Full?”  and likened finding a satisfying relationship to an excellent meal she had recently enjoyed with friends.

“When I’m starving, everything looks delicious.  I’m ready to eat anything to satisfy my hunger.  But I often regret what I ate when I’m full afterwards.  I wish I hadn’t stuffed myself.  The halibut, on the other hand, still tasted great even though I wasn’t hungry.  I still wanted it and enjoyed it immensely. And I had no regrets afterwards; I want the same in a man. No, I don’t want him to taste like  halibut…” Read more

She asked to me to respond with my thoughts on the matter, and naturally, I obliged.

Julie, you bring up an excellent point.

When you sat down to that meal, you were already satisfied. You didn’t arrive at the restaurant starving, diving into the bread basket, stuffing your face and counting the minutes until your meal arrived. You were enjoying good company and waiting patiently for what the waiter had described as a surely delicious meal. When the food arrived, you wholeheartedly enjoyed every last bite.

According to Lauren Frisky of the TheFrisky.com, there are two kinds of single women: the kind that creates - and enjoys - a full life, and the kind that wastes time lamenting their single status. Guess which one ends up happier?

“In January, I left a live-in relationship after three years. The experience was all the sad adjectives you can imagine. But after the sobbing spells and the heavy drinking, the fog lifted — I was finally single again for the first time since after I graduated college.

Naturally, I expected my single friends to react with equal doses of giddy glee. For the record, I’m not the kind of girl who ditches my ladies when I’m dating someone. But lots of time does free up when you become single.

As for my coupled-up chums, I expected sad stares. They probably thought I was doomed for spinsterhood after leaving my longest relationship at age 27.

“But don’t you want to get married and have kids?” I imagined them asking. When I’d respond, “Not right now,” they’d ignore me and say, “I know someone who’d be perfect for you!”

But that didn’t happen. My taken gals were as supportive as my sturdiest Victoria’s Secret bra.

“I don’t worry about you,” my best friend, who is getting hitched next summer, affirmed.

“You’ll be fine, alone or with someone.”

Which girl are you? Read the rest of the story here.

I wanted to share Living Life’s most recent blog post with you guys.  I always appreciate the raw honesty she shows in her blog, discussing her post-divorce life as a single woman just trying to do her thang. This week’s entry is no exception as she examines why we let certain people treat us badly (read: men) when, intellectually, we totally know better.  If you’ve been hurt once (or twice, or three times) how do you proceed in life, maintaining your faith in people without leaving yourself vulnerable to disaster and heartbreak?  It’s a good question.  I think it’s a very delicate dance we must perform, being open and willing to explore new relationships, but at the same time not forgetting who we are and what our value is.  Remember that as women, we have the option of saying, “no,” and we have to exercise that right, even when it’s uncomfortable or awkward.  Make “No” a phrase your comfortable with and use it when your gut tells you to.  Because if there’s anything the readers of this blog know, it’s that there’s nothing more awkward than dealing with bad relationship issues later rather than sooner.  

 ”In one particular relationship I found myself constantly going against what I knew had to be the truth and falling for his lies. He twisted the truth, and a lot of times straight lied to me, but somehow he always managed to make me feel like I was going crazy for questioning him and not blindly believing what he was saying. I allowed this to go on for a very long time, almost the entire three and a half years that we were together.”

“For the life of me, I can’t come up with a great reason that I allowed him to do that to me. Was it simply because I wanted to believe that he was a good honest person who loved me and wouldn’t hurt me? Maybe. Was it because my insecurities about being alone made me fear him leaving me? Possibly. My guess is that it was probably because of a combination of these things along with some others that I haven’t come to realize yet.”

How many of you can relate?  Read the rest of the entry here.

Happy Monday, people! 

Today, I am excited to report that (I, and) THTM have been mentioned in a new article about “Involuntary Celibacy,” a concept I find too funny and oh-so-2009.  Basically, it speaks right to the heart of those of us who are just-out-of-a-relationship-so-how-can-we-possibly-think-of-new-boys, in that it refers to that period in life when there is absolutley no hanky-panky happening in your life.  And you’re kinda glad.

Whether we are abstaining because we’re just not ready to jump back into the dating pool yet, (or we already have and found it um, freezing), OR we are deathly afraid of contracting swine flu, sometimes a girl’s just gotta pull back the reigns and say, “woah.” 

I opted out of the scene for awhile because I just didn’t want to subject myself to any bad dates, nor did I want to unwittingly burst into tears over appetizers by getting myself into something I wasn’t ready for.  I waited almost a full year before I even agreed to go on a date.  And then, it was another six months before I let any of them actually touch me!  I’m happy with my (very personal) decision, but it takes all kinds.  And this article mentions them all.

So don’t feel bad about your self-imposed dry spell.  It happens to the best of us.  It’s time we started owning it.  Come on, it’s even a got a hip new name and everything!

http://sirensmag.com/2009/06/not-getting-any/