Spoiler: Whatever the issues arising in our love life... as a love coach I've noticed that deep down it almost always boils down to some of the five following challenges. Challenges that can be overcome!
So let's jump in and unpack the 5 most typical love hurdles so that you can begin again with fresh eyes and ears. A fresh awareness into what parts of you need the most care to attract the healthy love you genuinely desire and is yours for the experiencing.
These occur in no particular order.
The Healthy Story Hurdle to Creating Love
This one is the easiest to spot. It goes something like this:
Brain is excited to get out and meet people. Maybe you open some kind of dating app with enthusiasm. But are almost immediately bombarded with all the stories that have been running the show.
Stories like:
"There are no good men/women/people out there anyways"
"I'm too complicated"
"I'm not easy to love".
"Dating apps are just for one night stands anyways"
"I'm not xyz enough... or I'm too xyz" (insert pretty, rich, tall, witty, photogenic, etc..)
I could go on and I'm sure you recognize some of the above for yourself right? We've all had some form of these stories mucking about at one time or another.
Here's what I want you to do with this one.
Remember the above is not necessarily true. It's usually just protective mechanisms trying to keep you in your comfort zone.
Remember there are all shapes, age ranges, personality types that get together and find love. Walk around your neighbourhood and watch the couples around you. You'll realize this is true!
Create a far more healthy story: Choose the story that seems to be most prominent in your mind these days. The one that really triggers an insecurity or stops you from taking action. And I want you to FLIP it. If it's that "there are no good men out there" for example: Flip this to something like: "I've got a planet with almost 8 billion people to choose from, and I happen to be attracting the right one(s) for me as we speak"
Then repeat this to yourself every time a doubt comes up. Walk as the person with this reality. Talk as the person with this reality. Dress like the person with this reality.
Notice the shift in who you attract from this energetic space!
The Healthy Self-Love & Self-Care Habits Hurdle
This one might feel elusive at first. Like how do self-love and self-care practices have so much of an impact on our dating or relationship life?
If you're a giver... (like me and many of my clients!). It can be so easy to forget yourself, while trying to please everyone else. A regular self-care practice becomes the grounding agent that helps you step away from anxious attachments tendencies for a moment and remember WHO is most important for you here? YOU!!
Doing self-care and self-love practices heightens your pleasure ceiling! It's an incredible practice to help you open to receive greater and greater things in many forms: including love, support, connection, sexy moments, compliments, etc
You teach others how to love you by how you love yourself. You stop expecting everyone else to supply all what you need, because you're already giving it to yourself first. This moves you out of chasing... and into ATTRACTING!!
This is where I begin with ALL of my coaching clients. It's that essential.
(I've got a 30-Day Love Ignitor PDF program with all kinds of amazing self-love and self-care practices, available if attracting healthy love is what you desire to experience in the coming months).
The Self-Worth Hurdle to Creating Healthy Love
I would consider this the most stealthy hurdle of all. And yet, it's the one that drives most of our relationship challenges: Our sense of self-worth.
Confidence and self-worth often get conflated. Which is why it's so tricky.
A high-achieving person, who appears confident on the outside, has the money, career, and social status... can suffer from tremendous self-worth issues which gets reflected back to them in their relationships.
You can learn to become more confident. This is a trait that is reflected back from external validation.
But your self-worth is all about you and what you feel you are worthy or deserving of in love.
And many of us need a giant boost in this arena. It's my number one focus in 2024... and I'm a LOVE COACH!! Just to help normalize this for you.
How does low self-worth impact relationships?:
One of the most common ways I see this play out is in various forms of sabotage.
This can look like avoiding dating at all.
It can look like dating, but being way too picky.
It can look like meeting someone great and then subconsciously sabotaging it.
It can also play out very commonly by being, or staying, or going back to relationships that are not feeding your soul. That make you feel bad, anxious, are un-reciprocated or lower your self-esteem.
So what do we do about this?
Do regular self-love and self-care practices like the above (or like what I suggest in this blog post or this one).
Flip those stories around and keep them top of mind!
Connect with people who remind you of your beauty every day.
The Heartbreak Hurdle to Creating Healthy Love
One of the most challenging (but very possible!) hurdles to overcome... our past heartbreaks, disappointments, past relationship icks. And this can include our childhood relationship experiences with our caregivers!
This hurdle creates a lot of unreasonable expectations when not in check.
And most of our relationship triggers and pain arise from these aspects of ourselves.
I can't give a one-size-fits-all tip for this one as it's dependant on the particular situation and I highly recommend love coaching to help with this (sign up for a free Connection Call with me here if you're searching for assistance with this).
We all have blind spots and even love coaches need love coaches! Just to give you an idea.
But I can say this:
You don't need to be 100% healed to find healthy love.
Much of this happens within the relationship itself.
Especially when it's of a healthy, supportive, collaborative nature.
So you can turn that "I'm too complicated" story around into "I am exactly right for my ideal healthy partnership" and attract a soul that compassionately understands your kind of "stuff" and where you compassionately understand their kind of "stuff".
And you are both available and willing to support each other in it.
In the same fashion, it's much more realistic to know that you'll likely find healthy love in someone who is not perfect!! So we can lower those expectations here too shall we?
The Asking for Help to Create Healthy Love Hurdle
Which brings me to the last point. So many of us assume that we should just be good at love from birth.
But how-to-relationship was not a topic in my 5th grade class.. was it for you?
No! We are not taught these things in school!
So as adults, or starting from our teenage yeas, we move through trial and error with great influence from our social and parental experiences that stem from a very young age.
But what I've also found to be true... is the shame that gets placed on needing to be good at relationships causes many to avoid asking for help when they need it!
Healthy love tip: Talk to your friends about your love challenges.
This actually helps you get a head start in having those hard conversations with your future (or current) partner that will need to be had. Often.
Get help from a professional. I've absolutely done so for my own post-divorce phase as well as throughout dating because I KNOW I can't see it all. And having someone else's eyes and ears to reflect back, keeps me on the path to my own healthy love desire.
And this is who I am to my love coaching clients! (Let's get on a Connection Call when you're ready for it).
You get to start your healthy love now!!
After reading all of the above. My hope is that you'll see how very possible it is, to create the healthy love life you desire. All of the above is addressable. And with greater self-awareness around what parts are coming into play in your dating and relationship life, you can begin to recognize where the strength in those experiences lie for you.
What has made you stronger and more resilient. Or more selective and able to be really clear on what you don't want!
And with this newfound awareness, you can step into your new health love journey as of today.
Your greatest Love Cheerleader,
Xine XOX
Next Step...
Join me for more of this juicy love goodness by taking the following
"What's your Healthy Love Archetype" Quiz!
Be sure to share your results and sign up for my weekly Love Letter so we can stay in touch.