It’s become the norm these days. You meet someone, you get their number, you go home and google them. You may find an inactive Linkedin account, a professional business photo, and their listing in the white pages, but none of those things will tell you as much about a guy than good old Facebook. If you can fully view a guy’s Facebook page, a world of juicy information awaits you…you just have to be able to decode it’s meaning.

Typically if you are the kind of woman that is looking for a relationship, then you want to avoid guys that are immature, shallow, egotistical, and/or selfish. They not only make bad boyfriends, the often never fully commit to a relationship.  Remember, a man who is too in love with himself will have no room left in his heart for you. The four negative qualities I previously mentioned, all boil down to being self-absorbed. Here are the top five ways to figure out via Facebook if you are potentially getting involved with the wrong kind of guy.

1. He has many pictures of just himself. If you click on his profile pics and realize he has multiple photos of himself, it could mean he loves his face a little too much. If he’s at least doing something in the pictures (running a marathon, hiking a cool trail, or in front of a national landmark) that’s more understandable than seeing ten snapshots of him just posing again and again in his best ensemble. You want a guy that has a good heart and a well adjusted self-esteem. Too many “cool” photos of him, especially one’s where other people are purposely cropped out, could be a red flag. If you find quite a few shirtless shots, find yourself another guy.

2. He is constantly posting self-gratifying updates. Are most of his status updates to alert others on his wonderful and impressive life? Do most of his mobile updates include him at parties, hanging with celebs, or pics with a harem of women? If so, this could be a man who’s mind has not evolved past his teenage years. A good, well-adjusted guy will post about other things besides himself – sport, news, or family and friends. He won’t display an eagerness to impress, but rather an ability to connect!

3. He is always announcing his location, location, location. Could you track every minute of his life for the last five years? If a guy constantly posts his whereabouts,  you have to ask yourself the question, why does he think everyone needs to know what he’s doing at all times? Although you may think you want a man with a jet-setting lifestyle, it’s more smoke and mirrors than actual substance. Besides if he’s always club hopping, restaurant going, charity balling and boys night-outing, when will he have time for a real relationship?

4. He is always boozing. If his page could drink, it would be plastered. Most, if not all of his pictures include big red cups or dark brown bottles. He may not go out very often but that’s only because he’s a one man party. A guy that drinks most nights of the week is definitely more interested in getting smashed than getting serious. While this tell-tale sign may not point to directly to self-love, you definitely don’t want to come second to Sam Adams.

5. He loves stuff. If you find his page to be more of a display of his toys (from his car or bike to his newest watch or shotgun) you may want to rethink investing your time into someone so materialistic. Although you may initially swoon over those pics of him on his Ducati, remember that what matters in the long run is a man’s character, not his play things. Too much “stuff” on his profile may indicate that his ego is tied into labels, brands, and ultimately what other people think.

For more answers to relationship questions, contact Jess McCann for a personal consultation.  Also be sure to check out her new book, Was It Something I Said? : The answers to all your dating dilemma’s, hitting stores January 2013.

Follow me on Twitter @iamjessmccann

Karina S. is twenty-nine and she has been playing hard to get her whole life. When a guy checks her out, she pretends not to notice. When he asks for her number, she feigns half interest. She keeps herself busy so she is forced to turn down a first date request, and she absolutely never tells a man how she feels about him…ever. Karina has been playing hard to get for so long, it’s become ingrained in her thought process. She doesn’t second guess how she interacts with men, she’s simply on autopilot. Her mother taught her from an early age that men like the “chase”, and so she’s always strived to start running away the minute she meets someone.

The problem is that it’s not working for her. Karina has been single for the last eight years. She’s had a few dates here and there, but none have amounted to any sort of significant relationship. When she sat on my couch for the first time, she wasn’t prepared for what I was going to tell her, as apparent from the shocked look on her face.

“‘Hard to get is not working for you,” I said. “You are have to drop the act.”

Confused, she referenced my book and cited that I repeated many times that men do need to “chase” women and feel they have won them over. She even pulled out her copy and turned to the chapter on Indifference. It seemed to her that my advice was right in line with what she had always been doing. But, as I gently pointed out, if that were true she would have found a boyfriend by now.

Forget “Hard to Get”

The difference between my advice and playing hard to get may be subtle, but don’t let subtlety minimize the importance. The reason playing hard to get doesn’t work anymore is because times have changed and men are now looking for signs of interest. Without some reciprocity on your part, they won’t keep pursuing you…or in many cases, even start to. That’s not to say you have to initiate contact, or ask them out on a date…Hear me when I say that’s absolutely NOT what you should do, because you will eliminate the chase that way.You don’t want a man to think you love him after one date, but you do want him to think that you like him.

My client Karina quickly understood the importance of showing interest. It’s a fine line, of course. Show too much and you can scare a man off, but show too little and you risk losing him too. How then do you find the balance in between? What if you are someone that has lived by the H2G rules. What do you do now?

The key is to use one of the tactics in my book called, Mirror Theory. It’s meaning is fairly self explanatory. You want to “mirror” his signs of interest. Therefore if he checks you out as you walk by, you want to smile at him. He’s showing you interest, and your smile shows it back. If he asks you out on a date, you gladly accept. You don’t want to do cartwheels or supply him with ten different ways to get in touch with you, you simply want to mirror his request with a, “Sure, that would be nice.” If he compliments you, tells you that you are smart or beautiful, make sure you work your own note of appreciate into the conversation too. Telling a man you find him funny or perceptive will only make him like you more… after all, who doesn’t love a sincere compliment? You can and should still be indifferent – meaning if the relationship doesn’t go the distance you won’t fall to pieces, but you have to add in a few buying signs.

After Karina and I had two sessions, things began to immediately turn around for her. Within a week, she had three men ask for her number.

Typically it’s a woman’s “relationship agenda” that causes her to come on too strong. Some try to cover their ambition for love with playing hard to get, but it often backfires. Try combating the “wanting” for a relationship at it’s core. If you don’t know how, give me a call. I’ll walk you through it!

For more of Jess McCann’s advice on dating, pick up You Lost Him at Hello in bookstore’s and online. Also, keep an eye out for her next book, being released in January 2013, “Was it Something I Said: The answer to all your dating dilemma’s.” You can contact Jess here or follow her on Twitter @iamjesssmccann

I think at some point in life all women have asked themselves this question. If you’ve ever been dumped by a guy who claimed he wasn’t ready for a relationship and then practically moved in with the next girl that came along, it is hard not to question if something about you is flawed when your relationship doesn’t work out. You may not even be able to pinpoint what it is about you that seems inferior to other women,  you just feel deep in your bones that somehow you are. If you watched this season of The Bachelor on ABC, you may remember that sweet, southern Kacie B. cried the very words, “Why am I not good enough?” after she was sent home rejected following her home-town date. From her point of view, if she were somehow “better” she would have been the one to get the final rose. But as we have seen play out repeatedly in season’s past, the “best” woman does not always win. In fact this season it would seem that the absolute “worst” woman triumphed over all. But Courtney, who landed the Bachelor and that final rose (but was temporarily dumped just weeks after the show aired) has involuntarily taught every woman in the world a very important lesson. And that is this – being “good enough” isn’t what makes a man love you. If that were true, Ben would have picked, Lindzi, who in many people’s opinion, was prettier, smarter, and orders of magnitude nicer. Or earlier cast-off, Emily, who in my opinion was not only more attractive than Courtney, but also a PHD student with a great sense of humor. There were so many women on the show that arguably seemed “better” than Courtney. Yet, Ben picked her. Why? Because something about Courtney resonated with Ben. His personality, his life experiences, and his own feelings about himself all play into why he chose her. Her being the “better” woman was not a factor at play. I’m hoping this is an ounce of comfort to any brokenhearted woman wondering why their man left them for someone else.

A client of mine fell deeply in love two years ago, only to have the man she thought she would marry leave her for someone else. They had had a bumpy relationship from the start but my client always thought that somehow they would work through their differences and end up together. When I first started coaching her she was already obsessed with her ex’s new relationship. Like many women, she stalked her former flame and his new girlfriend via the social network, hoping to find a a shred of understanding as to what this woman had that she, herself, did not. Unfortunately she not only failed to find the answer, she became even more perplexed when she realized the woman was less physically fit, less educated, and more needy (as evident from her many amorous wall posts on Facebook).  Several times my client asked me what it meant to be abandoned by your lover for a person of less quality. Did it mean that despite all my clients’ wonderful attributes, that she was just somehow, unexplainably inferior?

Of course not.

What my client failed to consider was (again) her ex’s personality, life experience and his own feelings about himself. Even though he was a good-looking, confident man, he had come from a broken and dysfunctional family. His own mother was an extremely volatile woman who relentlessly picked on him while smothering him at the same time. She was hot and cold with her feelings. Growing up he never fully felt accepted by anyone. Then he met my client. A woman who loved him the way he always wanted to be loved. A good, kind, well-balanced person that would never attack him or his character. And for him, that felt…awkward. He was not comfortable with that kind of love yet. He was not capable of appropriately receiving it. He truly felt more at home with someone who was …”dramatic.” Someone that provided the “ups and downs” he was accustomed to growing up. His mother also barely graduated high school, and he liked being in the company of people he found less intelligent than himself. My client’s smart, sound persona frankly made him feel subordinate to her. She of course never saw him as having a fragile ego, but none the less, he had one. When he met the woman he left her for, he immediately felt more comfortable, even though the relationship wasn’t quite as healthy.

Six months later, after the initial sting of rejection had subsided, my client realized that she was mostly just physically attracted to her ex. With a little time and distance she began to see a long term relationship with him would have never worked or made her happy.

If you are hurting from a recent break-up and the person you love is now with someone else, know that while you may have not been perfect (and who is?) you didn’t lose your relationship to the better woman. In time you will likely see that you can love someone that is not a good fit for you long term, and it’s very probable that your ex just saw that before you did.

For more advice on dating, check out Jess McCann’s book, You Lost Him at Hello or follow her on Twitter @iamjessmccann. You can also inquire about personal coaching at www.jessmccann.com.

If you are watching the current season of The Bachelor, perhaps you too have woken up this morning with a reality show hangover. After watching Ben kick off Emily (my personal favorite) and Rachel, and hand that final rose to the diabolical Courtney last night, I went straight to my fridge and consumed an entire vat of ice cream. The whole thing is so depressing.

Is it just me or are we are in the Twilight zone? This season is reminiscent of season 14, where Jake Pavelka proposed to fan-hated Vienna Giardi. Except Courtney makes Vienna look like Mother Teresa. My prediction for this season is that Courtney will also triumph just as Vienna did, stealing the bachelor’s heart as well as the final rose. I can hear all you women watching right now, screaming why God, why? Well, there is an explanation. You may not like it, but I’ll tell you what I believe are the four reasons that Ben will ultimately chose the most hated woman in Bachelor history to be his bride.

1. She is a model. Sorry, but most men are easily blinded by good looks, at least for a little while. Although her personality seems far from wonderful, she is a hot chick, and hot goes a long way. But the other women on the show are hot too, so it isn’t just that…

2. She is a master at Fear of Loss. Did you hear her tell Ben, “I lost the spark” and “If I didn’t get a one-on-one date, I was not taking you home to meet my family.” Courtney is the only woman on the show that has expressed she has the ability to walk away if she is not getting what she needs or wants. All the other women are doing the complete opposite! They are assuring and then reassuring Ben of their feelings. As I talk about in You Lost Him at Hello, Fear of Loss is one of the biggest motivators for getting men to propose, and Courtney is the only one who seems to understand this. Unfortunately.

3. She is Indifferent. When Ben is with Lindzi or Kacie B it is written all over their faces just how much they like him. They are smiling from ear to ear, hanging on his every word, and giggling like school girls. When Courtney is with Ben, however, she seems interested, but at the same time, gives off the perception that she is not even close to being in love. She is exercising just the right amount of indifference to keep Ben interested. (If you want to know more about Indifference, it’s all in right here)

4. Ben is a bit Insecure.  He made a comment a few episodes back that he always, “picks the girls that don’t love him back.” And hence, history is now going to repeat itself. The reason he picks these women who don’t love him is because he truly does not feel worthy of being loved in a healthy way. When a nice normal woman like Kacie B expresses her feelings, he is immediately turned off because he thinks, “Why would you love me this much? What’s wrong with you?”. He is more comfortable with women that don’t really love him because although it’s sad and unhealthy, it’s what feels right to him. Why it feels right is another story…but if he doesn’t work on this problem, he’s never going to be in a happy, balanced relationship.

My prediction:

I hope I’m wrong, but I think Courtney and Ben are going to ride off into the sunset together after the final rose ceremony. As I state in my book, using Fear of Loss and Indifference will land you the guy you want, even if you are, as Emily put it, “shallow and vapid.” However, in this case, I will also predict that Courtney and Ben’s engagement will not last and Ben will be 0-2 on the marriage proposals. Courtney is not a bad person, she’s just self-absorbed. Perhaps her parents doted on her a little too much, or perhaps it’s from constantly being in the kind of environment where people tell you that you are great all the time for doing nothing more than looking hot and smiling into a camera. Hopefully when she sees herself on the show she will get a glimpse into how own her feelings about herself rub people the wrong way. I’m confident that she can change, and even make a complete turn around if she really wants to.  I guess we’ll see…

Follow me on Twitter @iamjessmccann to get daily advice and updates! Also make sure you read, “You Lost Him at Hello” for all the techniques listed above.

If there is one thing Amy S. knows for sure, it’s how she feels about her ex boyfriend.

“I don’t know what I saw in him,” she says now.  “But at the time, I was so in love I couldn’t see straight.”

Amy had dated Clayton, a real estate broker in D.C., for nearly five years when she discovered he was cheating on her. She took him back for a short period of time only to find out once again that he was cheating.

“I thought there was something wrong with me,” she tells me one afternoon. “Here was this gorgeous guy with all the fixin’s – degree from Georgetown, condo in the city, running in the right circles – and I couldn’t get him to commit.”

Amy says she tried ten different strategies to make the relationship work – from backing off to practically moving in. Nothing seemed to steady she and Clayton’s volatile status. Finally she just gave up and let go.

“I cried for a long time and blamed myself.  It took me years to finally realize that I was not the problem and that Clayton wasn’t as great as I thought he was.”

Amy says she learned the hard way that good on paper doesn’t necessarily mean good in person. I myself have seen too many women duped into thinking a great resume equals a great guy. Although a few of our suburbs were recently named some of the best places to find rich singles (Arlington weighed in at #2) that does not necessarily guarantee that you as a woman have your pick of the Nation’s litter. Just because a man has the right look, the right job and the right degree, doesn’t automatically indicate that you are getting the best guy. In the metro area, there are a lot of Clayton’s: Guys that only look like husband material on the surface. They are the guys that will wine and dine you, but won’t ever commit. They are the ones that will tell you every detail about their life, but fail miserably at asking about yours. They drop names, as well as car models and measure their worth by their vast collection of passport stamps. Some girls call these men players, or bad boys, or even jerks, but doing so would elevate them to a higher caliber than justified. After all, labeling a guy “a player” suggests that no woman is good enough to tie him down. No, I prefer to brand these kinds of guys more accurately and call them what they really are. Losers. For at the core of every bad boy, every jerk and every womanizer is simply a loser that happens to dress well.

Harsh? Maybe. Appropriate? Absolutely.

Allow me to lift the wool from your eyes and reveal the telltale signs of a loser. First off, you have to look past the well-packaged exterior and investigate what is inside. If you are the type to fall fast for a handsome face, your Lose-O-Meter will need to be recalibrated because loser’s these days have had aesthetic upgrades. Secondly you have to know that the true measure of a man does not rest in his bank account, job title, handsome face or 5-series. It rests solely in his character. And a man’s character can be seen in one very clear and unmistakable way: How he treats other people, especially those from whom he has nothing to gain.

A man of character respects others and therefore earns others respect. When you start dating someone new, ask yourself this; how does he treat the man refilling his drink? The girl he has no interest in? The friend that is in trouble? A real man does the right thing even when no one is watching. When a loser does something selfless he makes a public service announcement.

A man of character displays strength and discipline. A Player has neither.

A man of character knows the value of a good woman. A Bad Boy does not.

And a man of character is in complete control of his emotions. A Jerk let’s his run his life.

If you want to know if a man is worth his salt, don’t size him up by the clothes he wears, the people he knows, or the places he travels. Those things are trivial and don’t represent worth. Any fool with a Visa can buy a Rolex or fly across the globe.  A real man is defined by his integrity and good nature; if he is true to his word, if he is moral in his beliefs, and if he is confident enough to carry them out.

Next time you meet a man that you find interesting, don’t be so easily won over by his attractive exterior. Instead dig deeper and find out what kind of person exists beneath the surface. Because like Amy, you may waste years thinking that you are dating the total package, when in reality the guy may just be a Loser in Sheik’s clothing.

For more on what to look for in a man, visit my blog on Washington Life and learn, “What your “must-have” list is missing.”New! As of September 27, 2011 – You can follow me on Twitter @iamJessMcCann

“I wish I liked him more. He’s so sweet and thoughtful. He is always on time. He calls when he says he will. And I’m not worried about being hurt this time. He’s everything I’ve ever wanted…but I don’t want him!” she cried.

I was sitting on my couch with Raquel, a client I’d been coaching for only a few months. She had been dating Anthony, a software developer with a small start up business, for only a few weeks. When she had met Anthony, she had just broken up with Jay, her on-and-off boyfriend of three years. She was trying to move on but she was having great difficulty. Raquel’s former relationship was filled with highs and lows. She and Jay were hot and heavy one minute and not speaking to each other the next. Their chemistry was great, but their communication was not. Despite all the head butting though, Raquel was deeply in love with Jay and always thought he was the one. Why they couldn’t just make it work, frustrated her to no end.

Now she was dating Anthony – a guy that made her feel good about herself. A man that wanted to hear her point of view and valued her opinion. Things that, over time, Jay had lost interest in. Besides that, Anthony was cute! He was tall, he had a great body, and he had these adorable dimples that came out whenever he laughed. So why wasn’t Raquel feeling it?

“I keep thinking if I give it more time, I will like him more. But I just don’t get that rush of excitement like I did when I was around Jay. I don’t feel the butterflies,” she told me.

“Is that what you think love feels like? Having your stomach always tied up in knots?” I asked.

Raquel wasn’t sure how to answer.

“I just know that for three years, I had butterflies with Jay. My heart even flutters when I think about him now! Doesn’t that mean something? Isn’t that true love?”

“No,” I told her. “Butterflies after three years of being someone that you couldn’t get along with, does not mean it was true love.  It means it was exciting – and it was exciting because Jay was unpredictable. He would spend a whole weekend with you and then not call you for three days. You never knew when you would see or hear from him again and that is why your heart always jumped when he came around. Not because it was true love.”

Adult Love: What does it feel like?

Everyone likes the feeling of falling in love. It’s a beautiful high that carries you throughout your day. It makes average living more lively.  It turns the mundane into something remarkable. And when you come in contact with the object of your affection, the rush is nothing short of intoxicating.

We’ve all felt this way at one time or another. My husband gave me the such bad butterflies I could hardly eat around him. Ask him if I have that problem now though, and he’d probably break into a fit of laughter.  Eating more now doesn’t mean I love him less, on the contrary, I love him more today than I did the day I married him. But real love doesn’t make you feel so nervous that you may lose your lunch. It feels like something ten times better and a lot less nauseating.

When love is the lasting kind, you don’t feel like you are standing on the edge of a 400 foot cliff (I should know, I’ve actually stood there.) Sure, you may get the butterflies in the beginning but when love is real, it goes deeper than, as Lindsay Lohan put it in Mean Girls, “feeling like your stomach is going to fall out of your butt.” It feels like home. Like a warm cozy room with a fire place.  It’s happy. It’s safe, and I’m elated to say, it’s super comfortable.  No, you don’t get tongue-tied around your partner after so many years – but you do feel a rush of utter happiness when they walk through the door after a long workday and you would absolutely jump in front of a moving bus if it meant saving them from any harm.

Keeping the Butterflies Alive

Some people mistakenly fight off real love. Have you ever known someone that religiously breaks off every one of their relationships at the same time point in time? Maybe they hit the seven month mark and suddenly decide they “aren’t feeling it” anymore. Or perhaps once the chase ends and commitment begins, they start to lose interest? These people are what experts call, “love junkies” – they chase the high that comes when you start to fall in love, and once they come down from it, they either create turmoil to get the high back, or they move on to someone else to create it all over again. They unknowingly prevent themselves from ever getting to the true love phase. Raquel had become an love junkie, which is why she was still couldn’t let go over her tumultuous past relationship and fall in love with someone stable. If a guy didn’t give her cardiac arrest, she was convinced it meant she didn’t like him. The truth is that Raquel and most love junkies are addicted to the feeling of excitement that uncertainty brings. Not knowing if someone liked her, not knowing when they would call or want to see her again, drove Raquel nuts. It made her feel extremely low. That’s why when the phone finally did ring, the high was so great, it felt like a full on episode of “When Butterflies Attack.” Her relationship with Jay was always in a state of flux, so the butterflies never went away, and she always assumed it meant it was love.

If you are like Raquel and you think a relationship is boring without ups and downs, then you are still dating with a high school mentality. If you are still attracted to guys that aren’t good for you because they keep you on edge, realize that you will be signing up for a stormy relationship, and later a rocky marriage. Yes, you get a rush of adrenaline when after three days and no calls, your phone rings.  It’s exciting when you are dating, but it will be hell when you’re married. You don’t want to be at home, pregnant and wonder where your husband is, do you? How your relationship functions right now, is how it will be after you’ve walked down that aisle. Men that are unpredictable (my nice way of saying unreliable), don’t miraculously transform into steady and dependable husbands once they wed. If you have been with someone for years and you still aren’t able to fully relax and be comfortable with them, you aren’t in love… you’re an addict.

Raquel was so used to her roller coaster relationship with Jay, that the stable happy one she had with Anthony seemed lackluster… that is until Anthony broke up with her for not appreciating him.

My advice for any love junkies out there. Be careful chasing butterflies. The good, dependable guy in front of you isn’t boring. You are just strung out. If you need some excitement in your life, don’t get it from boys. Sign up for skydiving. It’s a lot less dangerous.

Follow me on Twitter @iamJessMcCann or inquire about one on one coaching through my website at www.jessmccann.com

For more tips on landing the guy you want, make sure you read “You Lost Him at Hello.”

Many of you have been aware of my recent year long health issue.  I would get severe pain in my stomach every 2 months or so.  It was always accompanied with a lovely mix of nausea, vomiting, and (occasionally) fever.  The pain was sometimes in the middle of my stomach just around my navel, but sometimes it would move to a widespread pain.  It was AWFUL. I was in pain for days and  I could not eat, or sleep.  I saw ten doctors and did every test in the book – Ultrasounds, CT scans, Hida Scan (for gallbladder) MRI, Blood tests, and they all came back normal. My family started to doubt that I was even having a real problem.  I was suffering with these attacks for about a year when my cousin happen to tell me she had horrible stomach pain that lasted days and then would disappear for weeks or even months.  Her doctor thought it was pelvic inflammatory disease and did laparoscopic surgery to diagnose. They found nothing, but he did remove her appendix because he said, “sometimes it helps.” What do you know – after that she was cured.  The appendix was sent to the lab and it was in fact, bad. So I decided to meet with a surgeon and have elective surgery to have my appendix out too (why not? I had tried everything else.)  This past Friday I went in for surgery and when I woke up, my husband was sitting next to me beaming – “Honey it was your appendix!!” Apparently the doctor knew just from looking at my appendix that it was bad. It was extremely inflamed, so much so that he said I looked like an emergency room patient!  I was so happy I cried.  I had no idea that you could have recurring appendicitis! It didn’t even show up on my CT scans during my attacks.

When I went for my follow up visit the surgeon told me I was very lucky that my appendix didn’t rupture and that I somehow oddly managed to have acute appendicitis for over a year. He had never seen anything like it.

I’m so happy this is over.  Many doctors don’t believe that your appendix can get inflamed and then go back to normal on it’s own.  But my cousin and I are living proof!  I am not just writing this blog to tell my story, I want to make sure that no one else goes through the kind of torture I went through this last year. On top of the pain, I lost a tremendous amount of weight, couldn’t eat properly, was extremely fatigued, and of course, I was also scared.

If you have recurring abdominal pain, nausea, fever, and a high white cell count, there is a good chance your appendix could be inflamed and you should get that thing taken out.  I had very atypical symptoms and was told several times by doctors, “it’s definitely not your appendix, or you would have pain on your lower right side.” Don’t let doctors tell you that it’s DEFINITELY not your appendix.  They will tell you that, but thank goodness I didn’t listen to them.

Hope you are all helped by this. Now that I am healthy again.  I will be resuming my blog immediately. Thanks for your constant support.

Love, Jess

PS – Follow me on Twitter @iamjessmccann for all the latest dating advice!

http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=2664

Janna, a thirty-eight year old magazine editor, hadn’t had a real boyfriend in years. She had a ton of men in her life though. Three former boyfriends, two friends with benefits, and one love of her life that was married to someone else. She spent time with all of them because, as she put it, she got a something out of each relationship. It’s just that none of them gave her everything.

Janna subscribed to the belief that until Mr. right guy came along, she could occupy herself with Mr. Great Sex and Mr. I Love You but I’m Married. The truth was, however, that the reason she couldn’t find that one great guy was because she was distracted with all the wrong ones.

Distractions cause problems

We all know that distracted driving causes accidents. It’s reported that 80% of all car crashes are due to some form of distracted driving. Maybe you have been one of the lucky ones that has avoided re-ending someone because you just had to send that very important text, but how many times have you missed your exit because you were yapping or tapping on your phone? Much in the same way you missed that turn off, you can also miss your chance at a real relationship by engaging in what I call, “Distracted Dating.”

We’ve all done it at some point -spent a little too much of our time with the wrong person. It can be fun and briefly fill a void within you, but continually hanging out with men who clearly can’t give you what you need long term is like investing in stock that you know will eventually plummet. It’s not worth it because you won’t yield a return, and it can prevent you from being emotionally and physically available to someone else…someone better.

Janna was frustrated because she never got approached by guys.  She wasn’t a homebody, in fact she encountered men on a daily basis, but for whatever reason, no one asked her out. She was convinced that something about her appearance was turning men off, even though she was tall, thin and by industry standards, attractive. When I met her I explained the problem wasn’t with her appearance, it was with her persona. She had the right clothes, the right hair, and the right make-up. What she didn’t have was the right presence. She was so distracted in her head, thinking about all the “good-for-now guys”, that she missed opportunities to meet men that were right front of her. Because she looked distracted and unavailable, men that would see her and want to approach her, hesitated to do so.  On days she should have gone out to prospect, she did what was easier and called one of her exes to keep her company. Janna needed to get rid of her funnel dwellers – the guys that lingered in her funnel, not doing anything but wasting time. Once she cleared out her funnel, and her mind, she was able to focus on the road ahead of her.

For personal advice, contact Jess through her website at www.jessmccann.com or follow her on Twitter @iamjessmccann

For more tips on landing a guy, read “You Lost Him at Hello”.

I had only been dating Palmer for a few months but I already knew I really liked him. I was twenty-one at the time and just finishing up my last year of college.  Palmer avidly pursued me. I’d run into him at clubs and parties and he’d always slip away from his date and plead with me to go out with him. I thought it was exciting and romantic. I thought he was exciting and romantic. Finally after months of asking, I obliged a dinner invite and we ended up at restaurant near school. He was the perfect gentleman, opening doors and pulling out chairs. He paid for dinner and asked if he could kiss me goodnight. That date sealed the deal for me. I was falling for him.

A few months into our relationship, Palmer decided to enroll in my school. He had taken a few years off to wait tables and save money. I could tell he was nervous about his first day because he spent an extra ten minutes in the bathroom doing his hair and asked my opinion on three different shirts. When we got in the car and headed out to school Palmer was very quiet.  He didn’t even turn on the radio.  I reached over and rubbed back a little. “Hey,” I said. “Don’t be nervous. Everything is going to be great.” I wasn’t expecting the reaction I got.

“Get off of me,” he said with irritation.

An alarm went off in my head. I heard it. I tried to make sense of it. Why would he be upset with me? Why would he be annoyed at me for being supportive? I was confused. I looked at Palmer for a few seconds, hoping he would realize what he had said and apologize. But he didn’t. He just kept driving.

That was the moment that Palmer showed me who he really was. It was also the moment I chose to ignore it.

I continued dating Palmer for several more months and I can honestly say without a doubt it was the most emotionally exhausting, confidence wrecking relationship of my life. He was a moody, selfish person that threw anger tantrums if he didn’t get his way. He was also a womanizer that needed endless attention in order to feed his ego. At the time though, I blamed myself, thinking I was not good enough and couldn’t make him happy. That’s what happens when you don’t listen when someone tells you who they are. You get in too deep and you can no longer see them clearly.  That day in the car I heard the alarm bells and knew that he had issues. But as I continued to date him, his issues disappeared and mine began to develop.

I have always loved Maya Angelou’s quote, “When someone first shows you who they are, believe them.” Over the years I’ve realized the importance of this message as it saves you wasted time believing in false hope that people will become who you want them to be. Who are we to tell them who to be anyway? All of us have been told at some point in our lives that people don’t change, so to some of you perhaps Maya Angelou’s quote may not be as profound a statement.  But I think that the emphasis here is not to simply believe someone when they show you who they are, it is to believe them when they FIRST show you. That is the crux of the message. For if you ignore it the first time, you will lock yourself in for a long ride ending in disappointment.  Had I gotten out of the car that day and decided that Palmer’s reaction was not normal, not nice, and not fine with me, I could have saved myself many months of heartache and many years of self-doubt.

Today I’m blessed to be happily married to my wonderful husband. I learned a great deal from my prior relationships and thankfully I was able to self-improve  instead of self-destruct. But I was fortunate. I had good family, great friends, and God and the Universe somehow pulled me through the dark times unscathed. But other people have not been so lucky. So if you have been in an unsatisfying relationship because you’ve been ignoring your partners true self, open your eyes and start to see what they’ve been telling you all along.

Update: Over a decade later, Palmer is still in school, still waiting tables and still throwing anger tantrums.

For one on one dating or relationship advice, contact Jess McCann at www.jessmccann.com.  You can also follow her on Twitter @IamJessMcCann

For tips on landing the guy you want, pick up a copy of Jess’ book, “You Lost Him at Hello”.

Photo : http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=2125

We’ve all been there. Dry mouth. Sweaty palms. Racing heartbeat. You’d think you were about to give a speech in front of a live studio audience, but no, these are just the typical symptoms of how everyone feels on a first date. You are nervous, and rightfully so! You don’t know this person, and he doesn’t know you – so what you say in the next few hours will determine the fate of your future relationship.  Will this date result in another? Or will this first date also be your last? No pressure, right? Fortunately I have a few tips for how you can be sure to have a stellar first date. Most of us already know the basics. Don’t drink too much, reach for the check, and of course, no sex.  But there are three big Should & Should Not’s when it comes to first date conversation. The questions you ask are of vital importance because they not only give you good insight, they will also give your date a certain impression of you.

But let’s not drag this out any further than needed.  Here I am talking on ABC’s Let’s Talk Live about First Date Questions. What you need to ask, and what you should absolutely avoid!

If you want one-on-one advice from Jess McCann, contact her about a personal consulting session or follow her on Twitter @JessMcCann1