Category: Romanticism

If you want to know what your girl is thinking inside,  check out what is on her nightstand or bed.  This will tell a lot of what is going on in her inner realm because what you are thinking before you go to bed feeds your subconscious.

Many guys write me and ask me if their potential lady friend is a scammer.  Or how you know if a girl is good or just saying she is good. Here is my advice:

• Try to get into her bedroom.

I know, what you thinking, but I mean in an innocent way. You could ask her for a tour of her apartment or to see hots of her room. If you are on a wecam or snapchat or Skype you can get a good picture of what her nightstand looks like. What is on her nightstand will tell you a lot about a girl’s inner world.

You marry a girl’s inner world.

Books

• If a girl has no books by her bedside, ask yourself why?

Books are key indicators of intellectual and spiritual development. Sure literacy rates around the world are sky high, but there is a big difference between knowing how to read and reading.

Reading develops cognitive skills like mental diligence. Reading requires work and and patience, in contrast to the five word snap chat messages. If someone is not reading books, I mean real books not magazines and the web, I have a problem with that.

It shows they lack the intellectual curiosity to explore life at a deeper level. It shows they might not have the metal diligence to complete tasks that require thought and work. This potentially equates to being a less than optimal mother for your children.

My wife has read to my daughter every night as she falls asleep since she was a child. My daughter’s readings skills are better than mine.

Does this apply to men as well?

It is more important that a girl reads than a guy, because women are the carriers of culture and will be raising your children. You have to understand the importance of females being the guardians of culture and ethics and how they are responsible to transmit this to the next generation.

If a woman has a mess in her inner world and attaches to ideas and energies that are less than idealistic and eternal, than she she will bring that chaos into your life eventually.

More about books as indicators

Reading, and I mean books, is so important to life and the internal thought processes. Why? It takes seconds to write  a chat message. It takes years to write a book and often months to read it. So much pain and wisdom goes into a book, so much life experience. Text messages are nothing but surface. Where does your girl live in her heart and mind?

Will she delete you?

• Will your girl delete you like a text message during a mood swing? Or does she have the stamina to finish a novel like Persuasion by Jane Austen?

To date a girl who is not using her brain, and we all have, is so unhigh. You can take the most beautiful girl in the world but if she has nothing to talk about and discuss, the relationship will be superficial and boring.

Therefore, ask yourself what is your girl reading.  You had better discuss it with her.

My experiences as a college professor

When I teach, my class is based on discussion of the reading for the week. What I observe is there are people who read and discuss (or at least actively listening) and those who are bored. People who are bored are boring. To spend a lifetime with such a person is a hard life. They sit chaotically in their chairs and can not focus on simple ideas. In contrast there are students who really try in life.

Quick test for your girl

As a quick test of cultural depth and awareness is you could almost ask a girl if she has ever read The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky or least knows this book.  It is about free will and God and ethics and personal morality versus morality of your society.  If she has never even heard of this book,  wow.  If she is from a Non-European or American culture, choose an equivalent author from her culture and discuss.

Again this is not to sound elitist but what is your girl thinking about in her head? Do you want to spend your life with someone who has not thought to deep about life? Who is not aware of the complex moral issues and hopefully answered them with a morality that includes love and commitment. If she is not examining ideas and morality it will be a hard life for you.

Religious icons or prayer beads

Many of my friends that are female have crosses of their beds, or images of religious figures from the Bible or other sacred text. I know this sounds like a fanatic rant, but it is not, here me out. These women do not desire money and power and do not fall pray to the temptations of the is world. Rather than live humble lives centered on their family. Is this not what you want? I live this way and we are happy. You want to be and marry someone what is immersed in the ideas of self improvement. Not the self improvement of pop psychology and self confidence but the self improvement that came thousands of years before this post modern culture. That is virtue.

If this sounds chauvinistic it is not. I do the same.  I focus my life on humility and virtue.  For example, I have always put my family before my career or anything else.

The reward is an amazing family life and happiness.

• Therefore,  if a girl has the Bible by her bedside or a Holy book, and she reads it, this is a good indicator she would be a pleasant person to be around, rather than some crazy, self-rigorous, conniving, post modern materialistic career woman.

What about other indicators like her browsing history?

People surf all kind of junk as a form of decompressing from the day. Therefore, this is not a good indicator. Better than her browser history is what she reads at night. We are not looking for saints necessarily.

Indicators that a woman is trouble

Special box – If she has a little box for of ‘protection’ or anything like that in her bedside draw.

Plugged in – She has electronic devices at her bedside, cell phones etc. Electronics in the bedroom mean less room for other activities latter. Do you want to commit to a life of companionship? I am have never been looking for companionship. I want passion.

Random books – Books are fine but a lot of nonsense is written these days. If she has eclectic post modern liberal literature, this is no good. It just means she has the power of intellect but not wisdom.

Books connected to work – Career women equate to women readying her life for making money rather than spending their time with the family.

New age –  Similarly good but if she has  new age type things or materialistic literature, were a woman finds her freedom after a train wreck of relationships for example, this is an indicator that she could have subjective values based on cultural norms rather than full commitment.

Every ‘spiritual’ girl I know would have no problem leaving a guy in marriage if she was not happy in that moment.

Untidiness – If she can not clean for herself, who will she take care of a child and you?

Pets – Many girls smile at their pets, it would be a lifetime of competition in the bedroom, why do you need that. Let some other fool go for that.

What my wife has by her bedside now

• Bible in the Polish language.
• The Confessions of Saint Augustine in the English language.
• A book about a Polish explorer who lived in the Amazon with the indigenous people in the Polish language.

You basically want to find a runway model who reads the Bible at night or sacred text from your belief system.  Is that too much to ask for?

What  to look for in a girl to marry?

I mean come on, is a girl who reads the Bible or Sacred books before sleep going to wreck your life or give you happiness?  Your mission is to find a super cordial lady who has a bedside nightstand with books that feed her intellectual and moral life.

I believe that all happiness and unhappiness comes from the relationships.  Go back over your life. Think about your greatest sorrows and greatest joys. Are they not connected to people?  Money is like water it comes and goes. Health is something that is up and down until the end. However, relationships are what make the world go around.

For example, I am a professor and write about economics and when I do I get a few hundred views if I write something good. However, if I write about love on this website, I have thousands of views from men and women for one article.

What marriage is really like

Therefore, I wanted to tell you what marriage is really like from a married man’s perspective.

The Internet will tell you some cautionary tale or pros and cons of marriage. I am here to tell you there are no pros and cons, only pros. I mean that with all my heart as God is my witness.

I have never regretted for one day I have been with my wife. I have never wanted anything other than to be with my wife.  All the days when I was single does not equate to one day with my family.

Why I know something about a good marriage

I walk the walk. I quit my corporate job to spend more time with my family. I now teach economics, write programs at home and homestead.

With marriage there is no nagging in my house. With marriage there is no compromising and long conversations about how we can communicate better. We just live our fairy-tale.

It is all the adolescent fantasies come true and the incarnation of what others want from love and search for.  Remember your fantasies? Marriage is even better.

What is the secrete to marriage?  My parents have been married over 65 years and they would say it is God as the center. I have been married 10 and  I would say God is the center.

If you see the world the same way, that is as a practice of spiritual purification and repentance, then what is the problem? No humanistic commonality or psychological spin on marriage comes close.

• I was not born yesterday.  I have seen the world. I know when girls strive for humility and when girls strive for worldly desires.

Is marriage a partnership?

Not really, it is more like laying your life down for another person so you might have a greater life. However, this is an unconscious process. You do not feel it because you are so high on love. Love gives you so much juice that you are not thinking in terms of partnership and negotiation, but hero and princess.

 

Love makes all burdens light  (its true you know)

Is marriage work? Is it sacrifice?

No. For me, I have had a lot of challenges in my life, but marriage is easy and makes all challenges when you are married feel easy.  I do not feel like I am giving anything up or making sacrifices. Why?

I am living like I always have, a positive, prayerful life.

With all the nonsense and plurality of messages society gives you, why not keep it simple. Why not find someone whose life is a practice in humility and who is so super cordial?

Finding a super cordial lady who is humble is not only possible, it is probable. I think the ancient Greeks to some extent were correct that beauty and virtue are synonymous. If you have questions about this write me or comment.

What human experience about

Once you open your eyes to what this world is about, a purgatory or a school which includes commitment until graduation (the great beyond),  than it becomes easier to you meet other worldly women who were once only a dream.

• Last I checked the cordialtest girls are in school.

Women who are not in school, are in a word ‘trashy’.  They live their life based on self interest and like a succubus or sirens (Ulysses) will drive your life into peril.

We have all been there

1. If you have tried to date women who are arrogant, selfish, lack humility,  want money, and play their options, and you are just one of their options, I know how you feel.
2. If you feel it will not get any better because you are painfully lonely, I know how you feel.
3. If this cycle of rejection, loneliness and despair has lasted years, so you feel there is something wrong with you,  join the club.

You do not have bragging rights for loneliness and despair until it has been at least five years of this cycle of pain and desperation.

I know people in the 30s who have never had a girlfriend or boyfriend. I know people who have been left after relationships over five years. I know people whose partners steal money and their heart.

If you are depressed and lonely and at your end, welcome the real world. The good news is there is a solution.  What is it? Marriage.

Marriage will make you normal and happy if you find your partner who is your other half. It is that simple.

My recommendation for a partner

1. Super cordial – someone that is a model like and out of your league. The good news is, I have never met a girl who does not have potential to be super cordial. It is all about style and fitness.  One million years of evolution has taken care of the rest, as nature has honed people to be more than anything else, attractive or the genes would not continue.
2. Striving for humility – good signs are self abasement, asking for forgiveness, a Bible or holy scripture by her bedside she reads nightly before her closing prayers. This is in start contrast to someone who proclaims themselves ‘spiritual’ which means nothing and is an empty self-proclamation to relive themselves of the responsibility of bad choice. You want the humble one who is trying to purify her soul not the the spiritual one putting her self out there as ‘enlightened’.
3. Morally better than you – The person you bond with for life should be a person who is not necessarily nice. Nice is not the same as good. Good implies a deep level of selflessness and a striving.  You want good because who you mate with will influence your moral ideas. If you have a partner who is lukewarm about ideals you will be also.  You do not want to be trying to teach them. You want someone who as a daily prayer life and who would pray with you and encourage you to pray more.

What is marriage like?

I get up in the morning and there is this model like lady walking around my bedroom who actually loves me.  We go on road trips like we were single, weekends we go to the beach, natural spring, we have a lot of fun cooking, working in the garden and most of all spend time with our daughter. On weekends we go to church. Sunday we keep as a day of rest and try not to shop or work and just relax. We exchange ideas about life, science, the universe or philosophy.  I use Linux my wife uses a Mac and we are always helping the other with work and tech stuff.  There is a lot more. What would we argue about?  We both know why we are here, to glorify God.

We are gifts to each other for all the suffering we have gone through in our lives. Now is the time for you to find your gift.

Where to meet someone

Where can you meet people like this to have this perfect harmony?  Why not Church?   I have known several people who met this way and they are happy.

 

 

 

Simple test to determine who is your soulmate

Everyone wants to know if the person they are dating is their soulmate. Is this person the one? Online dating companies have detailed psychological and even genetic screens for matchmaking and compatibility. However, this does not definitively tell you, if this person is truly the right one.

Every user of Match.com, POF or Tinder knows how to craft a profile and filter selection criteria based on interests and compatibility. Yet, it often does not work. What is going on here?

The purpose of this post if to tell you a simple test of when you have met the right person you will spend the rest of your life with.

The test is this:

Hold up your hand and have the girl who you are dating hold up her hand. If she has a wedding ring on and so do you, that person is the one. If there is no ring on your fingers, you are just dating.

The key idea here is I want you to get the notion of “the one” out of your head and start living your life like there is no tomorrow.  I 100% believe in “the one and only”.  However, on the quest people get stuck thinking too rationally about it, and it slows them down.

You have to get the mess out of your head.   I am a romantic and believe in fairy-tales, but do not want this idealistic quest for “the one” from stopping you from finding the one and only true girl of your dreams.

You will have confirmed you are with “the one” when you are married. That is it. Until that time all bets are off.

When have you found your twin soul? When you can not can not help but asking some lucky girl, for her hand in marriage and you actually go through with it. Before that time, live your life and go do crazy things irrespective on your career and life plan until you get to that point. Take chances and be like Prince Harry in Shakespeare’s Henry the IV part 2. He was reckless in his living, until it was his time for responsibility.

The questions and answers around the one comes down to two ideas:

1. cravings of your genes
2. destiny/ the meaning of life

Lets look at both these ideas.

Conventional dating advice for finding “the one” is bunk – Look at her tight jeans to understand your genes

I believe in human evolution so strongly and the ability at a subconscious, sub atomic level, for your genes to choose a mate in ways human conciseness will never be able to analysis and steer. Scientific or sociological tests are monuments to man’s stupidity when it comes to the world of mate selection. We can not even predict the weather three days in advance, how can science predict who should be your mate. We can not do it because there are too many endogenous and exogenous variables.

Finding your lifetime optimal mate is somewhat in your genes and somewhat how she looks in jeans and do you have the stones to play to win.

Go for someone who you can not resist physically, this is what your genes are telling you to go for.

But it is not just about looks.  Life is more complex and even a genetic model of dating encompasses this. If you know natural selection often genetic drift comes into play. For example, when the availability of male or female DNA is not optimal in your immediate environment you might choose someone who is not your understanding of the Alpha. Since no human I have ever met has an optimal life circumstance, I think the idea of genetic drift is almost synonymous with the idea of destiny. This random element of life cancels a lot of the science of dating.

For example, ignore what you know about the Alpha mate selection. Alpha dating is ridiculous. If girls are looking for an traditional Alpha, that is money, muscles and aggression, then I would say those girls are Deltas and do not deserve you. What was relevant in the past is not true today. Put a gorilla in a cage with a man and who would win a fight, but, who would a girl want to spend time with. Intellect and most of all sensitivity is the Alpha traits for a human.

Traits like sensitivity and compassion are highly sought after, rather than money and power. Do you personally want to date a tiger or brute or a career person?

Further, because everyone is chasing their careers, genetic drift, rather than alpha dating is fully in play. This is  because of the restrictions of our careerist gilded cage world we live in. Both genders are back to simply trying to find a compassionate beautiful person that is right for them, within a geographically desirable and career area.

What is my point? My point is do not get too hung up on all the nonsense written about dating on the web or in books.  Know that your genes are searching for, an attractive person (and everyone can be attractive physically) that they can cooperate with, trust this. However, the next step is to find  someone that is real, that is transcendent, that is humble.  Dating advice falls short because they stress psychology and compatibility over genes and meaning of life. Interests and compatibility which is the center of this modern analysis for finding a match is non-sense. Genes and meaning is where it is at.

I am was never looking for companionship, that is for really old people with low hormone levels.

Have the Stones to take chances

Therefore, prove to yourself you do not have low hormones, will betray your birthright to find a wife and have family by taking radical chances for your genes sake. If our world is dominated by ladys that live in a careerist gilded cage, than my advice is why not pull out all stops and go international to find your true happiness.  Have the T levels to break the rules and look outside your box will increase the odds. The women I know in careers usually have weight issues and have learned to prioritize their life rather than live it.  I do not want to one of many priorities. I would not personally want to date that girl.

Now the Destiny/Meaning of life part of find your lady friend – Do this exercise:

Turn off all your electronic devices. Go to a room and close the door. Turn off all lights and and open the blinds and curtains so the room has natural light. You know so you can see the dust float buy type light. Something out of a Rembrandt painting. If you do not know Rembrandt look up his paintings online.

Now do not mediate or do anything, just try to look and really see the things around you. Try to see the surreal nature of the world we live in. Just look around the room and look at things. See reality as it is. See that life is complex has multiple layers. It is not simply about swiping a dating app and you will find a partner. Life has a flow of its own.  If dating apps were so effective, in themselves, why are there so many people unhappy about their dating life?

If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.  William Blake

See the canvas around you.

Life is not a Prophylaxis excises that can be solved with a system or approach. You just have to have a little trust that something else is at play here.

What does this excise have to do with finding a cordial lady? Everything. You need to see and believe that there is a complex stratification of reality and that destiny and the way of life is often not as it appears on the surface.

If you do not have crazy drama in dating you are not trying

It is about finding your destiny not about filtering criteria and thinking too hard about all this.

You have to let the dating process play out. You have to accept the drama in dating and know the whole point in dating is to get to the alter and have offspring. No one will be able to tell you at a conscious level how to do this, you just have to accept the fact it will be a challenge.

How about all the guys and girls that ‘think’ this person is the one

The key idea here is you think it, it makes sense to you at the time, but it is not real. Love is about living it with all the chaos and uncertainly that is coupled with dating. Nothing about love makes sense. It just has to happen. You have to have the drama, the arguing the cordial and cold cycles, the pendulum that swings between pain and ecstasy. No one I personally know, rationally came to the conclusion that this is the person they should marry.

OK so how do you hone in on “the One”?

The longest distance on earth is between the head and the heart

You can not figure out who is the one, by critical thinking and analysis. You just have to feel it.

Being the one is just like being in love. No one can tell you your in love, you just know it. Through and through. Stones to bones. – Oracle The Matrix

Before I get into the specifics lets talk about the past. It seems so many people are hung up on the past.

If you want to dwell on the past read a history book, not your personal past.

What if you have been dating for five or more years?

Is this not the one? These years and intense feelings do they not count? My question is why have you not take action?Perhaps you have low hormones or something, or better explanation is the girl has not inspired you.

Something is holding you back. Mating by nature is reckless and impulsive. If you have been dating for five years plus where is the romance there?

People in your past?

They were stepping stones. They are not the one. If they were, you would have  put a ring on their figure.

Every person you went on a date with before you were married, does not count. When you are married, you will not go back in your mind and reminiscence or wonder if you should have married that person because you let them go. It is almost a criteria or test, that is if you can let people go then you can get married.

What if you were married in the past?

It takes two to make a commitment. If you were married and had no and I mean zero kids, it might not count depending on the circumstances. For example, even in the eyes of the Roman Catholic Church you both people would have to be open to the possibles of children, if not it is a fake, not real, just a date you brought to a wedding rather than you getting married.

Erase that relationship out of your brain like all your past relationships. It is so lame when a guy or girl thinks about their relationship that did not work out. Maybe they are lonely or trying to figure it out. But there is nothing to figure out, it was the incorrect answer for your genes and her genes to pair off.

Can you go back to an old relationship? I would not recommend it because it ended for a reason. If you go back in your mind to an old relationship it is your ego trying to figure out why you were rejected or why you did something wrong. Which is normal, but better is to say simply it was not meant to be and understand the universe has your real path ahead.

If you get fixated on a past relationship that did not work it will not help you move forward to your real one and only.

Ask God to help release you from the chains of your past.

Who is the one? The one is the person who you marry and have a family with.

How do you know? How do you choose?

I believe:

Birds of a feather flock together

You want your worldview Doppelgänger. Someone who is just like you from the opposite gender from a moral point of view.

From a looks standpoint they just have to be super cordial. Common interests are not a big factor – if you find someone who see the world from the same way, then interests will develop.

For me ethics is connected to religion, Plato, Meaning of life, idealism and Romanticism. You might forge your own ethic, but the person you mate with you need to have this commonality of ethics.

If interests are the same and all the check boxes are there, but ethical ideas are off you will find yourself in a Nash prisoner’s dilemma scenario eventually and the outcome will be tragic.

So how do you find your soul mate?

Pray, meditate and put yourself out there. Do dating apps or travel the world (recommended) but put yourself in the game. Let nature play out. Get rejected and your heart broken and have a lot of drama. But if you do that, combine the transcendence with action, you will find your mate. Doing only dating apps or travel and not the transcendent aspects is the sound one one hand clapping. Also just visualizing and not circulating yourself is the sound of one hand clapping. You have to do both, the whole thing, pray and action. You have to accumulate some battle scars of life in the dating world.

How much should I risk in finding love?

I’ve seen an Agent punch through a concrete wall. Men have emptied entire clips at them and hit nothing but air. Yet their strength and their speed are still based in a world that is built on rules. Because of that, they will never be as strong or as fast as you can be. – The Matrix – Morpheus conversation to Neo.

Dating sites and psychology and advice from friends or from the web are all based on limited ideas, lists, quizzes and rules. When it comes to finding the one, you have to pull out all stops, and not break the rules, but ignore them and live like there are no rules.

I have always felt the rules do not apply to me – Mark Biernat

If the girl you are suppose to be with blows you off, show up at her window at 2 am in the morning with a guitar playing it in the rain.  If she calls you a stalker, thank her for the complement, because that is her really saying ‘wow no guy ever did this and my limited brain and universe can not processes his greatness’. At least you play to win, you are a man.

Travel the world do what you have to. If you are swiping too many dating apps, throw your phone into the crusher. The crusher is a good play for many electronic devices if inordinate time using them is dissipating your zest for the real world.

 Life is too short to spend online

Live your life.

All these wounds will heal instantly once you find the one

So again you want a conclusion, a simple formula. I have given you one. Pray, meditate or visualize and have the stones to travel and search and be prepared to have drama and get burned many times.  If women are not milking you for cash, cheating on your and calling you a stalker you have never really dated. However, somehow, somewhere when you least expect it you will be standing at the alter. All is drama will dissipate  in your memory and you will simply wondering how did I marry such a cordial lady.

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.

Rainer Maria Rilke

A princess who wears the crown of humility

The quality that I personally find attractive in a girl is humility. It is your winning selection criteria for finding a wife that will give you a life of happiness. This is why humility is the ultimate quality for me in a girl.

Yes, I know, this is contrary to what American pop-culture teaches. Women will shout you down and accuse you of wanting someone to control, a pushover. However, consider the source. If someone tells you that, it is because they do not understand the spiritual virtue of humility. I would recommend you do not try to teach them humility as it is a waste of time. Just walk away and do not say anything, because you are not your brother’s keeper.

I often repeat the similar themes on my website about dating, but it is important to read them. because, you need to let this sink in your brain. Think of it like a coaching, a mental massage, and comfort in the fact that you are not crazy or amiss in your thinking. Rather much of the world is, and will tell you up is down and down is up.

Self-confidence as the antithesis of humility in women (and men)

Western women are all about self confidence and empowerment. They have been taught it in public schools and it is reinforced in movies and TV.  Public schools are a key source of indoctrination and without parental intervention the schools produce adults with a skull full of mush. You can not deprogram someone who has been raised in that culture. Maybe you can but it is not worth the effort. Better is to find someone abroad or in a pocket of America which has a sub-culture which holds different values in esteem.

• If you want to go up against that, self-confidence bordering on pride, on a daily basis, you might as well, put your assets in your mother’s name and do not tell you wife about them.

Self confidence is the biggest lie in the dating world

Women say they want a guy with confidence and they themselves try to project this in every conversation. They engage in witty banter and try to one up you and size you up based on your perceived achievements.

Do you know what real self confidence (in contrast to pop-culture understanding) is a form of humility. It is being authentic and loyal to your value system. Taking up your cross everyday to humble yourself to be a servant, and see the humanity in all people, rather than seeing them as an aspect of your life.  Even self-abasement and flagellation (in the right measure and meaning), self-punishment, fasting and and ascetic practices are honorable. But self confidence, no, this is the opposite of what you want.

How do I know?

I do not know if I have any pop-culture confidence at all, however, I can say objectively that if I was single, I would have no problem chatting up model quality girls in any country in the world. I am talking Victoria Secrets caliber, and I have little self-confidence.I know this sounds contradictory, but it is true.

• I am filled with self-doubt, painfully shy, regret and insecurities, but it is not about that. I feel awful most of the time about myself. I am filled with frustration and resentment.

I am insecure about basically everything, money, my face, my looks, my background, my intelligence but it is not about that. I believe that God has a purpose for me, and despite my insecurities and fears, I am trust God. I know with my incompleteness, I found the wife of my dreams, travel the world, I am a Professor of Economics, lay chess competitively and write my own software,  and oh yeas, grow my own food, and I am happy, Why? Because with God you can move mountains, whereas, the person who lacks faith’s, life is a slave to ego gratification.

• So see self-confidence is really not worth much int he dating world.

How is humility achieved?

It is achieved through the daily practice,  of a religious ritual, whether it is reading a holy book or a chain of prayers which asks for forgiveness.

The early desert fathers (living in the North African and Middle Eastern deserts), of my religion use to repeat the Jesus prayer hundreds of time a day when they walked or strike their chest when a bad thought comes to mind. Virtue comes from Latin and means strength. You can not have strength without training. So I am a skeptic, if someone put themselves out there as nice, where is the proof? Do they say the Rosary or memorize the Bible?

I have seen women do this. Yes smoking cordial women, who put to shame most Hollister models have a practice of self-abasement and repentance. So they do exist.

What if you are not Christian?

Jewish, Christian, Muslim, that is the prophetic religions of Israel all have a similar tradition. The Chinese religion of Tao and Confucianism also have similar rituals, as do the contemplative religions of India, with Hinduism and Buddhism. Religion is like a language and each language has these structure in their lexicon.

What if someone is spiritual or agnostic or a non-believer?

I have seen ethical atheist develop an internal ethic, but if you are in the trenches of life, I highly recommend you do not go for these girls. You are in the battlefield of life and there are not atheists in foxholes. You need to put away childish things. When I was a child I thought like a child, life is too precious to think like a child or you will be playing with fire.

Go for a believer or also has humility as her summa bonum. Someone that tells you they are not good. Someone who tells you they are a bad person and has trouble forgiving themselves.

For me this is a person looking for redemption. And that is what life is about. It is about redemption.

What about a nice girl, a good girl?

No such thing. Everyone will say they are nice and good. Many women abroad are attractive because they do not eat denatured diets and are not obese.

How often we confuse beauty with virtue – how often we confuse nice with virtue

In contrast, my wife says she is not even that nice. She was so mean to me, when we were dating. She was not nice, but it is not about that.  Nice means nothing. Super cordial means something, and humble means something. Nice means jack. So do not go to Eastern Europe and strike a rapport with a girl who puts herself out there as nice or good. Do not travel half way across the world a companion.  Me, I want someone radical, someone versed in the in the spirit of humility and purification.

Where to find these girls?

If you meet a girl with humility and she is super cordial, and you feel she is the one, chase her across the stars like I did.
Do not worry about your job or money or your parents or if she will reject you. What if you are broke, your parents disown you and she rejects you. So what. It will happen, but do not make a big deal about it, it is your metaphorical red badge of courage, and you putting away childish things.

Where to find these girls?

I have given you hints on my site, I am a big believer in traveling aboard, and living abroad. I do nest alone, not with a group, as you do not want to get weighted down.

The only guys I know that did not get married or found their true love, in a year or so of being a real expatiate, are guys that can not get off the player roller coaster by choice. They have something to prove to their egos, they are not religions and are basically lost souls.

So if you want to find a wife, tune your subconscious radar into the frequency of humility. Find a super cordial lady, with humility, by living abroad or domestically with similar values (much harder). Remember nice is not a desirable quality, humility is.

In my personal experience, women of Appalachia are sensitive, artistic and have sense of romanticism that transcends the hyper-consumptive cookie cutter existence many of us have subscribed to. Jettison your stereotypes and consider an undiscovered region of single girls that are marriage material in the Eastern mountains.

That being said, cultural views in this region are still predominately aligned with Americanism and Protestantism.  They could be your dream girl, if you are looking for a good wife, or not.

My recommendation is align the crucible of your fantasies with a region of the world that germinates the type of women that dance in your dreams as you drift to sleep at night. Every man dreams of women as they fall asleep. The women of these twilight dreams are the the key to you finding a wife. For example, I was fantasizing about a Princess from Eastern Europe, before I met my wife, and I am happily married countless years later.

Female archetypes types in Appalachia

Perhaps you are looking for a non-materialistic thin version of Katniss Everdeen, or a nano-farming homesteader, or a faithful traditional wife who will meet you at the door in a plaid dress and dinner ready, or simply a pretty girl who wants to raise a family away from world’s preoccupations.  All these female archetypes are plentiful and waiting for you in Appalachia. They are in Appalachia specifically because of the environment of the region is still a wilderness and a land of faith in God that spawns the above female archetypes.

What is your vision, your fairy-tale?  I recommend you paint your fairy-tale on the empty canvas of  your imagination. You identify who it is in your dreams you see. If that includes nature and a degree of isolation away from others people’s agendas, and thoughts about how you should live your life, and also a loyalty to moral convictions, consider Appalachian girls.

• Appalachia is one of the few regional sweet spots for eligible women whom I would marry in the USA and a clear alternative to foreign lady friends.

Appalachian dating – An American alternative to foreign lady friends

If you are looking a homegrown/home team girl, consider this region of the US that is overlooked (lucky). If you are tired of communicating with Russian women on the other side of the world that  size you up based on your wallet, consider the Appalachian mountain region of the US. It is domestic (if you are in the USA), overlooked (your not competing with metro player guys),  they are Christian (good if you are a person of faith, if you are non-religious then you should off roll the dice with with modern liberated NYC career girls, good luck), and connected to nature. If this is not a winning combination for finding a loyal spouse I do not know what is. However, it is not for everyone. It is a Protestant land. However, it is specially American.

The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.  -John Muir

Maybe you cannot find a wife because of something in your water

I know what you are thinking, it is just another far away place and will lead to another disappointment. So what.  Any with any hunt for a lady friend you can not just pick and choose, you have to discover, explore and conquer. You have to uncover and discover something others overlook, zig when others zag. Think about the rugged pioneers this country was literally built on. These were men. Similarly, you have to venture into the wilderness and prospect not for gold or land but for something greater. You can not except to get the girl and replicate your DNA unless you have enough testosterone to take crazy chances.

• If you do not have the stones to take risks and do crazy things to find and pursue your wife, I would check to see if you have too much BPA and other estrogen mimicking substances in your water supply.

Appalachia is a wilderness

 A forbidding, oppressive, primeval country that was “grim and wild . . .savage and dreary,” fit only for “men nearer of kin to the rocks and wild animals than we.”  –  Henry David Thoreau

Bill Bryson, A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail recounts even the transcendental, nature loving Thoreau saw it as wild.  Yet do you not want a girl from the wild? Is that not part of the fantasy, a girl from some primordial time or place? Russia as Siberia we have Alaska ( no girls there) but also the Appalachian mountains.

Women in poverty in Appalachia

Being poor is actually a good thing, at least poor in spirit.  As long as the women is aware and curious and educated, what do you care? Yes, there are women in poverty that are uneducated or closed minded. That might be true in some cases but not universally, it is a percentage. According to the US census in 2010 there are 25 million people in the region, that translates into about 5 million single eligible girls in Appalachia, that is a lot of ladies to extend an invite to.

Lets talk about isolation

Generally isolation makes you beautiful and eccentric, and at the very least introspective because there are as not as many people to talk to, and you have more of a dialogue with yourself and God.

Isolation has cause a cultural fermentation around the mountains of the East coast. It is a true subculture in America. It is a combination of romanticized ruggedness, self-sufficiency and Bible based Christian values.

From an economics perspective isolation causes countries, regions and villages to be on a slower economic growth trajectory, because trade and specialization pushes the production possibilities curve out. Therefore, have no illusions because of its isolation, Appalachia remains still one the the poorest areas of the US.

The Appalachian region of the United States, while abundant in natural resources and rich in potential, lags behind the rest of the Nation… its people have not shared properly in the Nation’s prosperity. – The Appalachian Regional Development Act of 1965

Stereotypes aside

I am not talking about marrying an uneducated unsophisticated person. I recommend someone who has benefited from the isolation the mountains afford, yet has a rich intellectual internal life. Someone who the lie of consumerism has not infected.  When you are closer to nature no matter what language of rituals you express your spirituality in, you transcend. This closeness to nature and isolationism is what make women who grow up in this region special.

You can browse this women of Appalachia site and see if there is introspection and sensitivity.

Therefore, I am not recommending your should marry some hillbilly like Elly May Clampett (from the TV show the Beverly Hillbillies) but rather more like some introspective sensitive moral beauty like Mary Ellen Walton or Erin from the TV Series the Waltons.

Yes, I know, I know it is still hard to find a single girl who has these traits, but in Appalachia they exists. Families stay and live in this region specifically because of the isolation and because of nature. There are women in towns like Huntsville, AL, Knoxville, TN, Greensville, SC, Morgantown WV, Asheville, NC, Roanokeo,VA, Pittsburgh, PA, Stretching it a bit, Brattleboro, VT and Augusta, Maine. The small cities and areas around these towns have statistically millions of single women living our their lives without being around the block a dozen times like their metro counterparts.

Change the the label and you have something different

What was once called ‘dirt’ or ‘substance farming’ is now called ‘homesteading’ and ‘organic’. What was once seen as ‘fundamentalism’ is now call ‘being loyal to one’s spouse and family’. What was once called ‘healing with herbs’ is now called ‘alternative medicine’. What was once call ‘isolated’ is now called ‘having some peace’ in the world of endless traffic jams.

Are not all rural girls the same?

I know what you are thinking, are there not a lot of rural areas in the USA that have country girls?  I have always felt with some elitism, that the East Coast was a little more my style. There are regional differences in every part of the USA that can not be ignored. Living in the deep forests of the East as a highlander girl, is not the same as a girl living on a Texas ranch.

Where do you find a bluegrass doll?

I am not an expert, rather I know a lot of women from the region because I live in the South. I am in the inner circle of these women and hang out with them because I have a school age child. I personally know a score of soccer moms that are from Appalachia. I also went to school undergraduate at Wake Forest University resting at the foothills of Appalachia and I know the micro culture that exists among the educated women of this region. I was friends and roommates with people from this area and they universally had that sweet small town attitude but with sophistication enough to get into a top university. I travel there and hike the Blue ridge mountains.

The syrupy girls of Appalachia from Eastern Tennessee, Northern Alabama, Western North Catalina and Eastern Kentucky are intriguing. They are universally sweet (not cloying), religious, good mothers and loyal wives. They build you up and make you feel good with sincerity because every part of their being has been raised this way. It is an Appalachian female subculture.

None of us really changes over time. We only become more fully what we are.
― Anne Rice, The Vampire Lestat

The core nature of females and males crystallize in the first twenty five years of life. The environmental tone you are raised in shapes this nature to no small degree. The society you are born into manifest itself in how you actualize your potential. The women of this South Eastern region, actualize and fulfill their dreams by being married, having a family and living a peaceful life.

There are two type of women that I would consider from this region

Christian women in Appalachia – These are the women that read the Bible. They are educated, conservative and not closed minded. They are not Southerners per say, remember during the Civil war, Appalachia was a Northern symbiotic region (since it did not have the cotton industry and hence, Slavery was not part of their economy), although the region sits mostly in the South. They are cultured and and open minded without prejudice and Christians who walk the walk in a non-showy way. They are Christian women who educate themselves and are not caught up in excess materialism.
Earthy women in Appalachia – Americans who migrate or immigrate to the Appalachian region who are into permaculture and are attracted to the mild climate and alternative living. The reason appeals to them because of the low local zoning restrictions that allows for freedom of lifestyle. They stand for something, usually connected with agrarianism. The lack of hype connected with the West Coast. The closed minded liberals move to Portland or California or dissipate their vital energies on smoking something in Colorado.

When I say alternative women, I do not mean the drug culture that exists in Eastern Kentucky or Asheville, NC for example which is the Sodom and Gomorrah of the wrong type of liberalism. I am talking about clean living moral believers who are ecological and earthy with some ideal or region to keep themselves clean in spirit and mind, someone who runs a urban farmer or or a permaculture homestead or at least you see at Wholefoods.

Not all women who are from Appalachia are desirable singles, mind you.  You want premium women who have some dream, ideals and who just happen to have a local dialect and body like Katniss Everdeen of district 12 (yes a little thinner).

• Read my lips you want educated. You want some girl who studies literature or theater. You want a woman that likes to go to fine art museums, not a country music junkie.

They need to have gone to Universities like:

• Appalachian State University
• East Tennessee state University
• West Virginia University
• University of Tennessee

For example, educated  acquaintance I know has three kids and runs a community garden, as her job, and they are remodeling their 1930s house to look HGTV with little money. Their kids run barefoot and are half-home schooled. She will always be loyal to her husband who scrapes by with some on-line business. They are in love and live outside of Asheville and all around the are for the last nineteen years.

Another, lady I know has four kids, grow up in Kentucky but has four kids and teaches college, and is a Christian.

What is wrong with that? I would say these educated women from the country side are wives men aspire and dream of having.

What would Plato say?

The marriage material from Appalachia are either educated Christians or idealist educated perma culture hipsters. The best would be a combination of both.  Lets be honest, it is about a girl who is pursuing wisdom. Did not Plato say that wisdom as the ultimate good, the one good you can never have too much of, the good that is required for a happy life? You need a mate that is almost obsessed with virtue and wisdom, she can be super cordial mind you, but none of these good looking girls who have no substance.  Its building your house on sand man. First category 4 or 5 storm, it will fall and until that time you will find yourself in an unequally yoked relationship.

These mountains are not for everyone

• If you are weak or shallow or do not believe in God, skip it.
• If you do not want to have kids, skip it.
• If you do not like nature, skip it.
• If your dreams area aligned with a different fantasy or archetype, make the effort to pursue that vision, but do it like you mean it.

What do you mean another vision or culture?

It is a Anglo baptists Scottish Presbyterians border country. Although these women have all the whistle and bells I would be looking for if I were single, I married a princess from Eastern Europe. Remember I am not a WASP, my family name is not Smith or Wheat or Johnson. I am American many generations but yet my subculture is Roman Catholic, Eastern European. My world has always been East of the Elbe river and I believe Catholicism largely influenced my subconscious.  However, that being said, even me, if I were single would consider Appalachia as the place in the US to find a wife.

Who might not be for these gals?

If you are a generic guy with no particulate ideals, except believe in transitory humanistic ideas like being nice etc, I would say it is a no go. The women here are sweet because they are aligned with religion. It is emanating from their core. These women are specific, so if you are a generic guy with no strong religious beliefs they would not appeal to you. Generic guys are those without any great ideals either religious or even environmental counterculture type values. What are generic guys? Rather they spend their time on Netflix or their cell phones than reading books and exploring ideas. They have this notion of finding a nice girl, but they themselves have not used their intellect and spirit to uplift themselves.

They travel through the heartland, past cold factories and drifty towns, to the old, old mountains slumbering east of Tennessee.
― Sarah Sullivan, Passing the Music Down

What do they look like and where to find them?

The looks they have, they have to have. It is so un-high to marry an unattractive girl.

Their beauty impresses because their genetic line is unique. Genetically they are in one sense like the Icelandic people,  like an heirloom fruit they have unusual features. Their faces have the distinct high cheekbones and often a broad look with fair skin and freckles.

Where specifically do you find these girls?

This is the most common question I get. My answer is, I refer you back to the water metaphor above.  That is, you need to have the spirit of adventure and risk taking, and you have to have the vision and with a little luck you will find your wife. A wife rarely is just found with a click, rather, with time and effort. Since they are domestic American women, just take a trip there. You can go online or use a dating app (Whatsapp, Tinder etc.), but nothing beats taking the time to explore the region:

• Appalachian mountain club for finding a date or here single girls like to join groups for hiking

It is not a bad place to live, far away from the world. You can get ten acres of land and a house for 190k. If you do not believe me write me and I will show you where.

People ask me why their prayers are not answered for a soul mate. Why when they visualize nothing is manifest.

I am not going to give you a cliché answer.

Louis de Pointe du Lac: You must know something about the meaning of it all.

Lestat de Lioncourt:  Why? Why should I know these things? Do you know them?

– Interview with a Vampire

The truth is, I do not know. When you pray or visualize you should see something manifest or at least a sign. However, often you get nothing.

You slide a little bit more into disillusionment and disappointment. You feel prayer or visualization is just one more thing that did not work.  You put them on par with something like trying dating sites, dating apps or even clubbing. In the end nothing works. Why?

Yes, I am sure you can get plenty of dates, and you might have declare your love to someone, even been engaged, but still you are not  married and no soul mate in sight.  Further, to make your disillusionment even worst, you hear a lot of stories of people unhappy in marriages. You hear about break ups after years of marriage.

You might feel regret from all the physical relationships you have had, that did not lead you to the love of your life, and this adds weight to your heaviness.

I am sorry if prayer (or visualization) has not lead you to your soul mate. I know how painful loneliness is, yet hope shire eternal, and the silence of aloneness has deepened you and made you more beautiful, if you do not squared it on a cell phone addiction or other trivial distractions.

Before I give you some ideas on how to find your destiny with prayer, when prayer does not seem to work, let me give you some real life examples when it has worked for me personally.

Prayer is not supernatural wizardry like in Harry Potter, that with an incantation of Expecto Patronum, patronus charm is invoked, but something radically different and more powerful.

Bellow are specific examples of how prayer has moved mountains in my life. These are real verifiable miracles in my life. Maybe they did not violate the laws of science, but they were nothing less then a sign to me that God is here with us living, suffering and like a loving parent leading us to redemption.

Cynics out there can say that my interpretation of the below life events are all a fantasy. For example, it is an anthropomorphic projection ( Feuerbach) or an infantile illusion (Freud) and a function of my psychology, However, my response is:

It is something you have to experience for yourself.

My response is also, to cranks is ‘how is your love life working out for you’?

Below are not tall-tales, but this is me, the author of this site, Mark Biernat. It is my life of intense suffering and pain for many years without end, and how prayer helped me.

Issue in my life and prayer

I have had a lifetime of wondrous events,   I could convey,  that go beyond the scope of this writing, but here are four examples from four categories of life.  I would like to give you examples of God’s action in the areas of:

1. Medical
2. Financial
3. Love
4. Family

Medical miracle:

I worked at UPS to pay for my university and other physical labor jobs. I injured my back and my knees so bad that even walking in Walmart was not possible unless I was hunched over a shopping cart with my wife helping me. I would work laying down with my computer resting on my chest most of the day. My wife would have to carry my laptop as it was too heavy for my joints.

It was all very tragic. My face even aged because of the non-stop pain. I could not sleep or enjoy my life.

I went to Harvard medical in Boston and saw the best doctor there (everyone says their doctor is the best, but this was a Harvard neurosurgeon), and there was little I he could do, except surgery. Similarly I went to the best surgeon I knew in Europe. The conclusion was unless they were start looking into a back operation/spinal fusion, nothing could be done. But what about my knees and my hip and other parts of my body injured and in pain. Surgeries often have a positive effect for several years, but requires subsequent surgeries on the spine. For example, my friend Jack has had every vertebrae in his back fused except two and a lifetime user of pain medications. Poor Jack, he is highly educated, but lives in an RV trailer in pain. Therefore, I wanted to find a nonsurgical solution.

My life was pain, suffering and lament. There was no out. My life had degenerated to such a point that it lost its sweetness.

To add one more problem to the mix, I had a brain lesion in my pons, a critical area of my brain stem that was symptomatic. It was a cavernous malformation.

My whole centerline from my spine and my brain had issues. This is no light matter.

How my life changed with prayer

I prayed for an answer for a long time.

I believe part of my suffering was to purge our my pride and inordinate desires so I might be a more beautiful person. My ego made me a prideful person.

In fact, during my college days I thought people who were physically ill were basically just weak minded; oh the arrogance of youth.

I thought I was different than others, and judged people. Simultaneously I was jealous, angry at my lot in life and even my parents.

I had ideas like, people who were poor were basically lazy or did not have the brains I had. Wow what an ego I had (have). Maybe you do not have such issues with ego or maybe you do and are not aware of it. My dear friend Stacey said she does not need to go to Church, because she does nothing wrong. Believe me, she needs to go.

This loneliness and physical pain, in my life help remove ideas that were blocking my happiness. I offered my suffering up to God.

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. –  1 Corinthians 13:11

It was not until I tried to remove negative thoughts and judgmental feelings and negative emotions that went thought my mind, was the answer revealed to me.

Your cravings as a human animal do not become a prayer just because it is God whom you ask to attend to them. –  Dag Hammarskjöld

How prayer worked for me:

1. Intention – Have the intention of removing negativity and see these negative circular thoughts almost as a supernatural energy that is feeding off you.  Pray for this metaphorical exorcism if you will. Even if you can not give up the dark side emotions in your heart, having the intention in your head and asking God to remove these is good enough.
2. Pray for your enemies – Pray for those who have hurt you and wish good to be manifest in their life. Yes, those nasty people, are just like you on a path, even if they are lost. As I walked by people on the street I would try to see their humanity and were they came from.
3. Pray for  forgiveness.  The first thing I would do when I got up in the morning was as God forgiveness of my sins. Then I would thank God for my blessings.
4. The Lord give and the Lord takes, blessed be the name of the Lord – I offered my pain and suffering to God said, whatever you give me I will glorify your name, it does not matter.

Oh, do not get me wrong, I am still a petty little angry, resentful person. I spend a lot of time with negative emotion.  But I have the intention of being good and really want to remove these negative attachments from my life.

What happen? – the universe shifted – a mountain moved

I was coming out of Church one day in a small one room church I went to, and I saw a pamphlet, that said, ‘ did you know the Catholic Church approves of stem cells”.  Adipose stem cells that are non-embryonic stem cells come from your body is supported by the Vatican. I really did not know about stem cells. I Googled it.

I found a Doctor in my area. I call him King Julian (not to his face) because he has such a huge ego.

We were not in good financial condition. It did not matter, I put it on my credit card.

I got stem cells, no anesthesia. I just walked in, he took some corpulent from my stomach (which I did not mind), and three hours latter injected it in my body at various locations.

• After three months – I thought I was ripped off, with little positive effect and more credit card debt. I kept praying anyway.  I offered  my suffering to God and said, God, whatever you want of me, this is where I am. If I am suffering and in pain, blessed be the name of the Lord.
• After six months – I told my wife, I feel a little better, today, maybe it is the weather (rather than the stem cells), and was able to meet some leaves in the yard.
• After one year something happened – I found myself cutting trees in my backyard and clearing land.  I cleared a field with a shovel, moving logs and rocks.  I use this as my Organic garden today. I was moving mountains.  Twenty years of intense suffering was healed. The stem cells worked.
• How can I say God did not answer my prayers?

God lead me to the solution. A crazy solution. I mean come on do you know anyone else doing stem cells?  Everyone takes pain medications and operations.

From that physical suffering I have learned humility (some).

I asked God in prayer, that I might be healed, not for me, but so I might work and take care of my family better.

• No esoteric healing involved, however, I went from basically disabled to 21 forever, in a year. Who does this happen to? What do you think?

Financial miracle

When I re-immigrated to the USA after living abroad for ten years, I had no money and no car. In someways it was very romantic. We came here with two suitcases and peddled a land cruiser bike from Walmart everywhere.  My wife, my daughter and I lived in a tiny run down apartment by the beach.

I prayed for help. We had a mountain of debt on our credit card.

I prayed for help over a year.

• I swung and bam, I knocked it out of the park. I got a job making $160,000 dollars a year.  Who makes this money? I got that job after being off the grid for a decade in Europe.

After that I got another job even better, is that normal?  Then I quit that job to spend more time with my family and with prayer I got a job teaching as a professor of Economics at a state college nearby.

On a lighter note, when I got the job as a professor, I did not tell my wife, I just asked her if she was Mary Ann or Ginger, she looked me, and I said because I am the professor.

Yes, I know, no laws of physics were broken here and nothing supernatural occurred, but does there need to be?  God answers prayers in ways you could never dream.

• Nothing supernatural, but is this not a miracle of going to utter poverty to being the top 1% in a day?

Finding the love of my life – Miracle

My family is my greatest joy. You hear people say this but it is true.  After praying for my soul mate out of the blue my wife appeared. You can read about my dreams and prayers and how I met her in my other posts. We have been together now going on 13 years and happy as ever. She was the girl I saw in my dreams, yet more than I  could have ever imagined.

She is from the other side of the world. I am a New England Preppy and she is from the Polish countryside. Never could have imaged. How can anyone image the future when God takes you on such an amazing journey.

• No physical laws of science where violated, but God was throwing the dice when I was not looking.

Family miracles

My parents have been together over 65 years happily married with many miracles in their lives with a daily prayer practice.

One example, my brother, Joe, was tested by all the experts, educators and physiologists, that he would not be able to complete high school. They recommended a trade school instead of a high school diploma.  My parents prayed with unwaivering faith.

• My brother Joe went on to get multiple degrees and is worth over 50 million dollars today traveling the world running businesses, and now literally saving the rain forest.

I could go on with other examples of God’s participation in my life, but my point is not to tell stories, or to entertain, but to give a testament that:

God he does great things for us

He takes care of his children, he watches over us in our despair.

• Why not tap into the power of the infinite?  My advice  connect with the Divine or you just might be swindling yourself out of your own life.

My advice – Visit a monastery to find your wife

My advice is to find a wife or husband visit a cloister.  It is not what you think, rather, I mean for you to experience the power of prayerful people first hand, not something you read in a book.

Silence is the fertile soil of prayer.

• Take a Yoga retreat like Baron Baptiste if you have the cash.
• Visit a Buddhist monetary or meditation center.
• Take a visit to Amish country, the Amish settlements are found beyond Pennsylvania.
• Take a trip to a monastery of any religion.
• Go to a hippie type retreat center
• Do a weekend retreat at a Trappist monastery, they are in many states. At least go for the afternoon and bath in the silence and power of their prayer.

Directory of Trappist Monasteries

Why not try a visit? Is Tinder or Craiglist personals really working that well for you? They usually have a nice gift shop full of books that you would not find normally. If you did this, your spouse will not appear like magic, as God is not a powerful wizard, but you will have planted a seed.

With prayer it is about planting a seed, watering it and taking care of it.  Take care of your intention and be patient and wait for it to grow.

Work and Pray – the harvest is coming.

Also read classics by saints and monks of the past. Read Thomas Kempis for example. Read the Bible. Or read modern day theologians like Hans Kung  or classic inspirational writers like Anthony De Mello, Normal Vincent Peale or Neal Lozono. Read these by your bedside this is my advice. However, if you really want to see prayer in action. If you want to experience silence and prayer find a group that practices it, because silences is a practice.

How do you see yourself in this Universe

I do not care if you are under the spell of Richard Dawkins or you are too prideful to believe, or you were not brought up this way,  or whatever, it is not my problem. It really is not, I have my own life. I am not my brothers keeper. However, I would say this:

If you see yourself as a speck of dust floating thought this universe then that is what life will give you.  If you see yourself as infinite that is what life will give you.

You need to trust in God. Like in the movies when someone says ‘give me your hand’.  Trust is almost synonymous with faith.

Be patient in prayer and you will be happily married. All the days of being single does not add up to the happiness of one day of being with your soul mate. It might take years rather than months. But do not give up.

Just remember, prayer is not a technique. It is not magic. Faith, is not a creed or a declaration, but a radical reorientation of one’s life.

I don’t know Who – or what – put the question, I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer Yes to Someone — or Something — and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life, in self-surrender, had a goal.- Dag Hammarskjöld

Remember, God is not a super magician.  God is an active player in the game of life with us. He sets up the rules but does not violate them. However, he does throw the dice when we are not looking. He cares and loves us in ways we do not know. He is our loving Father and Mother and suffers with us.

Many people ask where is God in all this suffering on the earth. Where was God in the concentration camps of WWII for example.  I believe the answer is, he was there suffering with them.

God’s ways are not man’s ways

God will help you find your density but in ways you might not expect. Remember, God is not supernatural. I do not believe in anything supernatural. To believe in the supernatural is contrary to the laws of physics and science. To believe in the supernatural might be even contrary to religion, as it would boarder on superstition.

Nothing about prayer is to be connected with a trick or technique.

Pray that your loneliness may spur you into finding something to live for.

I do not want to leave you with a post and no practical ideas to take away:

However, prayer is real. You will find your soulmate if you pray for your soulmate.

What is the sound of one hand clapping? ‘Prayer’ is your left hand and ‘action’ your the right hand. Together they make a sound that resonates when placed that changes the universe around you.

Action Point – make yourself cordialter than cordial

I do not mean to cheapen the inspirational power of this post, but I am a practical person. People respond to looks.

Make yourself super cordial. So cordial that people’s hearts beat when you come into a room.  We all can be model cordial.

• Shape – If you are out of shape, get toned. Even use exercise as a form of monastic self flagellation.
• Clothes – Wear inexpensive but tight fitting cool clothes. Who does not like a body in clean, solid color tight clothes, consider brands like Hollister or from the thrift shop, or be preppy if you can afford it. Who does not like a girl in a while button down shirt, or a guy that looks like Hipster entrepreneur.
• Glasses – Get cool glasses, you can get them for under twenty bucks at a place like Zenni Optical.
• Hair – If you are a guy spike your hair up, and if you are a girl grow your hair long.
• Shoes – Does not have to be expensive, a woman in jeans and red shoes gets attention for example.

It is that simple. You can look like a model or a member of a teenage heart throb boy band.

Next work on yourself intellectually and culturally. Self actualize during your purgatory and wait for your spouse.  However, I think as long as you are intellectually curious, that is enough, more focus on making yourself physically attractive.

Do this in conjunction with prayer that is sincere, and as described above.

Prayer – find your method – wait for your soul mate

Make it not about finding your mate, but about making yourself a better soul, and if you find her or him on the way, thank God. Since as humans we tend to be ritualistic (for various reason), make your own prayer technique or use one from the religious tradition of your ancestors, if you are not religious. Be creative, for example, St. Ignatius use to pray laying on his back or facing Jerusalem.

If you are into visualization, no need to look too deep into techniques. Any technique is fine, or make your own. I like the pink balloon technique and whispering in your mind before you fall asleep, as well as pure visualization and fantasy.

In conclusion

You will leave all your single friends scratching their head, as they see living a normal life of taking your kids to the playground.  In start contrast the cynics will be the oldest ones in bar, still trying to meet women with Tinder or something. So do not worry about the cynics, they just get burned.

Do like the faithful have for generations, not give up, just persevere and be faithful in your prayers. If it takes time, let it take time. My message to you personally, if you are looking for a husband or spouse, pray, be patient, the love of your life is coming.

Plato believed that everything on this earth corresponded to a form, an ideal archetype of a concrete object on this planet. To contemplate these forms would bring a greater awareness to this life and happiness.

Similarly pop culture has had a parade of self help recommendations about visualizing your ideal partner.

In contrast, there are those that argue that you should not not have an ideal vision of a wife (or husband) or type because your real mate might be something totally different than you could have ever imaged. If you subconsciously filter out potential partners based on preconceived notions, then you might miss your other half.

My preconceived notions consistently get shattered with life broadening experiences.

The people and ideas that are distant or unconformable in your life, are often what you embrace closest to your heart. That being said, I believe imagining an ideal will help you sift out the wheat from the chaff. The reason is there are 3.7 Billion women in the world and 1.3 Billion single women of dating age.

Why dating sites do not work well

I am a believer in dating sites, but I question is this the best approach. That is playing the numbers game with a dating site, and going on dates until you find the right one. Yes many people do that, but it can wear you down. Thinking people use the three basic methods below.

1. Advance searches – You could argue that all you have to do is refine your search criteria on a dating site like match.com under advanced searches. Filter people out until there are really only a handful of people in your criteria.
2. Brute-force attack – By calculating and checking every possible potential mate as fast as you can on a dating site with visual screening. Even if you have the fastest right hand index figure on Tinder you would never really find the right one for you.
3. Logical way or interest based dating sites – Similarly, you can be the logician and think your way out of singleness. You can use sites that are not dating per say but more interest sites. Using your brain and do what your friends say,  like meet people based on clubs of mutual interest, work setting and getting set up. If I was a girl I would personally be on chess.com.

All the above are nice ideas but limited in effectiveness.  Life does not work that way.

Better is to fantasizes your ideal mate and go about your life and she will appear. Sounds crazy right, but  it works. Try creative visualization and prayer to send out a message to the web of the collective unconsciousness. This is much more effective in my personal experience.  You can use dating sites as an adjunct to visualization, but you would be better off spending more of your time in your imagination, the imaginary web, than on the dating sites on the real web. I am writing this because it worked for me, and writing this for you.

Is visualizing New Age hocus pocus?

I do not care if you do not believe me, I am not my brothers keeper. My question for you is, are you happily married? I am. Just be open to the idea that something that sounds like esoteric gnosticism, might work.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. – Shakespeare

I tried everything and I believe a combination of prayer and visual fantasies bought my dream girl to reality.  I do not believe in hocus pocus or new age thinking. I can not give you a statistical study or proof imagining your ideal wife will work. In fact, I am a cohesive skeptic and have for years followed the Skeptical Inquirer: www.csicop.org/si

I do not believe in anything, and certainly nothing supernatural. However, I believe in the human spirit, God, and prayer. This is real.

There is a complex stratification of reality. – Hans Kung

The reason is God is not a super magician, but rather than objective working in the subjective. This is another conversation, but trust me, prayer does work. Even if you have little faith, perhaps the size of a mustard seed, if you say to the mountain move, it will move.

I tested it on a small scale and a large scale. It works beyond the realm of coincidence and beyond anything you could ever imagine.  If it were tested under the lens of science, I am sure it would not pass. Dr. Lary Dossey writes extensively on the subject if you would like to follow up.  However, if you are a skeptic, remember, life is subjective and relative, and it did work for me and others I know. If you are talking about a law of physics that is one thing, but we are talking about love and the human spirit.  If you want to really get married, try it.

Here is a previous post on techniques for imagining your spouses. This goes a little more into some techniques in my list of seventeen or so methods. My most recommended method is simply imagining a fantasy that speaks from your own myths.

For me it was connected to a time and place I used to image when I was a teen, for example, Eastern Europe in a time long ago.

Patience is a virtue not a girl’s nick on Tinder

People will say they tried this but it does not work. Because it is not a magic trick. It takes patience. In our society people want something today or at least next week like an Amazon order. The universe does not work that way. God’s ways are not man’s ways.

God not only plays dice with the Universe, he sometimes throws them when you are not looking

Many guys write me and want to have their wife appear with nothing more than a click on a dating or lady friends site. Again this is the Amazon.com mentality of: I have the cash and I expect my order to be here sooner than latter. First you do not have the cash, as the karmic cash needed to achieve the results in the spiritual realm are earned though prayer and meditation. Second, God exists outside the time-space continuum and is not on our schedule.

Therefore, better than any dating app is developing a sensory rich and active image of the husband or wife you want.  Use your brain which was created by a million years of evolution.  To use your brain to think and image and explore out of the box ways to find a mate.

Thinking is the hardest work there is, that is why so few people do it

Why am I writing this?

Because, man, wake up, you should be a romantic conquistador seeking a princess, not some metro-boy, pop culture, Tinder using, corn addicted (I mean the other word), settling for endless dates with mediocre women. Stop wielding your cell phone in your left hand and replace it with a metaphorical sword and find your damsel. Go on that quest.

If you have no idea what I mean, choose a cheesy or deep romantic book or film epic to snap you out of your daze. Anything that inspires you personally like:

• Last of the Mohegans
• Braveheart
• Casablanca
• Romeo and Juliet
• Lord of the Rings (not romantic in the traditional sense but, dreamy and courageous)

Start feeding your mind with ideas that will  snap you out of the pack of lies that you have been sold by society. Be the champion that you are.

How to conceptualize your ideal wife?

Do not think your ideal wife, imagine her. See her in a rich sensory fantasy where you interact with her and win her. It should be fun not another technique. If it is a technique, I do not think it is as effective as if it comes from your heart.  Do not have a list of determinate criteria that she has to fulfill, rather, fantasizes, feel, image, visualize, mediate and pray. See her in your mind’s eye in fantasy where you win her in some scenario.

Thinking is not imagining

The greatest distance is between the heart and the head

Thinking gets in the way. Some people say that in the next life the logical analytical thinking is not needed and goes away and at your core true essence only feeling imaginative thinking is retained. Your imagination is the link between your soul and this world, all generated by the physical brain, mind you, but none the less valid.

If you want a more academic psychological scientific understanding of what imagination really is I recommend Imagination and sensory experien

I prefer more spiritual books on the subject. However, before you choose a book, also read about the author to see if they are walking the walk before reading their books. For example I see relationship authors who are not happily married themselves. In my humble opinion they are not experts on life. So much junk is published these days. However, usually the written word in the form of a book that takes years to write and the person is married, is of good quality.

The two page novelette Circular Ruins by Jorge Borges where the shaman dreams a human to reality, only to realize that he himself is a dream of another. Reality is multilayer, become aware of this. Do not be intimated by chants of the Richard Dawkins crowd. Their arguments are nothing more than rehashes of philosophical schools discussed for centuries and with less rigors than the Ancient Greek thinkers. Create your own reality.

But in the end you do not need a book. Simply try what I say. Imagine yourself in a romantic dream that you win your girl. Do this as you fall asleep.

What really prevents this image of your wife or partner materializing in reality?

The answer is, too much time on the web/phone, let me explain why.

Love in the time of technology

Call it karma or something else, however, watching corn on the Internet or  too many pictures in an image search, that over excites the brain detracts,  from the power of your imagination. This includes spending too much time randomly browsing dating sites like, Grindr, Tinder, OKCupid, or POF. The reason is the brain needs sensory deprivation to start to create and visualize. When you give the brain the image, its done. There is no need to work and sending out a message to the Universe. It tells, the Universe, OK this guy is happy, he has an object of adoration and move on to people who really need love. Those who practiced asceticism and monasticism in centuries past knew this. It heightened their sense and imagination, and power. It was like the original Internet.

Think about it, for one reason or another, in developing countries or even among the Amish, basically everyone gets married. In the USA or the UK there is lower marriage rate and marital success rate. The reason is temptation is everywhere as are images.

I live and breath technology myself. But I asked an Amish acquittance, why they do not use electricity. His reply stuck with me and I could not argue with it.

Electricity corrupts the youth – Amish cart driver

I contrast the Amish family with smiles on their faces playing with their children and American hyper consumptive and instant gratification behavior.

I am not recommending to become Amish or giving up your mobile phone, but rather use these tool in a way that it does not block your imagination. I am semi addicted to technology myself. Rather, use technology to play chess or learn something, listen to classical music, rather than fill the void.  When the void is filled with countless hours browsing your phone or on snapchat or whatsapp, then there is no room for anything else to come in. My recommendation is, rejoice in the pains of loneness and the darkness and emptiness will allow your imagination and fantasies take over, in a positive proactive way.  Gently guide these images to interaction with your ideal in your imagination.

It is in the darkness that light appears

Why hormones lead us to wrong choices?

Where id is, there shall ego be. – Sigmund Freud, New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, 1932

If you are like me, healthy, your hormones are raging. Not raging like I say,  ‘yes women are nice looking’, rather, driving you to the point of obsession (not in a certified psycho way, mind you). I am talking honestly how strong our physical needs and drives truly are, and they move us to do great and wondrousness things.

Sigmund Freud’s theories have not stood up well to academic research, however, his main thesis, I believe is true. Most human action and notation is initiated by the ‘Id’ or drive for reproduction and exists at the subconscious level.

Nature makes it this way or the human race would not procreate and continue. Lets be honest here, unless you are seriously repressed, every waking moment of the day you fantasizes or at least think about the opposite gender on the subconscious level. Even when you are not thinking about women, you are thinking about them. If you are honest it is like an intense hunger or thirst that drives you. This lies at the heart of the problem, your drive is so strong you might end up with the wrong woman. Your judgment is clouded because you need physical relations. Your ability to make a right choice is not clear.

Some people learn to became perpetual players using the Craiglist or match.com for example or browsing POF late at night and using Snapchat to seal the deal for hook ups. However, when you do this, you are opening doors that can not be closed. With time you would have plucked the petals off the beautiful flower and mystery of life and find yourself feeling empty and depressed in middle age. Every time you loose your seed in some type of frivolous encounter, this weakens your ability to visualizes, as your creative energies have been dissipated.

Midway along the journey of our life – I woke to find myself in a dark wood…this wood of wilderness, savage and stubborn…a bitter place, Death could scarce be bitterer.  – Dante

Lets be honest, if physical relations are you want, being a single player, is an inefficient way to get it, with all the drama and risks connected with being a player. If you do not notice some strange rash while showing, or knock some girl up who has so many issues they would have to be check into a clinic in Vienna, Austria for psyccordialherapy for her to be normal.

Using your body like a roller coaster

Having a physical relationship with yourself every evening does not do it either. There is nothing ethically wrong with that. It is silly people feel guilty. However, you might feel tired and depressed and regretful, or just unfulfilled. It is fine for a urgent quick fix is your urges get too intense, as long as it does not dissipate your drive for human intimacy.

Post coitum omne animalium triste est – Latin Proverb

The above quote is true only with non marital relations including ‘self relations’. After the moment of truth, you want to be around someone you are totally into.

Better is to marry a cordial lady with good values and than you have a VIP card of unrestricted access, additionally you have your best friend.

Wrong channels for libidinal drives

Challenging your energy into chasing money will not end well, like the classic movie Citizen Kane.

Some people transmute this libidinal energy into career or education or recreation. However, once you are in your mid-20s, I recommend you first get the girl then focus on your career. The reason is you do not really start living until you are married. This changes everything. Family is more important than careers. Do not let your parents or society con you.

Therefore, my purpose above has been to convince you to try visualization for love. Try it with the full power using positive thoughts and avoiding distractions and things that would dissipate your creative Kundalinic energies if you will.

Below I will give you a framework for finding that ideal girl simply by listing the qualities I think you want to look for. I am not an expert on life and all ideals and vision of beauty vary. However, if you hear another persons ideal, it might get you to reflect on yours.

If you read my site you already know my emphasis on finding an idealistic wife/husband, however it is worth reviewing:

Must answer the meaning of life question

OK, here it is, if I were to use criteria for screening girls it is this, a girl who is or has ideals lifting her up. They could be in poverty or a Ph.D from Harvard, it does not matter, what matters is they are idealist and live their life not for the here and now, but something greater.  Discussing the meaning of life with them, would be one of my first steps. This is so basic. You have to talk to your potential life partner early on about life. Forget careers and level of education, talk to them indirectly or directly about the meaning of life.

The purpose of life is to be defeated by greater and greater things – Rilke

For example, a strong active faith in God if you are a believer. If you are an atheist or agnostic or free thinker, your woman needs to have to have a strong ideal pushing them upward. I can not emphasis this enough. In the end the meaning of life question, is the only question that is relevant in a relationship. Love elevates you and transcends you.

Often people do not articulate this in a formula like

Ad mariom dei glorium

Rather convey something like this:

But, you know, I feel more fellowship with the defeated than with saints. Heroism and sanctity don’t really appeal to me, I imagine. What interests me is being a man. The Plague by Albert Camus

My point is you want your choice to be aware and striving toward transcendence. Do you understand how important this is. It affects their actions past present and future. They must be living a raison d’être that you can share.

The girl has to be going not in circles but on a spiral stair case upward.

People ask me questions about if a girl is a scammer or if she will divorce, or make a good wife. Better is to have a lot of conversations here and there in the relationship about the meaning of life and the purpose of human existence.  See the sincerity in their voice and passion as they talk about elevated things. You are looking for a life partner not a hook up. You have to live with this person all the day of your life so you had better choose right on this one criteria.

All women have magic. However some women have very little magic, like .01% – Mark Biernat

Think of the cliché Jersey girl (hyper consumptive, Facebook addict, cell phone junkie) might have their magic set at .01%.

You do not want to marry a girl with a low level of j’en sais quoi. The way you screen for this is find a women who is aware and walking the walk. She does not have to be doing anything greater than living a prayerful life for example.

How often we confuse beauty with virtue.

Guys like to rate girl from 1 to 10, trust me, many women (and men) are below 1.

In the end, this is all that matters. That the person is a person you connect with, on a meaning of life level. That is it.

In conclusion

Start to visualize or pray before bed. I like prayer as I am too ADD for meditation. If you can meditate than more power to you. I can not do it consistently, although the times I have I like it. Maybe at the end of yoga class when I can not move anyway, but even then. However, prayer does not require any rules or formulas. St. Ignatius favorite position was laying down with his head facing Jerusalem. Others use essential oil candles. Others just close the door for a few minutes. Find what works for you.

If you are a non-believer, just fantasizes before you go to bed in a dynamic way, and be patient. For example, be creative like see her lost in a open void and you find her, or in a forest with mist and you have to fight off villains to bring her to safety.

Be patient, finding love is not instant, like pinging and Uber ride. It is more like chipping away at a block of granite, to create a Michaelangelo stature, it takes time, the end result is something beautiful.

Your parents are not really crazy mind you, just enough to flatten your chance of getting married in your 20s. The experiences you had growing up, and the messages you received from your parents, influence the way you see yourself, and hence your success in attracting a mate. When you want to date and get married, your parents will test and challenge you every step of the way. Further, the echo of their neurosis and fears will reverberated in your subconscious affecting your life choices.

Every memory I have, even the sweetest ones, are clouded with a little bit of regret and sorrow. Perhaps you feel the same? It is hard for me to even go back down memory lane, when often on the next turn is a painful memory. I had a bitter sweet childhood. However, I learned to overcome the experiences I was set up with,  forgive and not go to the dark-side. It is easy to say you understand  this, but are you married, what is holding you back?

To further complicate this, if your parents had a successful marriage, statistically, you will. If not, you will have to be aware of how not to repeat their mistakes.

• What you need to know is this: life really begins when you are married.

Life before you are married is a lower level of existence, basically every cell in your body is waiting for you to pair off and reproduce.  Today, despite my personal challenges from my long adolescence (lets say until age 30),  if you ask me how my life is, I would reply,  I am one of the happiest people I know. How is this?

Read my list below to put yourself on a self-correcting course. The purpose of this post is to give you ideas to get you back on track that leads to the alter.

Proposal for you:

I recommend to print this article and highlight the three points that are most relevant to your situation. When you have identified those three points, you can write me personally (contact page) or leave a comment. I will give some advice personal to your situation.

You have to get married

Let me lay all the cards on the table.  You have to get married, if you want a full rich happy life.  Do not believe the media/studies, as we know they are not objective and their mission to get attention is to shock you, and to tell you up is down and down is up. Do not believe the unhappy stories of others, because the lamenting tend to be the most vocal.  Trust me, I have legions of friends that are married and happy for many years, including myself. My parents have been happily married for over 65 years. That is real, life experience not a statistic.

There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics

• All the experiences I had when I was single, does not compare to one moment of being with my family. That is the truth.

If you want to rationalize away your birthright to be happily married go ahead, but it is a low level of existence. Like the Architect (the Sigmund Freud looking spokesman for the machines) in the Matrix said:

There are levels of survival we are prepared to accept.

You have to get married because you need to have a partner to talk to. You need to have unrestricted physical relations. You need to get married because God wants us to, unless you pursue a life of monastic service to humanity.  I am a parent and having a child is amazing, you get to relive your childhood in a better way. Being married and having a family is not an option, it is the fulfillment of your deepest longings.

You want to pass on your genes rather than having your seed wiped from the face of the earth.

Then why do people (you) have such trouble getting married/with marriage?

It is because of the subconscious dialogue they have in their brain. Your beautiful perfect innocent tabula rasa you were born with, was corrupted by your environment. Yes your peers, and the media,  but more likely your parents imprinted messages early on that is your stumbling block. Further, your parents did not give adequate coaching on how to choose a mate and be happy.

In contrast, many parents give people the opposite information. Or the media and friends have told you that marriage is passé. Parents are good about telling  their kids about money and careers, but love is infinitely more important than money.  Parents  may even want you to get married, but do not tell you how specifically to pick a mate. They have picked a mate for you, or have their vision of a mate that is best suited for you. Do not do it. Find your own vision of love.

This is not about blaming our parents

They were doing the best they could, and they are truly great people,  my personal heroes,  but that does not mean they are not blocking you.  Some parents are too strict like mine, and some parents are too easy like some of my friends. The net effect is you need to overcome their programming. It is recognizing the pattern of thinking stopping you from getting married, where they came from, so you can get married and be happy.

The problem with the parental message about marriage

It is packed with emotion. Their vision of your mate is a manifestation of their insecurities and lack of confidence in you.  It is packed with fear and poor guidance. Your parents projected a lot of anger and fear on you. Maybe not everyone reading this, but there are a lot of parents from the last generation that knew little about good parenting.

Many parents have failed marriages or have given little or no coaching about love. For example, an acquittance of mine is a woman, almost 30 says she wants kids, but does not believe in marriage.  Wow that is messed up. Her father left her mother and is a playboy. I wonder if there is a connection. Be honest with yourself and examine your belief’s in relation to your parental experience.

An unexamined life is not worth living – Socrates

Also, examine the though of your potential mate. Smoke them out in terms of their true beliefs. Question them about their belief and their experiences growing up.

Below are is some advice/wisdom based on personal experience how to override your programming

The Bible says to ‘Honor your Mother and Father’. The greatest way to honor your Mother and Father is to not repeat their mistakes. To live your own life. To own your belief’s including those about love.

To thy own self be true

1. Get your parents out of your head – You need to be geographically away from your parents, if you have had even a hint of a toxic relationship with them. Move to another city, or Europe, like I did, like my brother did, or an opposite coast like my sister did. Yes, I did not get married until I moved to Europe and I temporarily banished myself from my family. In today’s economy it seems harder but, you can do it. In fact you can not afford to do it, if your parental relationship is toxic. In nature the bird pushes the little bird from the nest to fly. Once you are away from them call them maybe once a week or less on Sunday to let them know you are alive.  When you give your parents grandchildren they will love you more than if you are an adult child feeding off their emotional mammary ducts.
   

   The longer you stay with your parents to ‘save money’ you will be paying for it later with psychiatrists bills

2. Remove the noise – Try to engage in light conversations with your parents, and steer them away from topics like money and dating. Basically, when you call your parents you need to brace for impact. Then learn the art of steering them from life topics. I do not lie, but read my lips, do not have your hand on the Bible when talking to your parents.  Additionally, do not watch the news and be on Facebook more than a few minutes a day (you do not want feed your psyche junk food by attention fiends). You can in fact set Google News to just a few positive filters. Stay clear of Tinder or anything that will give you a cheap rush or ego boast. Basically clean up your eternal influences  including your parents subtle probes into your personal life.
3. Spend a lot of time dreaming about what you really want in a wife or husband? – Go back to what you think you wanted in your youth as a mate. Try to remember what you originally liked in a male or female physically. Was it long legs in a woman or a blond haired guy for example? Really take the time to be honest what you think is cordial. Fantasize about this person.
4. Do date people who believe marriage is forever. My first and most important rule is date an idealist. Someone that has a passion for their lofty ideals (not political) above everything else. This is often manifest in religion or yoga for example. This is centered on dating someone who believes in marriage in the abstract sense not just something to do. Why get married if it they believe love is conditional? People have vows that go “as long as the love shall last’. This is nonsense, marry someone who believes in ‘until death do us part’ – ‘for richer or poorer and sickness and in health’.  Women will say, ‘he has mental problems’. Well is that not sickness?  Stand by your man.
   

   You, who are on the road must have a code that you can live by. And so become yourself because the past is just a good bye. -“Teach Your Children” by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

5. Do read books on marriage by religious writers.  You need to have this influence in your life. You need to deprogram your mind from the media and even your parents. You need your life to be an instrument of the Divine. Do date people who have a passion for reading positive meaningful books and movies. Not liberal psycho babel, but real books like the Bible, by Saints or Christian writers,  or books on yoga or Yogic writers, or transcendentalist like Thoreau and Emerson. Read books not by psychologists, the modern day sophists, but spiritual leaders. It does not matter the specific ones,  there are thousands of books, as long as they are positive and stand for ideals above day to day life.
6. Do date sensitive people – Sincere, painfully sensitive gentle, forgiving people. Date people that apologize often. Insensitive people will cause you a life of misery. Find someone with real caring and emotion, that you can complain to. Marry and empath. This will not lead to endless complaining, but rather, they will inspire you to be strong for them.
7. Do not date materialistic people Love and money are opposites. Parents often over emphasis career.

You can have two of three things in life. Money, health or love. You choose the two you want.

Do not date trashy people Swearing, selfish, smoking, non-prayerful/non-meditating people. The world is filled with base people. Love them but do not marry them.

Your parents might believe that no one is good enough for you. Although my parents have been married over 65 years, no one was good enough for any of their five children. This is a common fallacy parents project on children, because they want to protect their kids or they are generally judgmental. The person who is good enough is the person who you are attracted to and will love you forever with gentleness and kindness.

Parents or other will say: Marrying a beauty does not matter, its the inside that counts. This is ridiculous, no this is ridonculous.  I say go for someone you think is cordial, because you are going to wake up the rest of your life next to this person and smile at them every night, trust me you want to go for cordial to maximize your happiness. Is that not a huge reason people get married? That is to have ‘physical relations’. Go for someone who does it for you on a physical level, then make sure they are a Godly, sensitive, intellectually curious person.

You think: You are not attractive enough to marry a beautiful person – Lucky for you, because of a millions of years of evolution there is no way you are not attractive. Evolution has made it so that everyone has a physical allure and sensuality. Everyone can be cordial. You just have to get in shape and have the right style.

Society tell you: Marriage is about fighting and jocking for position and dominance. Wrong, marriage is never about splitting control 50-50 or anything remotely related to power. Find a mate that is gives 100% and you give 100% without question to their who is on top or has that 1% edge. For example, what if one of you is in a coma? Love is about giving yourself fully and find someone who believes the same.

Your fears tell you: Marriage is about a ‘practical’, ‘reasonable’, choice.– Marriage is about primitive irrational desires for gene replication, based on deep subconscious longings and fantasies of youth. Marriage is not a business transaction. How is it practical I left my $100,000 plus job and lived in another country, in a 200 square foot apartment, for many years to marry a poor girl from the countryside? Did I make the right choice? Yes you bet, the best choice of my life.

Realize that your parents arguing traumatized you. – Realize it was not about you but about their fears. The Bible talks about sins being passed down from generation to generation. I always thought this was bunk, in the literal sense, but it is real if you understand that this energy might express itself from parent to child and echo though many generations.

Parents tell you: You need to get your career going and money established before you can think about marriage. – If that is true, why do people where I live, have seven kids and have no money, while the career oriented women have one child in day care? You need no money, only love to have a family. Kids need love, not career parents.

Parents will tell you: You need to married someone in your same social-economic class. – I went to an all boys English boarding school in New England, my wife daughter of a farmer growing up in communist Poland. We are so happy. Social class means nothing.

What if you are still too connected to your parents in a business.  If this is holding you back in anyway move away as far as you can. Out of sight out of mind.

You think: People will look funny at you if you have a foreign spouse.  Boundaries are for politicians not for love. We are all God’s children and God knows no political boundaries despite what the drum beating politicians, nationalists and ideologues tell you. You have visa issues, there are always ways to legally live in the same country. It might not be the country of your choice but there are always ways.

What if parents want to arrange a marriage for you and you need to comply. – Arranged marriages do work, but I prefer a love marriage. I believe you create your own destiny. Defy logic and tradition and go with what your instinctual drive tell you. You need to marry someone your parents would approve of, social obligation and honor to your family – wrong. – You need to find the love of your life.

 You might think: You are not smart enough to provide a good life for your family and live the dream. – Again, if evolution brought you here, you have the brains. It is simple evolution that has honed your instinct to survive and you can. Instinct kicks in when it needs to. We grow our own food for example.

You might believe: You are bad and do not deserve happiness. Wrong.

You parents were too busy to listen or care when you were growing up. – I know and with my daughter I try not to listen but to really be there with her. Parents are busy chasing money but most important is the family.

Your parents said small spiteful things or large hurtful things to you. – You need to let it go.

There is one way to literally go back in time and change the past. It is to forgive. Forgiveness is the best time machine there is.

You feel you wasted so much time – I felt this way and my older brother said, it does not matter about that, what matters is what you do with your life now.

You feel, there is no soul mate only nice choices. -Trust me your soulmate is out there, it is the person you have a family with. If you can not find your soulmate you are looking in the wrong places. Do not look on Tinder. Look in real life in yoga retreats or church or clubs but not Tinder.

 People will tell you: Marriage is a legal contract. False. Marriage is not about assets and contracts, it is about mating. All life is programmed for reproduction. It is the strongest drive there is, even above survival. Nature basically wants you to survive to reproduce. That is why you look good during your reproductive years. If you do not find your mate and reproduce life will not reward you with all the intangible goodness of those who are single will never understand. Less eloquently expressed, you need to get married to have ‘physical relations’ on a regular and frequent basis. Also immense emotional and spiritual rewards. You can be the biggest hook up artist in the world, but you do not have access this unless you are married. Even if you are single and living with someone it is not the same. It will never be the same.

 What is your scenario? You come from a home raised by a step father or step mother. You come from a single parent home. You parents are divorced. It does not matter, you can have love and marriage by jettisoning their wrong ideas.

In conclusion

If I listen to my parents I would either focus on my career or marry one of my parent’s rich friend’s daughters. Boring.
If you listen to your parents programming then: when you are old and sitting in your rocker, and people ask you how was the party, you are going to say, ‘what party?’.

Is this the experience you want have on this earth? You get one life and your experience is to play it safe. What a cowardly way to live.
Much, no really all, of my twenties I basically was either angry or I felt I was like a bird with a broken wing, just hobbling along in life.
Like the spiritual song sung by 19th century American slaves:

Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen

Everybody thinks that others can not understand what they went through. What personal hell you have endured. Worst I festered in the pendulum of regret and sorrow, the dark side, like drinking salt water that never quenched me.

I decided to reprogram myself, I did yoga and prayed and visualized (prefer to meditation as it is more active as I like most people are slightly ADD).

• My message is find the winning system that will liberate you from your patterns. Give visualization and prayer a chance in letting go of the past and creating your vision of your happy future.

My message is not matter what life experience brought you to adulthood, you can reprogram yourself and be happily ever after with your family. It is your birthright and do not let anyone, including your parents, friend or society, swindle that from you.

References:

The Transmission of Marital Instability Across Generations: Relationship Skills or Commitment to Marriage?
Paul R. Amato; Danelle D. DeBoer
The Journal of Marriage and Family, November 2001

The legacy of parents’ marital discord: Consequences for children’s marital quality.
Amato, Paul R.; Booth, Alan
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 81(4), Oct 2001, 627-638.

Intergenerational Transmission of Marital Quality and Marital Instability
Du Feng, Roseann Giarrusso, Vern L. Bengtson and Nancy Frye
Journal of Marriage and Family
Vol. 61, No. 2 (May, 1999), pp. 451-463

Find your destiny with your genes on

The purpose of this post is to look at how genetics influences our romantic interactions. Further, what you can do with the knowledge of your genetics and potential spouse’s genetics, to tip the odds of destiny. As a mating strategy we all want to optimize. Below I give you a specific road map. That being said, we need to understand what genes are and what they are do for us.

Where are genes taking us?

Genes are almost like light switches, they turn on or off chemical processes in your body. However, there is more to the story. Genes have a consciousness of their own. It is almost they live symbiotically in your body, in one sense. They sculpt your life, and drive you to reproduce in by helping you choose a partner that is optimal. Your genes want to survive through the generations, even if you do not.

Further,  Homo sapiens sapiens genes are taking the human race somewhere, the Omega point perhaps, who knows (Pierre Teilhard de Chardin ). What we do know is genes adapt and change, seeking improvement through mate selection. They want to ensure that the human race continues and thrives more than you personally. So the mating strategy for your genes is to seek out a genetically optimal partner that might be good for you, but definitely good for the human race’s survival. That is why even a cursory awareness of genes and mating might be important for your search. Just being aware of what is going on might lead you in the right direction.

Only the strong survive, is being replaced with only the harmonious survive.

For example, the Alpha male reptilians, the old model for survival and dating for humans, is being replaced by male and females that have genes of cooperation, compassion and intellect. Human genes as a whole, in this crowded aggressive world would not be able to survive much longer, unless the collective unconsciousness of human gene cooperate with other genes and decrease the number of aggressive reptilians who do not recycle for example.  The real question is, how do the genes know this? It is a mystery for another topic.

Life is a huge magic trick which no one person can figure out how it is done

To illustrate this point answer this question: who has more children, Alpha male players or Amish or Mormon communities,  Christians or Asian Indians? Whose genes get passed on, the hedonistic Western Europeans with important careers, but no kids, or homesteading families with gangs of semi-wild children running barefoot in the backyard covered with dirt and smiles on their faces?

God loves plain folk, that is why he made so many of them.

This is why I tell you guys do not believe the recycled information on the web about dating, such as alpha dating or genetic matching sites. Most of these sites do not follow a good model of science, rigorous academic research or even common sense observation.

A specific example is the anti-alpha model of dating . It is as follows: genes involving altruistic and pro-social behavior (D4.4) compared to a more aggressive, novelty-seeking type (D4.7) (genes of someone who has tendencies to be a player or an investment banker) have the advantage. (Reference: Polymorphisms in the dopamine D4 receptor gene (DRD4) contribute to individual differences in human friendshipual behavior: desire, arousal and friendshipual function. I Z Ben Zion1, R Tessler2, L Cohen3, E Lerer4, Y Raz5, R Bachner-Melman2, I Gritsenko6, L Nemanov6, A H Zohar7, R H Belmaker1, J Benjamin1 and R P Ebstein2,6)

It is beyond the scope of this article to elaborate on or defend such an theory, but I invite you to do the research yourself.

Limits of genetics and love

At this juncture, despite advances on the understanding of the genetic component controlling attraction, science is yet to reach the point in which a simple genotype analysis may clearly define the degree of compatibility of one individual to another. What is well known is that the science of love is a polygenic, very complex traits that also depends on several non-genetic and environmental factors. This means that is virtually impossible to determine one’s degree of compatibility by looking at one specific gene, such as D4.4 or D4.7 – there are several other known genes and probably many more yet to be revealed. It is the combined effect of all of them that results in the individual’s genetic profile of being able to live happily with a mate from a biological prospective.

For example, you may have the repelling allele to a potential mate indicated by a specific marker gene, but this can be largely compensated by the genetic make-up of a large number of additional genes – and even if you get genotyping information for all of them, you still would have to interpret the genetic data in the context of the non-genetic factors, starting, for example, with “degree of exposure”, that is, simply proximity to the person and time to socialize and rub elbows. The bottom line is, you cannot just match up some genes and conclude this must be love, there is simply not enough knowledge to do so based on genetics, and would you really want to do so anyway?

I am sorry if this disappoints everyone’s expectations on the power of genetics to determine compatibility – there still a long way to go before we have consolidated tests able to precisely define such parameter. Further, keep in mind that, in principle, there is no reason for exaggerated focus on such things as genetic compatibility for love or more primitively alpha male or beta male type classifications.

Simply focus on the elements in your life you can change. This will give you great latitude and power beyond any supposed predetermined biological mould you have been formed from. Like I have said all along: Shop Hollister on a sale, get a good hair cut at Aveda and have an easy going positive surfer dude or girl attitude with faith in God’s grace, and you will be empowered to create your own destiny. It is that simple. To override any perceived genetic disadvantage, take action.  Genes might give you one hair color and texture, but with a simple strip to the Whole Foods personal care section you can change your hair color and look. You can similarly increase your attraction with just stylish clothes and the right colors. If you develop your intellect you will leverage your mating power. Intelligence acquired through cultural enrichment is even better than innate intelligence because you gain wisdom with your challenges.

Steps to take if you are interested in Genetic matchmaking

If you have interest in genetics, as I do, then below is what current research suggests regarding the genetics of love. Every psychological tendency in an organisms physiology has multi genes in play. It is not like having blue eyes or Mendeleev’s pea pods. Rather, there are a series of chain upon chain of interactions. However, lets look at a few.

• 23andme how I tested my DNA –  for fun with my wife. It reveals interesting ancestors and unravels our DNA, Chromosomes, genes and alleles (they are either A, C, T or G). On 23andme.com – You get to browse your raw genetic data.
• How to interpret your results with this add-on –  This is a Firefox add-on you can use to interpret the genetic data. It allows you to decode your 23andme data created by a company called 5AMSolutions. After the FDA cracked down on 23andme, they are limited by what they can interpret. However, the good news is you have a brain you can do it yourself.
• Road map of your genetics laid out – This site lays out basic genetic information and using the add-on and your raw data your alleles can be interpreted. You can take a closer at physiological traits. You can hover over the trait and compare to your raw genetic data. If you want your genetic analysis more spelled out you can utilizes promethease.com where you can import your 23andme.com data directly for five dollars and have a probability analysis done on your psychological as well as biological tendencies.

This is a sample of what some traits might look like if you follow the steps above.  More research is needed but it does give you clues to your behavior tendencies. However you need to temper this with the wisdom of, knowing you have the power to change.

I think decoding your genetic profile is money better spent than any dating site that pairs people off based on DNA dating and olfactory hormone speculation. The reason is 23andme does this for more or less altruistic reasons and to fulfill intellectual curiosity, whereas dating sites often have a strong profit motive and make promises that are based on speculation and even misleading statements about the power of interpretation. And as stated above genetic matchmaking is not good science, at this juncture. Further you can use your raw data for multiple purposes on going into the future.

Life is an art not a science

Clues for genetics of attraction:

Desire and genes

• Desire or the wanderlust gene – The idea is which gene controls drive for physical relations. Gene or known as C-521T ‘T’ allele showed higher desire for physical relations. The or C-616G C allele was associated with higher function and libidinal desire scores. DRD4 5-locus haplotype (19%) was significantly associated with Desire. Five polymorphisms were genotyped across the DRD4 gene: three promoter region SNPs (C-521T, C-616G, A-809G). There is a link between NS and dopaminergic activity via DRD4 on chromosome 11 and increased propensity to take risk, as well as exploratory novel stimulation.

References:

1. Dopamine D4 receptor and desire
2. Differences in friendshipual desire
3. Novelty seeking behavior 

Parenting and genes

• More empathetic and sensitive parenting – There is a gene for emphatic parenting.  This might be a good gene to have in a partner. It is not mutually exclusive with the above arousal seeking gene. You can explore parenting sensitivity (5-HTT) – the gene of love? to research more on the subject.

Immunity and genes

• Different immune genes – Why do plants not self pollinate and humans do not want to either? HLA-dissimilar alleles produce stronger immune systems than HLA-similar alleles because wider diversity of antigen, than HLA-homozygous children (inbreeding avoidance). This is under the ideas of histocompatibility MHCs. Pheromones are the external signals that we use coupled with the sense of smell to determine this when talking to people. This is why I recommend that you use natural scents or no scents at all. Your own perspiration or sweat will do the talking.
• Red Queen’s race – HLA-dissortative mating produces adaptations that pathogens gain an adaptive advantage in friendshipual reproduction. Red Queen’s race is evolutionary adaptation.
• Polymorphic HLA genes – are better because they reduce the chance of recessive mutations caused by genetic homozygosity in other words genetically distant relatives even if unaware. You would be surprised how many 3rd and 4th cousin you have with out being aware. This is revealed on 23andme.com

Reference:

Zion, I. Molecular Psychiatry, online edition. News release, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Pair-bonding

Oxytocin – Genes influence the level of oxytocin which is associated with the desire to stay with a mate. For example GG alleles are associated with higher levels.

• The above examples relating to: desire,  immunity and parenting, are four examples of how information about ones DNA might give indications about potential mates or yourself to defy or actualizes your genetic tendencies based on an assertion of free will.

Genetic matchmaking versus free will

If genes can not precisely determine your next mate, my advice is go for:

Someone who does it for you physically. Intellectually curious and has a commitment to faith – that is manifest in a spiritually lawful goodness and daily rituals of prayerfulness. Someone peaceful connected to nature and wants harmony in the world, wants a family, rather than someone you will be competing with or, married to their career.

Always remember genes are not destiny. Even now they are learning how to alter genes and correct, if you believe in even limited free will this means you can exert an influence over your tendencies.

Free will and culture can override genetic mate selection. Specifically, in societies like the US and Europe, where love marriages are the convention, people with similar genes tend to pair off, with the exception of some specific genes relating to immune system for example. Natures idea is that mixing of immunity genes, will produce stronger offspring with immunity but similarities can reduce cultural friction. However, in traditional societies where there are arranged marriages, we do not see the correlation between these specific genes. I personally believe, opposites do not match as well as similar with a few differences because of cultural understanding. I also believe awareness trumps genes as a survival strategies. For example, if you live an organic and fitness lifestyle you will be fair better then the person who has ‘better immunity genes’ and eats package food.  There are some that question if free will exists. This is my take on it below.
As an additional addendum from a philosophical basis, you can take two attitudes towards genetics, free will and dating.

God does not play dice with the universe – Albert Einstein.

If you think about it all human psychology and thinking is based on the biology of the brain and the body. All biology is based on chemistry. All chemistry is based on physics at a sub-molecular level. All physics is based on mathematics. Hence there is no free will and everything is pre-determined. Rather what exists is only the illusion of free will and the interaction of internal elements (your body’s genetics) and external elements (your environment). Therefore, your genetics, the 23,000 or so genes carried on your 23 chromosome, basically determined your life, from your intelligence to your propensity to risk taking and social interaction and love. The paradox being why even look up your genetics if everything is predetermined. Taken to its end Stalin and Mother Teresa are morally equal since there is no free will.
On the other side.

God not only plays dice with the universe, he throws them where we are not looking.

If you are honest, really honest there is an intangible mystery to life, a quality that can not be quantified but you feel it. In your heart you know this to be true unless you just block it out because you can not accept uncertainty and the unknown. Yes genetics plays a roles, as well as environment, but life is something radically different than anything that can be describe in something as simplistic as genetic formula or a philosophical axiom. Free will determines your destiny in love. Below is a quote about an intelligent robot named Tik-Tok by the same author of the Wizard of Oz.

He thinks, Speaks, acts and does everything but live –
The Marvellous land of OZ – by L. Frank Baum – 1904

Being alive is something radically different and mysterious. We are not predetermined organic machines.
Genetics is not destiny, just and an influencer.

Free will (which is almost synonymous with awareness) and spirit will always trump genetics when it comes to love. Love is the infinite energy that pulses though the universe and ts can be understood as much as we can understand the Absolute, who exists outside the time space continues and the constraints of our physical laws.

So if you want to find a mate, do it. Do it like you mean it with confidence and courage. Do it by risking everything and rather than using your genetic code as a rode map for anything in live, follow your heart. Life is simple and love simpler, follow your heart, not a prescription by anyone else, including me.  Because your heart has reasons which reason knows nothing of (Pascal).