Once in a while, right in the middle of an ordinary life, Love gives us a fairytale.

What is an ordinary life? Is it one where something extravagant doesn't happen? Like winning the lottery, or finding your perfect match in a sea of 6 billion people?

Or is it one where you just follow the pattern - finish school, get a job, find a husband, build a house, have some kids, quit your job, do some more study, kids move out, go back to work, retire, travel, die?

If its either of those then I'm not convinced I have an ordinary life. In fact, I'm not really convinced I even understand what I just wrote.

Either way - I love life. I find life interesting and most days marvel at how spectacular the simplest things can be. I don't consider my life "ordinary" but then I haven't made a million dollars, I don't have an amazing career, I don't have the love of my life by my side. So I do nothing short of just plain nothing, but I still want to believe that my life is better than ordinary.

After a few years of soul searching, I have experienced many emotions and am still learning everyday. The journey took me to extremes - first, the gut wrenching decision to leave the life I knew because it just wasn't were I needed to be; then the heartache of leaving my best friend in search of myself knowing it'd break his heart; then that journey - the isolation and despair that comes with it; and ultimately the strength that comes with identifying the real you, and feeling like its time to make a difference.

All the while feeling hollow and empty and searching for that thing, that deep desire that burns at the very core of your soul, and feeling like you're failing if you can't find it. So I travelled many dark, lonely roads, and I've been down the Vegas strip of happy times, but at the end of the day I believe the thing that will complete me is love. I love to love, I love loving people, but I've never felt truly loved in return. I don't know yet whether its because I haven't found someone who loves me, or I just can't accept love when it is right in front of me. I don't read the signs, and I never quite trust that someone would actually want to love me.

But maybe I never let it in because I am still looking for the fairytale? I want a story to tell - I want the love of my life to just sweep me off my feet and show me a love I've never seen.

That amazing feeling of waking up next to them and smiling just knowing they're holding your heart safely, the amazing feeling of knowing that everyday will offer more amazing opportunities to grow into an amazing human being by his side, and then passes on that exceptional life to your offspring. Where is he? I know he's out there. Do I already know him? I don't know.

My biggest problem is I won't look. I know the journey of 1000 steps starts with just one, but I'm scared to start the journey in case I don't succeed. I don't want to walk 1000 steps and die alone risking that I might have taken step number 747 in the wrong direction and missed his passing. So I find it safer to sit back and hope that one day, right in the middle of my ordinary life, love will give me that fairytale.

Of course I love you. Now get me a beer.

Does being in love with someone mean you give up who you are and become a slave to their needs. Apparently so. As human beings we go out of our way to please everyone else, at the same time as constantly seeking that reinforcement that we are still loved.

It seems to me that we use that people pleasing skill too excess, and it looks like a desperate attempt to convince the person that we love that they need us. They couldn't possibly live without us, because look! We do everything for you.

Well I say bollocks to that. Not to say I won't do anything for the person I love - hell I'd take a bullet for them, but doing it to keep their love? Well no, that just ain't my style. I want someone to love me because I enrich their lives, I stimulate them to achieve all that they are capable of, and I'll be there to brush off the dirt and help them back up when they fall. And I'd like to receive the same in return.

Why can't we see the signs that the person we are right next to is sending us. Are we sometimes way too close to see the smoke signals? Does it take that blatant proclamation of love to let them know how we feel? Why aren't we brave enough to just tell all? Why keep our cards close to our chest? Expose it, let it be heard, and deal with the after effects. Get your own beer. If they don't feel the same as you do, you've just saved yourself the pain in the ass of trying to prove to them that they need you, rather than just being in the now and enjoying the time you spend with them.

Women are so needy these days - they call, they hang on, they cry when he's out of sight. They worry that he's with someone else. So when he's there, what do we do? We pander, we try too damned hard to be exactly what he needs. Why not be yourself - you might be surprised that is exactly what he needs. Stop asking him if he loves you and just believe that he does. Stop hanging your hopes on a fairy tale ending, and start living in the now. Enjoy every day that you have with the one you love and send them off safely into the world whenever he needs to be set free. Get him a beer, but for god's sakes, stop asking if he needs you and start learning to read the signs. Sometimes they in neon lights. You've just got your blinkers on.

Love him, let him love you, but make sure you both keep enough independence that you don't need to ask, you just know. Oh yeah, and don't get shitty at him for going on a bender with his mates - he's a bloke for god's sake. Live and let live.

Do you love someone because you need them, or do you need them because you love them?

In today's society, those of us who are single are either so desperately so needy for love, or so desperately prepared to be so damn independent so that we don't want or need another individual in our lives.

I'm guilty of the latter. I have built my safe place, my own kingdom with my rules and my possessions and my ideals and values. I can go wherever I want, whenever I want without "checking in" or asking permission. I can see who I want, what I want. I swing to my own beat and I don't need anything from anyone. And this day and age, let's face it, if I need something I can get it anywhere, as long as I keep my friends close or I'm willing to pay for it. I have shut out the idea of love because, right now, I have everything I need.

The beauty of not needing anything from another person is that, when you do need them in your life, it is solely because you love them. You love them for who they are, for what they bring to the table and what they dream about. It's not about what they can provide or what possessions they bring to the table. It is a deep, unforgiving love that can only be delivered when two souls touch so intimately that they appreciate that they don't need to take anything from the other, except love. And there's no doubt about it, we are all so full of love.

I fear that generations gone by, and also the younger generation, are guilty of loving someone because they need them. Friends at 15, lovers by 16, pregnant by 17 and married by 18, our grandparents generation has never known a life without their lover, their life partner. Over time they've grown and changed, but always together, as one. They have no individual identity, and don't know how to live without that dependancy on the love of their life. But it's only one life, and is it a good one if the person in your life is there because you need them? You love them, but not for the same reasons as when you first met. Not for the passion, or the excitement - it is now just because you need them. They complete you. Your ying, their yang. Your sense of balance is off if they are not around, because they are your air. It's a beautiful kind of love, but it is one based on a need; not on a spiritual connection of two souls that are just right for each and don't need any validation of their own lives.

That love is pure. It is unasking and it is unforgiving. When you break the heart of someone who needs you because they love you, you destroy their whole world. The very foundations they have built their life on are shattered, because the one thing they did need from you was love. And when love is gone, what else is there? When you don't need another person to complete your soul, you need them to complete your world. Sure, you still have a good job, an income, nice stuff and a car. You go on holidays and party with your friends. But your world is incomplete because the one thing you found in that one person to make your world complete, is gone.

Some people won't wait for the person they love and instead love someone because they need self validation. They need to know they are wanted at all costs. They settle. They settle for love that is based on an unhealthy need that is so rampant today. We are forced to believe we are not pretty enough; not thin enough; not career motivated enough; not home motivated enough; not healthy enough; not attractive enough to ever be the person that someone needs because they love them. Instead, we seek out a person that gives us the validation we need to know we are ok. We embrace that person because it feels good to be wanted. And then because we need that validation so much, we settle into believing we love them. Love based on need. My grandparents, now that's love. Flawed and unable to be reproduced but its still love. Love based on need.

When I love again I will need that person because I love them. I want for nothing in my life, but direction and happiness. I have a soul that is void of that consumer-driven desire for a better model, a newer version, a bigger TV! In its place I have loving and an inane desire to give back. So when I love, I will love. Love with everything I have. And I'll need them because I love them. The only thing I'll ever need after that is their love. Their love for me, that I would hope would be as great as mine. What a refreshing thought it is to believe that someone could love you for who you are, and that they could need you to love them, and they'd love you right back any time you need.

To Find Yourself, Think For Yourself

I've been searching for awhile now. Searching for a meaning, a purpose, a definition. Searching for acceptance, love and approval.

I'm not certain that I have found any of those things. Its been a dark, and often misleading trail, but I have reached the edge of the dark forest and I can now embrace the light that surrounds me.

I am at peace. I know who I am. I have found my identity, I have located my strengths and I have identified my weaknesses. I think my weaknesses are what makes me strong.

An overwhelming desire to be loved and accepted, and approved of. Sometimes so much so that I constantly seek confirmation from those around me that I'm ok. That I'm accepted. That I'm good enough. That can be exhausting for the people in my life. I don't know that I'll ever overcome that feeling. Somethings are hard wired and you just have to accept they are part of your makeup. I will always hold deep feelings of abandonment, no matter how well adjusted I am or well I cope with my reality, the truth is that deep down somewhere very, very deep in my core, I don't feel like I could ever accept being loved. Because by accepting it, I leave myself open to being left again. I love so unconditionally, but I can never find the strength inside of myself to believe that anyone could love me the way that I'd love them back. For this reason I give myself so much more than I can physically or emotionally afford to, but its purely hedonistic. I feel that if I give enough of myself everyone there will no reason not to love me back.

My strengths, well they are many. I am strong. I am independent, and I have started to think for myself, and in that thinking I have the person who I am. I don't like some elements of that discovery, but try as I may, they are the things that make me who I am and they are there whether I like it or not.

I'm not an attractive person. I am certainly lacking aesthetically, but I have a big heart and its full of love and warmth. I am not a selfish person, and I will let someone drain the very life from my soul in an attempt to let them try to love me.

Now that I have discovered who I am, the time is right to let others find out too. And who knows, that might just be the time to open that door ever so slowly and give someone a damn good chance at loving me the way I deserve to be loved.

For the first time in my life I am thinking clearly. I am thinking about today. I am planning for tomorrow but not with the same focus I had when I was in the shadows. I am taking each day as it comes and embracing the fact that I can enjoy it. My thoughts used to be preoccupied with who will love me now. I am damaged. I am scared. But now, my thoughts are that today I am alive. And that is a good day. By taking control of my thoughts and thinking for myself, not thinking about what everyone thinks of me, I have found myself. And I like me.

Yatesy

Inside the Male Mind:

Bait him with your body, and keep him with your brain.

Dress sexy, and stylishly. Wear something to accentuate your best body parts. Stand straight, make sure your bum looks good, lift your boobs. Trick is to tease - highlight the bustiness but don't make it overwhelming. My advice would be jeans and a black singlet. Hair down, tousled just out of bed look. Don't overdo the makeup. Just moisturiser and mascara.

Tell yourself you look a million dollars and everyone around you will think you look it.

Now how to reel him in:

• Ask him out of the ordinary questions: first car, favourite concerts, sports team, dogs vs cats etc.
  
• Share opinions on various topics rather than asking point blank tell me about yourself questions
• Pay attention to what he's saying to take the focus off yourself. 

Men want sex, so be careful of being too dry - maintain the fun and flirting with the function. Keep him wanting to come back for more.

Have an escape route. If you feel off at all... leave. Stay in a well lit public place, and don't let him walk you to your car unless you feel safe. Make sure you park somewhere in the open.

If you don't hit it off, leave by saying "thanks for meeting with me". Don't say anything about contacting him again.

Remember, he's not out to get married. Keep it fun, carefree, and don't put any pressure on him. Don't talk about previous relationships. 

Having sex on the first date is not a no-no - contrary to popular belief. If you want to - do it. If you don't - don't. If its right - it doesn't matter when you sleep together and there's no mystery lost or any of that romantic notion stuff. Just make sure its on your terms.

Above all else, remember he'll be nervous as hell too. Be honest, be friendly and fun, and just don't expect too much.

Good luck... on behalf of me and lots of advice borrowed heavily from Steve Santagati! :)

Saturn Return: The Twenty-Ninth Year

By Skye Alexander

Many of us approach our thirtieth birthdays with anxiety, even dread. We start looking for gray hairs and paying attention to ads for wrinkle creams. We question whether we are climbing the career ladder quickly enough. We hear the biological clock ticking loudly and worry that soon we will be too old to bear children.

Astrologers call the period between ages twenty-eight and thirty "Saturn Return." That's because it's the first time the planet Saturn completes its cycle through your birth chart and returns to the spot it occupied when you were born. Internationally respected astrologer Rob Hand calls Saturn Return "one of the most important times in your life. . . a time of endings and new beginnings."

For most of us, ending a phase of life that is familiar and embarking on one that is new and untried is unsettling, even painful. Few people describe Saturn Return as a pleasant period. While undergoing your Saturn Return you may find yourself turning inward and reflecting on your individual destiny. You examine your true needs and desires and the role you want to play on the world's stage. You may feel lonely and alienated from those around you, while family and friends think you are shutting them out. But this is a necessary period of consolidation, when you must retreat from the distractions of the outer world and focus on yourself at your most fundamental level. The Saturn Return is every individual's search for the Holy Grail.

Coming of Age

The first Saturn Return marks the end of youth and the beginning of the productive adult years. It is now that you truly become an adult--not at eighteen or twenty-one. You realize your need to define yourself as an individual within society and to demonstrate what you've learned. Newswoman Jane Pauley described turning thirty as having grown into womanhood. German film director Werner Herzog compared this period in his life with a maiden's loss of virginity, a line drawn across his path marking the end of his youth.

This transition into adulthood is often accompanied by a sense of urgency, a feeling that you must try to accomplish everything you've ever wanted or planned to do now. Goals start to come sharply into focus. If you have not settled into a definite career, or have been pursuing one that is inappropriate for you, you'll experience a strong push to establish yourself in a more fulfilling occupation. Sometimes this means a complete change. During his first Saturn Return Vincent Van Gogh decided to be a painter rather than a minister. More frequently it means a new direction or specialization within your chosen field.

If you have been building steadily toward a goal that's right for you, Saturn Return can be a time of achievement and rewards. Your labors bear fruit. Runner Bill Rodgers' Saturn Return marked the first of three consecutive Boston Marathon wins. William Faulkner published his first novel at age twenty-nine.

According to California astrologer Stephen Arroyo, author of Astrology, Karma and Transformation, "The quality of the entire experience and the extent to which it is felt to be a 'difficult' time depends entirely on how one has lived during the previous twenty-nine years." If you have been pursuing an unsuitable vocation or merely fulfilling someone else's expectations, Saturn can be relentless in prodding you to make adjustments.

Revising Worn Out Patterns

Saturn strips away illusions and points out limitations, allowing you to view yourself in a harsh, often unflattering light. At the same time, it endows you with prudence, practicality, and the perseverance to work hard toward achieving your purposes. Consequently, this is a good time to rearrange your career or lay the foundation for a new one.

Saturn Return almost always requires some major adjustments in lifestyle, attitudes, and relationships. Anything you have outgrown, or have tolerated but not found satisfying, must end now or be altered to meet your emerging needs. According to Hand, "Consciously or unconsciously, you are pruning your life of everything that is not relevant to what you really are as a human being."

Often interpersonal relationships are deeply affected by Saturn Return. Gail Sheehy writes in Passages: Predictable Crises in Adult Life that during this period "Almost everyone who is married will question that commitment." The U.S. Census Bureau lists the peak divorce years as ages twenty-eight to thirty. Some people experience more subtle or private adjustments in their patterns of relating, such as shifts in responsibilities. Many couples decide to become parents, not only altering their relationships but their financial obligations and perhaps their vocations as well.

If a relationship is sound, based on mutual respect, honesty, and sharing, it will probably survive the test of Saturn Return and become even stronger. But a relationship begun before the partners knew what they really wanted is likely to fall apart. Relationships that start during this period may have a "fated" or "karmic" quality about them.

When Enough is Enough

"Saturn. . . is never easy to deal with because his function is that of promoting growth," explains astrologer Liz Greene, author of Saturn: A New Look at an Old Devil, "and it is only frustration and pain which at present are sufficient goads to get a human being moving." This frustration and pain have given Saturn a bad reputation. But the planet's often misunderstood value lies in its very ability to evoke pain. Like the pain of an illness, it warns that something is wrong. Saturn doesn't create the problems, it merely illuminates them.

Growth is often accompanied by trepidation and turmoil. As the old self is pushed aside to make room for the new, you may feel weak and vulnerable. You want to move ahead, yet are frustrated by a fear of doing so, torn between a compelling urge to throw off everything connected with your past and an equally frantic need to cling to the familiar rather than brave the great unknown.

Even if your external world seems to be in order, your internal structure may feel as though it's being assaulted with a battering ram. Nervous conditions, irritability, depression, insomnia, and feelings of insecurity are common. Most people go through some sort of identity crisis.

Even though your Saturn Return may be disturbing, ultimately it reveals what you truly want and sweeps away the clutter that may have been impeding your progress. Your Saturn Return is a personal spring cleaning. No matter how difficult it seems to let go of inappropriate people and things, the first Saturn Return is the time to do it. For if lessons are not learned, the problems will come knocking again during your second Saturn Return at about age fifty-eight, when you are more set in your ways. Once the conflict is confronted, the tension usually subsides. You feel stronger and more capable of moving ahead.

Saturn Return is one of the most crucial turning points you ever experience, when you assume the greatest responsibility of all: responsibility for your own life.

Bailamos

I find it heartbreaking that no matter how accomplished women may be, we often continue to see ourselves in the diminished distortion of another's view of us.
I'm ready to stop seeing myself as everyone else sees me and start portraying the real me - make them see and appreciate the person I am, and feel that I am doing all I can do to be the best I can be. Remind me of this the day I say I'm not good enough for someone, or I change my plans to suit someone else because they make me feel my life plan is not as important as theirs.
I know it will happen again - it always does - but that day when someone finally swings my way; that's when I'll know I'm dancing to the right beat.

Tonight I danced. I felt it. I wanted to be there and I was there. I had quiet in my mind. I heard nothing, thought nothing, just felt. There is nothing more liberating than freeing your mind from the clutter and noise and just being, just doing, just experiencing.  

I felt my mind and body connect for the first time in a long time. I recommend it! Feel, sense, experience, live!