Unwritten Rules of Relationships

I’m sure many woman have been out on dates they thought went really well, only to never get a call back for a second date.

You figure if you had a good time and want a second date, then he certainly must. WRONG!

Here are 8 things you can do to pretty much ensure a second date.

1. Smile when you greet him. Nothing beats a welcoming smile. Too often we greet our dates with a look of shear anger, which gives them the perception that we are either uninterested or not really happy about going on the date.

2. Talk like you have some sense and not like a baracuda from the gutter. Believe it or not, men do like intelligent women who speak proper english.

3. Dress appropriately. Try your best to dress with sense, style and class. If you’re over 30, please don’t wear something my teenage daughter would wear. If you’re fat and out of shape, remember the rule, just because it stretches that doesn’t mean it’s for you. And for God sakes don’t dress like a Friday night whore.

4. Don’t dominate the conversion. You may be a wonderful person, but remember the world doesn’t revolve around you.

5. Ask him questions and take interest in what he says. Often times, women don’t ask men questions and therefore learn absolutely nothing about who they’re on a date with.

6. Don’t ask him how much money he makes…. PERIOD!

7. Don’t be a maneater and grill him on if and when he wants to get married, if he wants kid and when he wants them, etc, etc.

8. THANK HIM for the lovely date. A little appreciation goes a long way…..

1. You find yourself holding her purse.

2. She tells you what to wear.

3. She buys clothes that aren’t your style & you wear them to make her happy.

4. You lie to your boys to hang out with her instead.

5. You get a pedicure, manicure, or your eyebrows waxed.

6. You go to the store to buy tampons.

7. She talks sh!t about your family & you let her.

8. She made you watch “The Notebook”.

9. You have to tell her everywhere you go.

10. She makes you turn off sports & watch reality T.V.

Adapted from – http://www.time2man-up.com/?p=147

Have you heard that song by Melanie Fiona, “It Kills Me”? I LOVE that song, but as I listened to the lyrics of this song; I quickly realized this should not be any woman’s theme song (no offense Melanie).  Like I said, I love this song; Melanie has a great voice – I mean the sista can blow, the track is hot and the harmonies are solid. However, don’t be so quick to make it your theme song for 2010. Have you checked the lyrics??

Let me recap:

1st Verse:

Oh yaahh ive got trouble with my friends
Trouble in my life
Problems when you don’t come home at night
But when you do you always start a fight
But I cant be alone , I need you to come on home
I know you messin around, but who the hell else is gonna hold me down

—Ok, from the jump this isn’t sounding too good. Problem #1 – your man isn’t coming home. Problem #2 – you know he’s messing around, but this is the type of cat you want holding you down; CA-RAY-ZEEEEEE!!!

2nd Verse:

Should I grab his cell, call this chick up
Start some shhhh then hang up
Or I should I be a lady
Oohh maybe cuz I wanna have his babies
Ohh yah yahh cuz I don’t wanna be alone
I dont need to be on my own
But I love this man
But some things I cant stand ohhhh

—Huh, sounds like things are not improving. Let’s see, can you point out the craziest part of this verse? Oh, you caught that too? Yes, he’s a liar and a cheat and YET, you want to have his babies. What kind of new fangled shit is this?!?!?!?!?

Some women have a tendency to hang on to relationships that mean them no good simply because they don’t want to be alone. But, being alone is sometimes necessary; to clear your head, get rid of excess baggage and rediscover who you really are.  Doing this will better equip you for the next relatonship. No man wants a jacked up insecure woman.

You know how y’all are so quick to make a song your theme song for the year, but ladies, this one clearly isn’t it!

Now that we got that out the way, enjoy the video, but remember, if your relationship kills you; you need to kill it!

We are so proud to debut The Truth Uncut. From the start we wanted to do a show and now it’s finally here. We hope you all send us comments because we want to continue to improve the show and make it as engaging as possible and we need your suggestions, critiques, comments, etc.

In this episode we talk about being alone by choice in order to really get yourself together so you can stop dragging around excess baggage. The excess baggage we normally carry from relationship to relationship. If you take time to be alone, work out your issues and take out the trash; you’ll set yourself up for a healthy relationship.

Check out the show and leave us your comments.

I WAS TRYING TO DO THE RIGHT THING – Beware: If you here this phrase, just go ahead and run for the hills. This has got to be one of the most dreaded phrases someone can utter.  The sad truth is just about everyone at one point in there life has said it to someone.  We all know what this phrase means.  It means I lied and that’s the truth!

How many times have you gone out with someone just because they were nice and you didn’t want to hurt their feelings?  How many of you have gotten married out of obligation instead of for love. Maybe you’ve been dating someone for 10 years and you figure, hell, I might as well get married [it's the right thing to do-right?].  Maybe you get pregnant and marry the guy solely because you’re trying to do the right thing. Maybe you’ve been dating a woman who has put up with your crap for years. I mean she was there for you when you had the car accident, you got locked up or whatever crazy thing that happened in your life; she was there for you every step of the way. You may really care for her, but deep down inside, you know she is not the woman who truly makes you happy, BUT  what do you do; you marry her anyway because she has been there for you and you feel obligated to do the right thing!

If you think doing the right thing is the best solution, ask yourself a question. What if YOU are the person being lied too? You may be in a relationship or marriage where you may love your significant other with every breath in your body, but can’t ever get that bond to grow deeper.  You may spend days, weeks, or even months trying to figure out what the problem is, where the disconnection is coming from. Then after all the talks, arguments, fights and mental frustrations, your partner finally tells the truth. It’s not that they don’t care about you  but they were just trying to do the right thing! Checkmate!!

I know, I know, it always seems easier to deal with the lie rather than be honest with the other person about how you truly feel about the situation. Know that whenever you enter into a relationship like this, it is almost always guaranteed to fail! So remember, doing the right thing isn’t always doing the right thing!!

In my adult life I’ve had my share of dating experiences, but none compare to the time I dated a mama’s boys. Let’s just say, this was not the best relationship in my dating book. To preface this post, I think it’s important I express how much I admire men who respect and love their mothers; I think it’s a great character trait for a man to genuinely love, respect and admire his mother. However, this does not mean that man should be so attached to his mother he is unable to maintain a healthy relationship with a woman.

Some women may not really know what it’s like to date a mama’s boy, so allow me to share my experience with you. I’ll give you a snippet of a specific occurrence that ultimately led me to ending the relationship.

The Scenario:
We were on a date spending some much needed quality time together. We had opposite working schedules and this was one of those rare times when we were both off and were able to actually spend the entire day together. Well, in the middle of our date his mother calls. Let me set the scene. We’re in the car heading to this restaurant we’d both been dying to try and I’m sitting in the passenger seat listening to him fumble his way through the conversation, unable to tell his mother we’re on a date. I look to him and I whisper, just tell her we’re on a date and you’ll come by tomorrow. He looks at me with intense fear in his eyes as if I’d just told him to cut off his mother’s right arm. He studders as he tells his mom we’re on a date. Well, this was apparently something she did not care about because they went back and forth for about five minutes. Can you all guess what happened next? I bet you can’t. Well, allow me to fill you in on the next set of events. He looks over to me and says his mom really needs him, so let’s just head over there and then we can continue with our date (o course in my mind the date was officially over and I am now officially pissed). Yes, he really said that. To end this particular scenario, let me just tell you what was so pressing that he had to interrupt our date. [wait for it] his mother could not get her new DVD connected to her television and needed him to hook it up for her (can we say super ridiculous and super needy).  This was the super important thing she needed help with; the thing he could not say no to. I swear I couldn’t make this stuff up if i tried. I wish this scenario was just a fabrication, but sadly, it is not.

This was the last straw for me. At this point I realized I absolutely could not deal with being in a relationship with a mama’s boy. I couldn’t imagine being married [till death do us part] dealing with playing second fiddle to my mother-in-law. It was something that made my stomach ache and I needed to end this relationship and that’s exactly what I did. From that point on I looked for signs of men being mama’s boys because I knew that was a deal breaker for me.

Questions to my female readers:

Have you ever dated a mama’s boy? If so, what was your experience like? Does it bother you dating a mama’s boy?

Are you married to a mama’s boy; how’s that working out for you?

Let us know. We so value and appreciate your thoughts and comments.

This is a topic that came up when Naomi and I were having one of our many conversations about love, life ,dating and sex.  The question is simple. When did you start having great sex?  Not just slam bam, thank you ma’am plain sex.  I am talking about the type of toe curling sex when you are confident in your body and you really know how to please your partner to a point where you both leave feeling great!  You know, the time when you noticed sex changed and you really knew what you were doing as a grown man/woman.

All of us would love to believe we were born as these great sexual dynamos, but the truth is most of us; damn near all of us, really have no clue as to what sex is all about when we actually first start having it.  Most of start having sex in the teenage years.  In my day, we started having sex during our late teen years. Today that may be a tad off considering how young kids are having sex now. Who knows when it starts. Seems like these kids are starting as early as age 10!  [Anyway, that's another topic for another day.]

As teenagers, we think we know what we’re doing, but we don’t have a clue.  Back in the day, sex was like a roller coaster ride.  You were just happy and excited to be on the ride, but before you knew it, it was over and you didn’t know what happened.  Very few teenagers are connected to themselves enough to truly have great earth shattering sex! Most of the time, teenagers are just recreating something in their heads or something they’ve seen in a video, movie or porno.  Its not too much different once we become young adults, college student or of “legal” age (18 – 24/25 ) .  These are the years when you have a lot of sex that doesn’t seem to really have a purpose to it.

During these young adult years,  guys definitely tend to subscribe to the motto “quantity not quality”.  Guys are trying to get their hands on as many girls as they can handle.  For ladies, they seem to go through what we call “the freedom years”.  Many girls are getting away from their parents for the first time and they start experimenting more with sex.  However, after speaking to many women about this, it seems young girls don’t go after sex with the same reckless abandonment as men do during these years.  Guys have sex on the brain 24 hours a day 7 days a week; not Love but SEX!!  Woman on the other hand are dating, but are still leaning towards marriage and family.

This brings us to the late 20’s early 30’s.  Many people said this is when they really started to find themselves sexually.  More women have said they really started to know their bodies and understand what they want and how they like it.  However, it seems to me in the late 20’s and early 30’s you really become an adult.  And in being an adult, life and more importantly, love changes.

Great sex happens when love is present.  No matter how much people want to deny it.  The greatest sex comes from the people you have feelings for and care about.  Let’s be honest. Is that one night fling really better than the sex between you and someone you truly love and care about? It’s very interesting how everyone seems to have that one person that “opened” them up sexually and that is when sex changed.  Maybe it was that woman/man you connected with and brought out the “freak” in you.  The key to becoming a great lover is letting yourself go.  The more you let go and really be in the moment with your partner, the better the sex will be. Your special friend/lover is that person who was able to bring feelings and emotions from you that you never thought you had.  Most importantly, you trusted that person enough emotionally to let go and really experience GREAT SEX!!!

So, when did you start having great sex?

How did sex change for you as an adult?

Since we have just come out of one of the most historic elections in US history with everyone from Joe “the plumber” to Jay-Z showing a new found interest in politics. It seems everyone has a strong opinion on one issue or another nowadays.  The issues range from the Wall Street bailout, gay marriage, illegal immigration, General Motors and yes, torture. It seems like everyone has something they feel strongly about, but do your political views go overboard and shrink your dating options?  Are you only going to date democrats?  How about only dating a “real” conservative republican?  I always thought in “dating”,  people were a little more open to find out about the person beyond the politics first before making a decision.  Yeah right! More and more I’m seeing people  not being as open minded about dating as you think.

I was speaking a group of friends and one of them has very strong views that lean heavily toward the republican side of the isle. So much so that if they are on a date and they find out during the course of conversation they differ strongly politically, they end the date immediately (I’m talking in the middle of salad at dinner immediately!) and go home.  I thought that was way too extreme, but as the group talked it seemed that people who are very political definitely factor that into their unwritten dating rules.  So the unwritten rule for today is:

Unwritten Rule: Politics can play politricks in dating! so be careful!

Questions to YOU:

Have you met someone you were “feeling”, but was turned off by their political views?

How important are politics to your relationships?

Thanks for those who commenting on What is Full Disclosure in Dating? Part-1. (Not too late to put in your two cents)…

From the comments many believe in full disclosure and believe it is an essential part of any and every relationship. Let’s dig a little deeper on this topic of full disclosure. I believe full disclosure also requires you to be honest with yourself.  Huh, now what do I mean by that? Well, let me tell you.  Let’s say you know you don’t want to date someone who is a workaholic. Oh, I guess I should have prefaced this with the fact that in order to be honest with yourself, you should have some kind of idea of what you want out of a relationship (that always helps).

So, you meet someone and you hit it off, but you realize or they tell you they’re a workaholic. First, there’s nothing wrong with being a workaholic, but if you are someone who needs a lot of time with your companion, then obviously dating or marrying a workaholic is going to create problems.  Here’s my question;  you KNOW you don’t want to date a workaholic, so do you all of a sudden change your mind and decide dating a workaholic is now ok? If you do change your mind; is it because you are hoping the other person will stop being a workaholic? Are you secretly hoping they’ll work less if you love them enough? Are you accepting anything for the sake of not being alone? What is the motivation behind this “change of heart”?

This is where the fine line of being honest or fooling yourself comes in. Why do we start relationships with people whom possess things, ways or habits we do not particularly like? Why do we think people will change those things once in a relationship with us? This is such a common mistake we all have made at one time or another, but many continue to make it. The whole point of full disclosure is to give both parties the opportunity to really know and understand what the other wants and to give both parties the chance to make the decision on whether or not they should move forward. If more people did that; there would no doubt be less divorce.

What are your thoughts on this? What have your experiences been?

You will often hear me talk about full disclosure when dating. I feel it is an essential part of this whole dating game. What is full disclosure you ask? I’ll explain – it’s simple. It is the act of telling the person you’re dating what your intentions are and what you want. Why is this important you ask? For starters, no one is getting younger by the day and I personally hate having my time wasted and hate wasting the time of others. Let’s use an example:

WOMEN:
If you KNOW you are on a mission to find a husband and you are NOT into casual dating and do NOT want a booty call type relationship, then YOU SHOULD SAY THAT. It’s something I like to call being honest and there’s nothing wrong with it. Being honest can save you some time and weed out those men who don’t share your same wants and desires.

MEN:
If you KNOW you are only interested in casual dating (going out every now and then; nothing serious), then you should say that. Again, nothing wrong with being honest. It might actually spare you of some woman being to clingy because she THINKS you MIGHT want a relationship with her.

I believe dating is the time when people should actually talk about who they are and what they want. Too often, we skip the talking and get into something we never should have entered in the first place. Now wonder why the divorce rates are so high.

Do you believe in full disclosure or do you think withholding the truth is the best way to go? Share your thoughts with us. This is just part 1 in the discussion of full disclosure. There is more to come. So, join the conversation…