In my nearly 20 years of working with clients, I have heard a consistent handful of beliefs that women hold as to why they can’t find a new partner.
These beliefs impede their growth (personally and relationally) because they give them more weight than they deserve. How do I know this? Because when you slow down for long enough to analyze the beliefs, they don’t hold up. And because when I help women overcome these specific beliefs, they then become willing to do the actual work of finding the most highly aligned relationship of their lives (and they do, time and time again).
So today, I’m going to dismantle five of the more common beliefs I hear from the women I work with, and then give you helpful reframes that will bring you better results.
Without further ado, here we go.
5 Limiting Beliefs That Keep Amazing Women Single
1. “I’m too old” / “I’m not attractive enough anymore”
Most of the women I work with are over 40. I’ve helped countless women find love in their 50’s, 60’s, 70’s, and beyond.
So it is understandable, in a culture that is so prone to praying at the altar of youth and beauty, that age would be a common reason as to why a woman would think she has aged out of the dating pool.
But here’s the thing…
You’re not optimizing for universal male approval. You’re looking for one amazing man.
And chances are you’re evaluating yourself through a much narrower lens than he is.
Many women (downstream of billions of dollars in advertising) think that the main thing that men are looking for is youth and beauty. Beyond that, things that still ultimately show youth and beauty (skin, wrinkles, hair, etc.).
But in reality, two things are at play.
The first is that if a specific man doesn’t perceive you as an option because he wants someone who is decades younger than him, great! He has saved you time by opting out of your potential pool of dating options. He isn’t buying what you’re uniquely selling. The end.
And the second, again, is that men actually perceive you through a much more nuanced, generous, loving lens than the one you think he’s perceiving you through.
Your inner critic/society-mind might look at you through the filter of skin, wrinkles, hair, etc. (i.e. “I’m not matching up to magazine beauty standards and I couldn’t possibly compete with what men supposedly want”)… whereas he’s far more likely to be perceiving you through a lens of warmth, voice, movement, scent, style, eyes, playfulness, kindness, presence, heart, and depth.
Ultimately, you can believe the magazine ads if you want to. But that narrow lens of what makes women radiant and captivating simply doesn’t hold up to what I hear men say on a regular basis in my practice.
2. “There aren’t any good men left”
This one I hear the least often with the type of women I work with, but a version of it still comes up ever. So I will address it.
First off, it’s a mathematically impossible statement. I have yet to meet a woman who has met all 4 billion men on the planet across all demographics and thoroughly examined whether or not they were marriage material.
And second, how would you feel if the man you’re looking for was thinking the same thing? What if he were telling himself, “There’s no high quality women out there who have their lives together and who are honestly ready for a real, warm, loving relationship… so why even bother?”
If there’s even a shred of hope still flickering in your heart, some part of you likely would want to reach into that man’s soul and say, “Hey! Don’t you dare give up. I’m right here and I’m looking for you and we just have to find each other and then we’ll both be the happiest we’ve ever been.”
Well, guess what? He would say that exact thing to you.
I intellectually understand why someone would want to tell themselves that there aren’t many good left. It’s because they would then be off the hook for having to go meet them. It’s ultimately just a way to avoid responsibility. If they don’t exist, then I don’t have to do anything to go meet them because they aren’t out there to be found to begin with.
But they are.
I know, because I speak with them all the time.
I have met countless men and women through my work from the ages of 40-85 who are all phenomenal, big-hearted people who want nothing more than to give and receive love with another amazing person.
So yes, they absolutely exist. And they want to meet you just as badly as you want to meet them.
3. “My last relationship hurt me so much… I can’t risk opening up to someone like that again”
I have compassion for how much life can sting. Difficult things happened, and those things were real.
And… that doesn’t give us an excuse to live in a glass box for the rest of our days.
Besides, you’ll be beginning your next relationship from a completely different place.
The ‘you’ that you were when you first started the relationship that hurt you had so much to learn, and you’ve since learned it. You’ve become more discerning. More self-aware. More in touch with various needs and aspects of yourself.
You’ve never been a more integrated and self-aware version of yourself as you are today.
So just imagine what kind of relationship this version of you is capable of attracting.
The past only equals the future if we decide to not grow from it at all. The fact that you’re reading these words tells me that you chose to grow from it.
So long as you are perpetually on a path of growth and self-reflection, you will inevitably enter into increasingly healthy, supportive, nourishing relationships going forward.
4. “I’ve already tried everything”
After a number of years of feeling like we’re putting ourselves out there, it can feel like we’ve been there and done that.
But putting forth any form of effort repeatedly isn’t the same thing as seeing the unique blind spot that is producing dissatisfying results and reversing the trend.
This would be like someone feeling like they’ve tried everything to lose weight (because they’ve tried walking more, drinking more water, working on stress, etc.), but not actually doing the things that help their body/their unique physiology feel safe enough to release the weight they no longer need to carry.
If there’s anything I’ve learned from working with thousands of women, it’s that calibration and nuance are absolutely critical.
What one woman needs to focus on can be a harmful strategy for another to use, and vice versa.
No two women are alike, and so the things that each woman needs to integrate or implement are different based on who they are as individuals.
5. “Maybe I should just be grateful for the life that I have”
Another common belief that women in the second half of their lives can cling to (generally, after a few years of not being able to find a suitable man from their own force-of-will efforts) is, “Maybe I should just be grateful for all that I have.”
But here’s the thing…
Gratitude for a beautiful and fulfilling life and experiencing an extraordinary love are not mutually exclusive.
You can acknowledge that your life is amazing, and still want the most beautiful relationship you’ve ever experienced.
We can all feel grateful for the abundant blessings that we already have, and still want more for ourselves in certain aspects of our life. That doesn’t make us ungrateful or bad in any way.
I believe that it honors God and life more fully when we intentionally lean into our growth edges and get all that we can from our lives.
In fact, just recently I had a client come to me and tell me that she deeply wanted “to be loved and chosen by an extraordinary man”, and it hurt that she didn’t have that yet. In our first session she said that hiring me required admitting that she wanted more than she had. She is already making huge strides of progress and I bet she’ll easily find her man within the next three months.
So remember, you can be grateful for all that you have in your life, and also want a beautiful relationship for yourself.
Life is a constant game of growth and integration. If we don’t yet have one thing we desire, it just means we need to take some different steps to get that outcome.
If you want any personalized support in finding the healthiest and most nourishing relationship of your life, I would love to help.
Dedicated to your success,
Jordan
Ps. If you enjoyed this article, I think you’ll also love checking out the following:
– 7 Hidden Costs Of Being Single
– How To Meet Your Husband In 30 Days
– 8 Reasons You Won’t Attract A Conscious Man (As You Currently Are)
– 6 Ways To Meet Someone Without Online Dating
– Everyone Asks The Wrong Questions When It Comes To Finding The Right Partner
