Tip #1: Know Thyself, to Thine Own Self Be True

How many times have you met a person who really wanted a boyfriend but didn't even have a clear idea of who she was? This is the first tip I'm writing about because it's the most important. Before you can begin your quest to find someone, you need to know who you are, what you need, what you like. You need to know why you are worth dating. Until you know those things, I can't really see any of your dating attempts being successful.

So, practical application: how well do you know yourself? Who are you, really? Take a few moments and think about this. If you can, write down your thoughts. These ideas will lead up to the big question: why would someone want to date you?

For some of us, figuring that part out is easy, but for others it's hard. Just quickly I'd like to mention the findings of a study I read the other day--that while men always think they're several times hotter than they are, women usually don't think they're as beautiful as they actually are. Especially if you're a woman, please remember that a lot of your virtues are ones you probably don't even take into account.

Another good exercise here is to ask several of your trusted associates to write down some of the good things about you. These lists are things you should constantly remind yourself of. At the end of the day, how can anyone else love you, if you can't even love yourself?

The quest here is to know who you are, because knowing who you are is the only way to figure out how to love yourself. And loving yourself is the first step in finding someone else to love and to love you.

STORYTIME WITH ALLIE

I felt like maybe tips deserve some sort of illustration to match, so I've decided to add in stories from my own life. So here is a story for you.

I think all of us have an innate loneliness, a desire to be heard and understood by someone else. Ever since I was in middle school I felt that way, but never could find anyone. It was pretty sucky, now that I think about it. At the end of high school I started dating my first boyfriend, who was madly in love with me but totally wrong for me. I was so swept up in it, though, because no one had felt that way about me before, that I couldn't bring myself to end it.

In other words, because I didn't have the faith in myself to believe that I was good enough for someone else to find, I couldn't end the bad relationship. I didn't know myself well enough to know that I needed someone better than that, and so I just settled. It was sad and unnecessary, and caused a lot of heartbreak for the two of us, as well as those around us who cared.

The next relationship I found myself entangled in was not much better. I was afraid to speak up with my ideas and opinions, and when I saw things in the guy I didn't like, I didn't feel like I could tell him, because I knew he didn't respect my ideas if they didn't agree with his. And yet, for the longest time I felt like that was all right.

Friends, that is never all right. We all deserve people who are willing to understand us as we are willing to understand them.

We can only find people like that once we accept the truth of the good things we deserve.

So, I urge you all to do what I did: take the StrengthsFinder 2.0 test from Gallup. Read some motivational books. Go through some therapy and work out your issues with yourself. Keep a journal of how you feel, and record your own ideas of how to get through it.

You don't need to be Christian to appreciate the idea in Christian theology that Christ died for us, because He loves us. If you are good enough for a god to die for, you are good enough to have a significant other who loves you, cares about you, and goes out of his or her way to treat you the way you should be treated. And don't you forget it.