As I write this, it’s about a week before Valentine’s Day, and many people are thinking about love right now. Those with partners may be planning something they could do for their special someone to celebrate – maybe take them out for a meal, buy a gift, etc. But those without a partner may be, quite frankly, sick of the whole thing, as Valentine’s Day seems to just be there to rub their noses in the fact that they are single and would rather not be.

Detail from L’Amoureux from the Jean Noblet Tarot de Marseille

It will probably be no surprise to you that quite a large number of people who come to me for tarot card readings want to know about matters of the heart. They may want to know whether they will find love soon, or if the person they are currently with is “The One.” When I do a reading for someone, I’m reading them – I can’t really predict random things from some random place in the universe, or tell you about someone you nor I have ever met. Unless there’s something you can do to influence the situation, I probably can’t help you. What I can do, however, is help put you in a better position to find that person, or help you see whether you’ve found “The One.”

A very good friend of mine recently shared an article about relationships on Facebook, and it prompted a very interesting discussion. Like many people – indeed many people who were involved in that discussion – my friend has become disillusioned with dating, especially online dating, following a disappointing run of bad dates, no-shows, etc. She has decided that she’s “retiring” from that scene. I don’t blame her – in fact, I think that’s the best thing she can do right now. She’s an amazing woman and one day, the right person will realize that.

A couple of comments in the discussion really resonated with me. One woman talked about how she had heard many stories of women who had stopped looking for “The One” and decided to focus on themselves and their own happiness and suddenly found themselves in love. What she said next was really profound, and I use her exact words here (with permission) since I couldn’t put it better myself:

Sometimes, I just think we try too hard to find The One, forgetting that really, WE ourselves are The One.

The reason these words resonated with me was that they completely echoed my own experience. I wasted way too many years “looking for love in all the wrong places.” I spent time in bars, clubs, trying to date women at work, etc., and while I had some dates and even some short relationships, they were not satisfying. When I say “wasted” perhaps that’s a poor choice of word, because I always try to stress that there’s no such thing as a bad experience, it’s just experience and it goes to shape the person you are today.

It was only when I decided to stop the nonsense and concentrate on me that things happened. Almost magically. Once you start working on you, on your personal growth, you pretty much are guaranteed to become a more interesting person. And interesting people are very attractive!

In my case, I was fortunate to stumble upon someone who was in almost exactly the same phase at the same point in life as I was. And this March, we’ll be celebrating 16 years of marriage.