Date with Cents
Date with Cents
The $10K Dating Coach Controversy: Desire, Devotion, and What No One’s Saying
We celebrate women for investing in weddings, houses, businesses, therapy, and fitness coaches…but the minute a woman invests in love on the front end? She's called desperate. This viral story of a woman who paid $10K for a dating coach and got engaged a year later has sparked fierce debate, but the backlash reveals more about us than her.
In this episode, I explain what's really happening beneath the surface—how we shame women who want love out loud, why dating in 2024 requires different skills than our grandmothers needed, and why that "ache" for partnership isn't something to fix or hide.
I'll also share how to honor your desire for love without apology, so you can stop distracting yourself from what you truly want and start creating the relationship you deserve.
If you're ready to learn what devotion to your love life really looks like and start attracting quality men now, book a sales call HERE to speak with me about 1:1 coaching.
Book a sales call to learn more about private 1:1 coaching with me. Book a sales call HERE to speak with me.
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@torahcents
@curved2cuffed
What's up, lover girl, welcome back to the Date With Sitz podcast. Oh, I am so happy to be here. Well, I'm really, really I'm feeling really excited and optimistic and over the moon. I am currently getting ready to go to the DMV, the Washington DC area and I am going to a conference hosted by one of my coaches. You all know, I think I talked about her last year on the podcast. I went to her event last year Emancipation and I'm going back this year. Last year it was life changing, business changing. I'm going back this year. I met so many amazing entrepreneurs at her conference. Last year I got my business together.
Speaker 1:Last year, I made so many changes to who I am as a person, as well as my business, since going, and I've even met clients there, and so what I mean is people who became my clients throughout the year, and so I'm very excited about going again. I know I'm going to learn a lot more. I am, I know I'm well, I'm a different person from from last year. I'm a, I'm a different business owner, I'm a different leader, um, and I'm just I'm so excited to be there and I'm going to see some of my own coaches that I've coached with this year and I am going to see some of my clients, so I'm really excited about that. I'm like, oh, I haven't even packed yet and I'll leave like five in the morning tomorrow. It's like 4 PM now on a Tuesday as I'm recording this. You'll hear this on Thursday.
Speaker 1:But yeah, speaking of coaches, though, I want to talk about something that really hit a nerve for a lot of people and honestly, I get why. Okay, so the past few weeks there was this video going viral. A woman got on TikTok and she shared that she paid $10,000 for a dating coach and now, a year later, she's engaged and she told everybody that she got up there and she let everybody know, and that was her story. And that story didn't seem wild to me at all. I mean, I'm a dating coach. I get it, but the comment sections, the comments, what people were saying, the think pieces, the YouTube videos, the stitches it was wild. People were saying she was desperate. They were saying they would never spend that kind of money for a man. They're saying she's paying for common sense, all these think pieces. I think one person said may this type of love that costs this much never find me. And I've been getting people sending me this video.
Speaker 1:My clients have been asking me to weigh in, so I'm like you know what. Talk about it, tora. Talk about your point of me to weigh in. So I'm like you know what. Talk about it, tora. Talk about your point of view, your perspective, and I just want to let you know that. Number one, I'm not here to defend her, or I'm not here to debate her coach at all. Like I'm not here to defend either of them, I'm not here to debate either of them. I think her coach was Anwar and I think they did what their client coach relationship, that they wanted to do, and I celebrate them for that. I'm here to talk about what this really reveals, though.
Speaker 1:Okay, about how we treat women who want love and why so many of us are actually terrified to really want it out loud, especially us high achieving women of faith who supposedly have everything together, and if we can't be seen like we cannot be seen that we have it all together, okay, let's be honest. We celebrate women for investing in weddings. We celebrate them for investing in houses, for investing in businesses, therapy, fitness coaches, fertility treatments if they're having trouble having kids, right. But the minute that a woman wants to invest in love. On the front end right, it's the front end of all of this it's desperate, right. We're like, yes, $10,000 to have baby, that's great, right. Or $10,000 to tone up for the year, that's amazing. Or $10,000 to start a business, that's fine, that's nothing wrong with that. $10,000 for a wedding, that's cheap, right, that's cheap for a wedding. The average wedding is like 50,000 plus. And women drop 10K on business coaching all the time, on career coaching, all the time on branding photo shoots, all the time on things that help them build the life that they want. But somehow, when it's about love, when it's about emotional fulfillment, suddenly it's a problem, suddenly it's common sense or desperation, and I think we really have to slow down and ask ourselves why. I think we really have to do that in this society, that it's a very masculinized society that really rejects a lot of the desire around women.
Speaker 1:But before I get into that, I've invested hundreds of thousands on business development, on courses, on coaches, on masterminds, you name it. Again, I'm about to go to emancipation. I've spent thousands with several women in that room. I probably last year. How much did I spend last year? I probably spent over 50K last year, you know, getting myself together, and I've also done therapy.
Speaker 1:I've invested in my mind, I've invested in my body. I spent 54K on a life coach on a life coach. So I've invested in my mind, I've invested in my body, I've invested in my purpose and, yes, I've invested in my mind. I've invested in my body, I've invested in my purpose and, yes, I've invested in my heart. Now, not because I was chasing a man. It was because I wanted to live fully, trust myself and stop settling in every single area of my life, and that also includes love. Like my investments support my love life. All of my investments support my love life. I'm investing in business to support my love life. I invest in a life coach to support my love life. I've invested in masterminds all of that therapy to feed, to support love.
Speaker 1:Now here's the thing Therapy taught me how to process my feelings in a way, but not how to communicate them to a man that I just met. Therapy taught me how to recognize patterns, but not how to fall in love without falling into those patterns. Again, it helped me understand my worth, but it didn't show me how to express desire without over functioning or performing to be like. And when I think about business coaching. It taught me how to pitch myself, how to sell, how to market, but not how to pace intimacy or how to build emotional connection and personal development courses that I got taught me how to be confident, taught me how to live by my core values, but not how to say soften, open while also being seen. Okay, I learned how to be very powerful, but that didn't show me how to be pursued without performing.
Speaker 1:And this is the part that people do not talk enough about. Okay, we wildly, wildly underestimate how much skill it takes to meet, alignment and to move into healthy, emotionally available relationships in this current world. It's not just about putting yourself out there. All right, sounds very simple, girl, just put yourself out there. It's about learning how to have meaningful connections, how to pace emotional intimacy, how to recognize red flag, green flags, how to stay grounded in who you are. We're exploring that connection, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But we downplay all of that. We say that's common sense, we say my grandma didn't need all of that, right, like.
Speaker 1:But I want to talk about that for a little bit, because a lot of us are still romanticizing the way our grandmothers or our great grandmothers met their husbands. Right, we'll be like, oh you know, they met at church and they were married 50 years. Okay, they. They met out at the grocery store in the neighborhood grocery store and they were married 50 years. Okay, they met out at the grocery store in the neighborhood grocery store and they were married for 40 years. As if it just happened, as if they were just simply lucky to be in love and fall in love, as if love was a simpler back then. But here's the truth. Love didn't just happen for your grandma. Okay, it was expected. Women didn't have the same freedoms, so they married early. They often chose from a very limited pool of men and they stayed with these men because they had to, right?
Speaker 1:I know some of you guys were like well, not my grandmother. My grandmother was deeply in love with her and I need you to understand something. There are probably some outliers there, but for the most part, that is not the truth. And even now I think I told a story about an older couple who was married like 50 something years and they found out that I was leaving my husband and they were trying to get us back on track and had a call with me, and I've always known these people to be very loving. I've only known them for the past five years, right Out of their 50 years of marriage, and I see them to be very, very loving. But when she got on the phone and told me what they went through, I was like baby hell. If you thought this was going to help me stay, you really lost your damn mind. If you thought I understand, you've been married 50 something years but, man, this is not going to help me stay in my marriage because you telling me all the bullshit y'all went through to get here, it's not worth my peace. I'm not doing it.
Speaker 1:Or you know, we just seen a clip that went viral on the Dear Future Wifey podcast of a couple where the woman was saying she was ironing the clothes for the side chick and she was talking about how he would call her all kinds of names out her mouth. And then I actually looked up the story behind those two. I looked up the story and this man was living with his mistress and the mistress was murdered. The mistress was actually murdered and that's how he ended up going back home. She was murdered in the same house he was. It was crazy. It was. It was crazy when I read the backstory right and he was emotionally abusing her and the reason why he stayed, why he kept coming back home, because he was saying that he didn't want no man coming and feeding his kids. And I'm like now, if anybody asked them about the 30 something years of marriage, and they'd be like, yeah, I was married 30 something years. And on the outside people are like, oh, that's amazing, these people are always getting divorced. You know these zoomers, these millennials, baby, I don't want, I don't want that kind of marriage, I don't want it that bad. Okay, again now.
Speaker 1:I went on this rant about women not having the same freedoms. But this is that's not the goal. That's not the goal to just have a man, all right, and that's what happened with our grandmothers. It's still permeating today. The goal wasn't deep emotional alignment. For our foremothers it was survival, it was stability, it was social approval, probably why a lot of these women are staying in these marriages now and now.
Speaker 1:You are not just looking for a man. You're not In this modern day. We're not looking for survival stability in that way for a man. You're not in this modern day. We're not. We're not looking for survival, stability in that way for a man you, my queen, you, my dear you are looking for a relationship that feels safe, that feels inspiring, that feels passionate, that feels emotionally expansive and spiritually aligned, and I need you to know that that is harder, of course, that is harder than getting just getting a man, just meeting a man, like your grandma did, because you're asking for something that she didn't require. You're asking for something that's never been the standard, and that's the part we forget when we romanticize the past, because the truth is, you think it was so simple, it was better for them.
Speaker 1:It wasn't simple, it was structured. Women didn't have the same rights or options that we do now. They couldn't open a credit card without a man. They needed permission to get a mortgage. They couldn't leave abusive relationships without being ostracized or financially ruined. And yes, of course there are outliers, and some of them actually did love their husbands. I think some of them had Stockholm syndrome and but so many of them. To even love their husbands, they had to have religion telling them to do so. They had to shrink, they had to submit, they had to silence themselves in order to stay in those marriages. And men, especially in those earlier generations, they were entitled to women by default, not because they were amazing partners, but because that's how the system worked. Okay, that's how the system works.
Speaker 1:So now we're in this generation, we're in this decade, we're in 2025. And women have freedom, we have options, we have agency. We don't need a man to survive anymore in that way, now that we're providing for ourselves, now that we have some form of protection for ourselves, now that we can exist without a man's approval I mean literal approval for him to sign off on things. Now we want men who can meet us emotionally, spiritually, energetically and mentally, and that requires a totally different level of skill, self-awareness and clarity than what women in the past needed to prioritize. It's not harder now because dating is harder or because men are worse. It's harder because our standards have changed. We're no longer just looking for stability or a provider or a protector in that way. We're actually looking for a partner, and that is where the disconnect is coming from. So we are still walking around with outdated ideas that say love is supposed to quote, unquote just happen.
Speaker 1:But we're not taught how to create alignment. We're not taught how to navigate the nuance of dating when you do have freedom, when you do have agency when you do have choice. And a lot of women, if we are honest, we're still waiting to be chosen. We're still hoping that the right man is just going to stumble into our lives and just know and just pick us and we don't have to work for it. But the truth is, connection has to be created. Not marriage per se, right? Not a man swooping you up and saying, hey, I talked to your father, you're mine, right? But connection has to be created by you. You don't sit around and create this connection by accident. You co-create it through clarity, through presence and through intention.
Speaker 1:So when someone says when I'm seeing the comments talking about you pay 10K for a dating coach, that should be common sense. I think common sense according to what To who, because knowing how to get a man's attention isn't the same as knowing how to build intimacy. That's why I got women saying Tora, I know how to attract men, I don't need you as a dating coach. I know I'm like, but yeah, I've been watching you for 15 years attracting men and you still don't have what you want. I've been watching you. I've been watching you for 10 years on social media. I've been seeing these things.
Speaker 1:Okay, getting asked out isn't the same as building a relationship that lasts. It's not the same. Right, a lot of us are going out on dates and then we're ending up in relationships. Now here's the thing it doesn't have to last, but we're not. We're not building relationships that lead to more thriving relationships in the future. What we're doing is we're going into relationships and then we end them, and then we don't know how to recreate anything better. That's a problem. Okay, we don't have the skill set for that. We're just like oh, it just happens, and now we're not in a relationship and I don't know how to create something better.
Speaker 1:And avoiding heartbreak doesn't mean that you're creating real connection. And this is for my ladies who are like oh yeah, I'm glad I'm single, I don't have to worry about getting my heart breaking, I don't have to worry about getting cheated on, I don't have to worry about yeah, but you're also not creating real connection, so you're not actually in a better place. You know, and we assume that this should all be intuitive, this should all be common sense, but it's not. It's not common sense based upon all the things that I've just shared with you. It's learnable. And if no one taught you, if your grandma didn't taught you. Your great grandma, your mama didn't teach you, even though they were married for 30, 40, 50 years. Of course it feels confusing. Of course that doesn't make you broken. It just means that there's a gap. There's a gap because our parents didn't tell us the truth about what really happened in their marriage. Our grandparents did not tell us the truth. They were not open, right, they kind of hid it or like hid it behind religion or hid it behind shame, or hid it because it was nobody's business. They didn't talk about what really went on and the skills gap. Hell, even the women back then had a skills gap because they didn't have all this mental health stuff, they didn't have all these personal health stuff, they didn't have all these personal development courses, they didn't have all of these things that have awakened a lot of us up to know that we can become higher versions of ourselves.
Speaker 1:That woman on TikTok she didn't pay 10K for a man. She paid to stop questioning herself. She paid to trust herself more in love. She paid to move with more confidence in her love life, more clarity. She paid to learn what it takes to be pursued without performing, to express her desire without fear and to feel grounded in her choices. She paid for options. She paid for quantum leaps to where she didn't have to waste years and, honestly, not learning those skills is often way more expensive emotionally, mentally and even financially. Right, it costs money to do life alone. Right, it costs money to do life alone. Right, it costs money to do life alone. And, yeah, a lot of women are doing very well for themselves, but a lot of them are paying way more in life I mean including in taxes, right, including just living everyday life where they could be actually saving some of their money to build up their own personal legacy because they have men that are investing financially in them.
Speaker 1:It costs time, years being spent in trial and error trying to figure this out, trying to figure it out. I'm always baffled by people who are like, hey, I've been, it's been 10 years, 10 years of me not doing anything, 10 years of me not making progress, 10 years of me not making progress, 10 years of me just being in back-to-back relationships and I haven't figured it out. Like that's a long time in your life. 10 years you can never live again. Okay, that's expensive.
Speaker 1:I want you to imagine what. Five years, what does a year of your. What is a year of your life worth? Because, for me, if I think about it, if I look at my time, right, hell, let me calculate it now. What do I calculate my time to be? Based upon my business, based upon how I live my life. If we're to see how much I'm using my calculator right now to calculate things, to calculate stuff, all right, all right, all right, I'm calculating it now. One year of my life is about $4 million. It's worth $4 million. I think I'm going to. I think I'm really going to pay 10K because my life, when I calculated how much I think my life is worth, based upon my hourly rate, based upon, like, all the investment that I've already made in myself to improve myself, my life, one year of my life is worth about $4 million. Okay, that's a no-brainer for me, right? It's cost energy.
Speaker 1:Pursuing men who can't give you what you want. That's a huge energy leak of your attention when you could be doing something else, right, but you're leaking energy and it costs confidence. It costs you confidence when you start wondering if love just isn't in the cards for you every single month, every single year, that you are not moving towards the relationship that you want meeting the men that you want your confidence lowers, and some people are okay with that. Some people will have their confidence lower year after year after year. They keep receiving evidence that it can't happen for them, and that just makes the situation more dire. It makes it harder for you to come out of the hole.
Speaker 1:But let's be completely honest though. The real discomfort isn't that she actually spent the money. It's not about her spending the 10K. It's that she wanted love out loud. People hate. People hate that someone could want that woman could want love out loud like this, so unapologetically.
Speaker 1:Because we're trained, especially as high achieving faith, like women of faith, to want everything but love, to get the degree, to get the job, to be independent, to be self-sufficient. And if love happens, it just happens, but we don't go seeking it. We can't admit that you want it. We can't admit that we want it. But here's the twist If you're single at 40, people will ask you why are you still single? But if you say you want love, they'll tell you that you're doing too much. And if you don't want love, they'll call you bitter. And if you don't want love, they'll call you bitter. It's a trap. It's a trap.
Speaker 1:So many women, including myself, grew up thinking that if you just work hard, if you keep your head down, you'd be a good girl. Love is going to magically find you right, because you were not supposed to look for it, we're not supposed to need it, we're not supposed to want it. But then life happens for us and we heal and we grow. And then one day we realize, no, no, no, I want love. I actually want love. I have degrees, but I want love. I have money, but I want love. I have the career, but I want love, and not just any love, but love that feels safe and expansive and deeply mutual and expansive and deeply mutual. And then suddenly people want to make you feel ashamed for it. Why? It's because you stopped waiting to be chosen as a woman and you started choosing your shift. That is the shift.
Speaker 1:That is what really makes people uncomfortable. It's not the money, it's the agency, that someone, that a woman would be so bold in this day and age, that a woman would be so unapologetic and use her coins take, invest in her coins into something that matters to so many people, but so many people won't admit it. She makes them uncomfortable, but and well, that leads me to talk about this, something that we don't talk about enough, and that's the ache. Because underneath all of this, underneath the comments, the shame, the distraction, there's an ache. It's that quiet longing, that deep desire, that sense of I'm ready for love, but there's no one here to receive it yet. And it's not loud, it's not chaotic, it's just present and it hurts in a very specific way.
Speaker 1:And for some women it shows up like that moment when your friend announces her engagement and you feel a lump in your throat, even though you smile and clap for her. Or it shows up when you finish the work date, you close your laptop but you start to feel a heaviness that you can't explain. Or it shows up for some women when a man you like, you kind of like, maybe you like him a little bit, but he gives you attention and you entertain it right. He may not be that attractive or he may not be on your caliber, but you entertain it, not because he's right for you, but because he's there. Or it might show up when you post a cute photo on social media and deep down, you hope a certain man watches your story or texts you after seeing it. Or it shows up when your weekends are full, your calendar looks great, but you feel like something is missing. It shows up when a man shows up for you halfway right and you're trying to convince yourself that, oh, he could grow, he has potential, he can grow into the rest.
Speaker 1:It shows up when someone asks if you're dating and you say, oh, I'm focused on myself. But at the same time it kind of stings a little bit. It shows up when you see a couple kissing or dancing in public and you feel your stomach kind of twisting a little bit, like you think they're really cute, but your stomach twists. It can show up as frustration, as exhaustion, as that weird jealousy that you don't want to admit. You're doing quote unquote everything right, but then there's still a part of you wondering, like, why hasn't love found me yet? I've done this, I've done that. Like, why hasn't it found me yet?
Speaker 1:That is the ache. It's not traumatic, it's not desperate, it's just your body telling you the truth that you're ready. It's a sign that you're ready. It's not something to shut down, hide and fix. And I want to pause here because a lot of women ask me Tora, how do I know I'm ready to date again. They always ask me you know, whether they left a long-term relationship, whether they got out of a marriage or whether they've had some really bad dating experiences. They think that they'll feel ready when they're totally healed, or when they feel totally confident, or when they totally lose the weight. Ready when they're totally healed or when they feel totally confident, or when they totally lose the weight, or when they're totally over the pass. And that's not true. You're ready to date, you're ready for love when the ache shows up.
Speaker 1:The ache is your body saying there's room for love now, even if you're scared, even if you've made past mistakes, even if you're not sure where to start. Because readiness doesn't mean you have all the skills. It doesn't even mean you have everything figured out. It doesn't mean that you have all your ducks in a row, right, you still could be going to school or building a business, or in the process of buying a home or shifting careers. Readiness just simply means you have the desire. When you have the desire, you're ready.
Speaker 1:The ache is what tells you that you're no longer numb. You're not numb to the desire. You're not closed, you're not avoiding. You're no longer avoiding. You're open, and that's enough. But here's the thing and that's enough. But here's the thing Some of us avoid the ache because we think the ache makes us look desperate, like we feel desperate.
Speaker 1:But also a lot of women avoid it because it just hurts when we feel it. It's not about how it looks, it's about how it feels. The ache is very uncomfortable for a lot of us and I know because I know how the ache feels, right. Every now and again I feel it because I'm not in a marriage yet. I'm not, um, like, I want kids, right. I don't have them yet, like. So I get like how there's this ache while I'm dating, but I'm still not in a committed relationship and I'm still not married and I still don't have kids, right. So I know how it feels. The ache is uncomfortable, it's tender, it's very tender and it's exposing. But instead of sitting with it, many of us start distracting ourselves. We go back to school, we take on more at work, we on more projects. I'll be having people come to me tomorrow. I work like 12 hours a day and I'm like what's your schedule at work? And it's not 12 hours a day. I think they choose to work.
Speaker 1:It looks like like we be going, we, we become the one that everyone can count on at church, at, at home, in the community, like we feel our lives, what we think is purpose, but deep down, like we know, something is missing. And it's not because you're broken, it's because you've numbed the ache so much. This is how you're numbing the ache. You've stopped being in relationship with the ache, but the ache never goes away. It never goes away no matter how much you try to distract it with and you don't realize. You're going back to school to distract it. After you got 30,000 degrees, you're taking on more work, right? You're being a strong friend that everybody can count on.
Speaker 1:You think that your life is full of purpose when you're just trying to numb the feeling, okay, the ache doesn't go away because it's not a flaw, it's an invitation. And if you can learn to tend to the ache, instead of outrunning the ache, outworking the ache, outstudying the ache, out working the ache, out studying the ache, out doing the ache, something beautiful happens. You stop seeing your desire as a weakness, you stop feeling the ache as something so painful that you have to distract yourself and you stop abandoning the part of you that wants connection, that wants love, and you start. You stop making your desire the problem and you start realizing yes, this ache is an invitation, one that deserves to be answered with care. Now you're probably at the point you're wondering. You're feeling called out right now Like damn Torah's reading me fulfilled. So you might be wondering okay, torah, now that you've identified yes, I have the ache what do I do with this ache? I want you to start here. I need you to know that the ache doesn't mean that you're desperate. It doesn't mean that you're behind. It doesn't mean that you're doing something wrong. The ache means that you're doing something wrong. The ache means that you're ready and there's just nowhere for your love to land yet. Okay, the ache basically puts on display that you feel ready for love, yet the man isn't here, yet the relationship isn't here and there's this gap. And that's what the ache is looking for. It's looking for somewhere to land.
Speaker 1:Typically, we feel better when we have a man, even if he's a half-ass man, because now we have somewhere for our love to land. But it's misplaced. Right, it's a misplaced. We are landing. It's like. It's like we are flying Delta and we're in the air and we try to land in a private airfield. Right, it's like. This isn't where you should be landing here. This isn't the right place for your plane. You're in the wrong area. Okay, you're in the wrong area, and so.
Speaker 1:And then for those of us who, like we, realize, okay, I don't even want to piece a man, like I don't want to entertain a piece of man, but we still don't tend to the longing we don't. We, even if we don't have a man, there needs to be a place for it to land. There needs to be a place where I love to land and be tended to so we don't distract ourselves, which can cause all like we have, I can get into, all the bodily illnesses that a lot of us women have from our reproductive system, all because we ignore the ache. But anyway, the ache is asking will you show up for this desire, even when it hasn't arrived yet? It's inviting you. It's inviting you to ask like will you stop numbing it, will you stop trying to fix it and start actually caring for it?
Speaker 1:And that's where the next part comes in. That's where devotion begins, not devotion to a man, not devotion to a fantasy, but devotion to your desire, because devotion is what we do in response to the ache. It's how we say yes, I feel this longing. I am not going to shame myself for it and I am going to stay in relationship with it. A lot of us do not want to be in relationship with feelings that are painful or that hurt. That is the wrong move. If you stay in relationship with the ache, that's when you stop needing to be partnered to feel powerful. That's when you stop distracting yourself just to survive your singleness, distracting yourself with work and school and career just to survive your singleness. Distracting yourself with work and school and career. That's when your dating life becomes a sacred space of movement. Not just waiting, not just hoping, not just wishing.
Speaker 1:Devotion is what makes it bearable. It's what allows you to feel forward motion, even when there's no man yet, because a lot of us are struggling, we're feeling frustrated and exhausted because we're like nothing's moving, I'm not having progress, I'm not seeing progress. But when you are devoted, when you have devotion, it's what allows you to feel forward motion. It when you have devotion, it's what allows you to feel forward motion. It's what lets you stay open to love, even when the path is uncertain. So if you've been asking, what do I do with this ache, this is the answer. Now let's talk a little bit more about devotion, because devotion is the place where we're actually tending. We're tending, we're basically saying, hey, well, here's what it looks like in real life, like when you're single and you're still healing, you're still unsure.
Speaker 1:Devotion isn't dramatic. It's not always dramatic. Most of the time it's quiet and deeply personal, and here's what I mean. So if you're a desperate, right, if you're desperate, desperation says if I don't have a man, I'm nothing. If I don't have a relationship, I'm nothing, I'm losing out. Like, if I don't get this, I'm going to blah, blah, blah, blah. Like that's desperation. Like I need this, this, this, like to stay sane, like I need this in order to feel good about myself. That's desperation.
Speaker 1:Devotion says this is devotion. My desire for love is sacred and I trust myself to meet it with care and consistency and action. That's a very different posture and, frankly, most of us were never taught the difference. Most of us were taught to hide our desires, not be devoted to them, to downplay them, not to be devoted to them, to act chill about them, not to be devoted to them, to hope for them, not to be devoted for them. But devotion that's grown woman work to hope for them, not to be devoted for them, but devotion that's grown woman work. Devotion says that I believe in love enough to make space for it, to prepare for it to be visible, for it to be clear, for it to heal what's ever in the way, to take action and be there with it. And that's what I help women do. That's why I help women do this Not to just flirt better, not to just get more dates, but to be honest with themselves about what they want and to learn to show up in a way that attracts and sustains it, to be devoted to their desire.
Speaker 1:And sometimes that looks like deleting the apps because you're addicted to them and going out and touching the world, touching some damn grass. Sometimes it looks like setting boundaries with someone who may be cute but not really committed to getting to know you. Sometimes it looks like investing in support when you've done all the free stuff and you're ready to go deeper. Sometimes devotion looks like putting together a plan of what it would look like to date when you're busy, right, or what it would look like to date when you're in school, or what it would look like to to date when you have a broken leg or when you when you have STI? Like, what would it look like to be devoted to my desire? Now that I felt it, now that I have it, how do I not try to ease the pain, but how do I be in relationship with this desire and tend to it?
Speaker 1:Because the woman on TikTok, she made a devoted move and it worked for her and that doesn't make her better than anyone. I'm not trying to make anyone feel like, oh, she's better because of it, but it is worth noticing what it brought up in so many people. But I want to go deeper here, because a lot of women don't realize they're avoiding their devotion because they think that they are being practical or productive. You won't guess how many people I hear saying oh I, you know, I'm not ready to date, I can't even think about dating because I'm, really I'm super busy. I got three jobs and I and I'm, I'm building up this business and I'm, I'm, I'm trying to learn how to do this and do that. I just bought a house and I'm doing blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I can't even think about that right now. They think they're being practical, they think they're being productive, but really a lot of it is distracting themselves from the eight.
Speaker 1:There's no, there is no reason. There's any time you feel like you are too busy. To date, you have too much on your plate to date. There's a place where you're not serving yourself. There's no way love can't be part of the picture. There is no way, especially considering that God is love, you wouldn't even exist, right. That God is love, you wouldn't even exist, right.
Speaker 1:The love that you desire is in you for a reason, and if you say that you can't touch it because you're doing all these other things, you're avoiding the devotion. Now, this doesn't mean I don't want you to get on here and be like oh my gosh, I'm so ashamed because I'm not honoring my devotion. It's just recognizing the truth of it and it's okay Like. It's okay Like, if you're responsible for it. You're like, yeah, I'm avoiding my devotion to my desire for love right now and just own it. Right, but we have to be responsible for that.
Speaker 1:So, instead of asking these, instead of these ladies asking like how can I honor my desire even with the busyness, even with all I got going on, even with death in the family and loss, even with all this happening, they're asking well, what can I do to not feel it so strongly. So they stay busy, they chase another certification, they fill their calendar with work and service, not because they don't want love, but because being still with that desire feels way too raw, and they double down on work. They over-serve their church or family. They say they're too busy for dating, not because they don't want love, but because wanting it for so many feels shameful, it feels like it can't. Wanting it for so many feels shameful, it feels like it can't. What I mean is anytime it's not a priority.
Speaker 1:There's a problem, especially if you want long-term partnership, especially if you want, especially if you're in your thirties plus, because if you really wanted it, if you admitted that you really wanted it, like you, you might have to take responsibility for your role, Not might. You might have to take responsibility for your role, not might. You have to take responsibility in your world. You'd have to risk disappointment. You might have to change right. You might have to ask for things, maybe some time off at work, maybe a change, and you'd be surprised how many clients I get that feel like they have to do all the things. And when we start working together they don't have to do half that shit. They've just been distracting themselves the whole time, thinking they had to do it.
Speaker 1:But here's the consequence of avoiding your devotion you build a life that looks full, lots of things going on, but quietly there's loneliness there. You get everything else right and you wonder why your love life feels like the one area you can't figure out. And you say that you're not settling and that's why you're still single. But the truth is you're settling with yourself. You've settled, even if it's not with a man. You've already been settling, and so I say this with love. I say this with love number one because I've lived it. I went into a marriage and stayed in a marriage to end my ache, instead of learning how to tend to it.
Speaker 1:Okay, avoiding devotion doesn't just delay your desire. It actually disconnects you from the very part of yourself that knows how to attract it, which is why you're not getting it. This is why it's not falling in your lap. You're disconnected. We have to learn how to date in a way that honors who we are, while still leaving space for real connection to grow. And that's a skill, that's emotional leadership, and without it, we either default to old survival patterns being busy, busy, busy, overly masculinized society, working, working, working, productive productiveness or we ghost the process altogether.
Speaker 1:So, before I leave you, I want to give you a few reflection questions, not to fix anything, but to get honest with yourself. Ask yourself where might I be distracting myself from my own devotion? What parts of my life have I used to justify not pursuing love more fully? What would it look like to take one aligned step toward devotion of my desire for love today, if I wasn't afraid of seeming too much, toward devotion of my desire for love today, if I wasn't afraid of seeming too much, what would I allow myself to want? Ask yourself and listen. Maybe your next step isn't hiring a 10K coach and, by the way, I'm not charging 10K at this time. There will be a time where I will, but I'm not charging that. So there's that.
Speaker 1:But maybe it is doing something you've been avoiding. Maybe it's reactivating your apps, but showing up differently this time more present, more mindful, more loving. Maybe it's letting all your friends know that you are in the market for love and you want an introduction to at least one of their friends guys that they know to be out on the lookout when they go to events. Maybe it's telling your therapist that you want more support around your dating life. Maybe y'all not talking about dating at all and you want support. Maybe it's calling y'all pastor right the church and letting them know you want more support around your dating life. You need help. Maybe, hell, let's book in a sales call with me to see if working together is the best next step, and you can do that in the link in my show notes.
Speaker 1:Shameless plug. There's no shame in that. That's not desperation, that's devotion. Again, devotion doesn't always have to look big. Sometimes it's just a quiet yes to the thing that you keep putting off because of whatever reason. Right, kids work, build a little business. Sometimes it looks like finally giving yourself permission to want love and then choosing not to wait for it to find you.
Speaker 1:And if you're listening and you've been feeling that quiet ache, that longing for partnership you've tried to ignore or suppress, I want you to know this You're not desperate, you're not wrong for wanting more and you're allowed to move toward love without apology, because love doesn't make you weak, desiring it doesn't make you weak, it makes you human. And desiring to be chosen isn't the problem. But waiting for it to just happen while shaming yourself for wanting it, that is the real heartbreak. I feel so sorry for the woman in the comments, cause you know tons of them don't have the relationship that they want. Tons of them are struggling with men. That's the reason why they look at men, why they think it's 10 K for a man and they don't think it's worth it because they don't know what quality men look like. They don't know, they wouldn't know how much that is worth. That's the real heartbreak.
Speaker 1:So you can want it, you can work for it, you can claim it out loud and if you're ready to do that, work in a grounded, supported way. I'm here Because working with me and one-to-one coaching I help you date from devotion, not defense. So you start attracting quality men now instead of waiting for that longing, that ache, to disappear. Working with me, you'll stop staying stuck in a loop of healing, of waiting and wondering if love will just show up. You'll learn how to meet your desire with reverence, how to date with self-trust and how to stay open to love without losing your peace. You'll learn how to date like a woman who knows she's ready. She's not having to think about when, even if she's healing, even if she's scared, even if she's been through it, you'll know how to stay rooted in your desire, even when the path feels slow or vulnerable, and you'll experience what it's like to be held by men, by God, and by a process that honors your heart, and you'll finally be on the path to the kind of relationship that you pray for, not the ones that you settle for. So work with me to turn your ache into real action so that you stop stalling and start dating men who are ready to love you as well.
Speaker 1:Book of sales card. The link below in the show notes or head over to my profile. And if this episode was amazing for you, please leave me a review. Please send this to all your friends. Yeah, pass this knowledge along. We need to get the word out, but I'm about to get ready. I need to go pack because I'm about to go on a date and I ain't packing. I got a flight five o'clock in the morning and my date about to pull up in like 30 minutes. All right, guys, bye.