Seeking, Finding, and Gifting the Spark of Love
It’s a fragile thing, this spark we are all looking for. But it’s essential for success in relationship, I think.
So this “spark” we are seeking in love, it’s hard to find. And when we do find it, it’s even harder to keep. It’s easy to mistake sex or chemistry for spark. They are not the same thing.
The key to spark, however, is more than discovery. The key to spark, and sparking with another person, is how they carry and care for your spark once you’ve revealed it to them. You see, I think we’re hoping to GIVE our spark to someone for safe keeping and nurturing. We want someone else to see, love, and protect our spark. That little thing inside of ourselves we are proud of no matter what.
When you begin to wield your spark, many things happen. The other people interested in fire begin to show up.
In the last few days an amazing thing happened that helped me illuminate, for myself, a bit more about this concept of spark and what it IS and what it IS NOT.
I’ll take them one by one.
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What we want is someone who lights up when they see our spark. And then we want to be lit up by their spark as well.
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1. Kissing Girl imploded. In the process of telling her, my spark had dimmed in relationship to being with her. She bargained she negotiated, she got mad. Kinda the stages of letting go, right? Anyway, what I saw in that change was how accurate this spark and spark awareness was for me. The minute I felt the spark was not in the right place, I brought it back home to myself, and the proverbial floodgates of confused communications began. She blew up my phone with texts and calls within 15 minutes of a potential agreed upon contact time. I can’t abide that. Sorry. You and your drama must go.
2. New Girl, of the poetic and aspirational heart, did a bit of a disappearing act. Not in action, but in presence, she became unavailable. A visiting friend, and then a scheduling conflict and then, “Have a great weekend with your kids.” It was only Wednesday. Easy handling here. No worries. No fear. We are still in the very early stages of “what if.” I have not given her any of my spark. I have begun nurturing a spark for her, but that is all. I’m saving the poetry for a future time. At the moment it is a projection of my spark on to something that might not be accurate. So we breathe and relax. “Yes, have a good weekend.”
3. Girl with Potential #2, from the previous post (Tilting the Planet In My Favor) texted and called me last night. It was a nice phone call. She was asking if I was available to join her for an event on Friday. I couldn’t go. But I was happy to express how willing I would be in the future for similar invites. And I was clear that I was happy to hear from her. It was a warm fuzzy. She had reached back to me. After a moment of pause. Again, she’s got spark potential, but it’s still undeveloped.
What we want is someone who lights up when they see our spark. And then we want to be lit up by their spark as well. When we are together our sparks have the potential to become a fire. But the process of bringing them together and being vulnerable and protective at the same time is something new and different for most of us.
I learned in my marriage to ex-y that passion and beauty can blow right over the spark. In the fits of desire, my own need, and my infatuation with her, I forgot, or missed, some core fundamentals that I should not have. No regrets. I have two beautiful children, and we soldier on as co-parents rather than parents. BUT… we could’ve had it all.
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When you are aware of your spark, you can bring it to bear on a given relationship in a new way. As I am learning how precious my energy is, I am also aware that people of the fire are drawn to sparks.
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In fact, we did have it all. At least, I thought we did. And while she was carrying my spark I didn’t even look at other women with the same eyes. I was DONE. I was HOME. I was COMPLETE. I was also misguided. But that’s a story I’ve already told here.
So in the current moment, I am well aware of my spark and the sparks building with PG#2 and NG. How fun.
And what I hope to learn, before moving too quickly with either of them, is how well our sparks fit together. How well we resonate, even in these very early stages. How easily does change get accepted and how stressful are the resets? We are in this next journey for the big finish. (That’s an idealistic concept, I know, but it’s an intention and not a truth.)
So let’s be sparking together. Let’s see if we like the feel of the other person’s personal flame. How can we support and champion their ideas?
Oh, and I almost forgot. I’ve killed my online dating profiles. Not in response to any of the above changes, but more in an attempt to simplify and be quiet. AND in that process, one final spark, OK-girl and I exchanged contact info. We’d been chatting on OKC for over a month. She was busy. I was easy. We were just being casual friends on OKC. But she was the only remaining spark. So I gave her a final ping with my email and cell number. And guess what? She texted me last night. And we had a funny exchange. And we’ll probably go have a drink in the next week or so.
That’s another learning. Hold on loosely. I learned this in spades with Kissing Girl. When they are TOO ready to engage or schedule, that might be a sign that something is missing in their lives.
And final thought. When you are aware of your spark, you can bring it to bear on a given relationship in a new way. As I am learning how precious my energy is, I am also aware that people of the fire are drawn to sparks. And, unfortunately so are the vampires. So as you bring your energy online and put the spark on your sleeve a bit more, beware of the baddies as well as the potential mates.
We’re all learning this together. Today I spark. And viola I have three potential sparkmates again. Like moths to a flame. Let’s see who circles without imploding, getting burned, or lighting up too quickly. And I will be listening for their sparks. What songs are they singing about themselves and their lives? And how does their flame make me feel?
Sincerely,
John McElhenney – life coach austin texas
Facebook | Instagram | Pinterest | @theoffparent
*written April 2013
As a certified life coach, I’ve been helping men and women find fulfilling relationships. If you’d like to chat for 30-minutes about your dating/relationship challenges, I always give the first 30-session away for free. LEARN ABOUT COACHING WITH JOHN. There are no obligations to continue. But I get excited every time I talk to someone new. I can offer new perspectives and experiences from my post-divorce dating journey. Most of all, I can offer hope.
< back to On Dating Again index
related posts:
- Seven Signs of a Healthy Post-Divorce Relationship
- The Honey Trap: How Beauty Can Lead Us Astray
- Three Loves: Eros, Filial, Agape
- The Sensual and the Sexual: Dating After Divorce
- Divorced and Dating Again: What’s the Worst That Could Happen?
resources:
- The Divorce Library (reading list)
- Songs of Divorce (free listening library – youtube sourced songs)
- Laugh It Off (building a resource library of funny videos and other diversions)
- Facebook (follow us on Facebook and keep up with all the conversations)
- The 5 Love Languages (a book on love styles by Gary Chapman)
Girlfriend 2.0 Startup Initialization Sequence: Step 1: Kissing
She showed up to our “coffee date” with a text about a bottle of wine and two glasses she had brought along, in case. We had already been taking, texting, about kissing. It was midday on a sparkling Saturday afternoon.
I had chosen the Starbucks near a small park to give us a place to go walk, should the initial greeting prove promising. I think she had brought up kissing first. We’d already had two phone dates: calls lasting in excess of 30 minutes accented with many laughs and touch points. “Kissing is another way to get to know somebody.” I was ready for a really good kisser.
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There’s a lot to kissing. How you give and receive. What pressure and forcefulness you exhibit. Can you change the pace to be soft and hesitant and then reverse into a crushing hug-fueled kiss?
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“You are tall,” I said, right on cue as we were leaving Starbucks, there were no seats anyway. It was on her dating profile that people often commented on how tall she was. She was exactly my height. I guess, she still is, exactly my height.
(Jumpcut ahead to now: 7 hours after seeing her for a second kissing date, I can still smell her perfume/lotion on me. It’s as if she’s still with me. It’s an odd sensation. Perhaps like a pheromone cat-like thing. I’m marked. And I can imagine what it might be like if she was lying in the bed with me instead of halfway across town.)
This time around, I’ve added the little bit in my online dating profile, that I want them to be awesome. That average and mediocre won’t cut it. This woman, GF 2.0, is all that. She’s confident and eloquent irreverent in just the right places, she does a great job at being funny and laughing at my subtle and not so subtle humor. And her college and career have set us up to have a myriad of things to talk about. And she’s a great talker.
She’s also a great kisser. I have to say I was unsure at our first date, with the wine. I was perhaps too hurried, too surprised, to anticipatory. But we made plans about 5 hours later to meet again. And this time, with time and the early Spring night unfolding above us, we kissed. And kissed.
I’m trying to organize my thoughts around what this depth of kissing means. Of what signals our brains and bodies are giving and receiving during prolonged lip lock. I ventured to say something about it while we were taking a conversational pause. “I’m guessing this kind of kissing tells a lot about how a person makes love.”
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Given the right startup sequence, I’m pretty sure GF 2.0 is nearby, and maybe already kissing the life back into my belief in sensuousness as a core driver for connection.
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The anticipation and yearning for that event is now filled with this pre-dating information of kissing. Even before we’re able to really fathom the potential of the “relationship” we are well versed in the other’s kissing style. And kissing, with someone who likes to kiss… Well, it’s an amazing thing.
There’s a lot to kissing. How you give and receive. What pressure and forcefulness you exhibit. Can you change the pace to be soft and hesitant and then reverse into a crushing hug-fueled kiss? And if it paints any picture of future connective activities, I can say, we kiss really well. And I’m not sure I’ve started with that.
Well, I’m pretty sure when we I was pre-coitus with the ex-y we just about broke our lips off kissing. But it had less intention than this. It was more hunger and passion fueled. This kissing, yesterday’s kissing, seems more about getting to learn about the other person. I texted to her, tonight, after I was trying to come down from the high, “Kissing you is like a gateway drug.”
If it’s possible to bottle up this early enthusiasm, and joy at being together, and hold on to some of it for the duration of the relationship, well, there might be no end. And I said, midway into our second kissing date, “Let’s always remember how important kissing is.”
Now the rest of the initialization sequence is being mapped out in my head. 1. more kissing; 2. more time looking and conversing; 3. navigating the details of how we will have our first “in-home” encounter; 4. luxuriating in the pre-during-post experience of love making; 5. setting plans for the next time; 6. trying to modulate how quickly you allow yourself to entwine your lives, now completely you let yourself submerge.
Of course, there is still girl #3, who returns to town in a few days, with some pre-wiring from our history together pre-marriage, pre-kids. And she is a rockstar woman. Holding out a pause, and allowing for that potential to remain, is a nice place to be. In the flow. In my own power. With a bit of my farming and hard work paying off.
Spring is here. And perhaps there is some giddiness in all of us. We want to be blooming too.
Given the right startup sequence, I’m pretty sure GF 2.0 is nearby, and maybe already kissing the life back into my belief in sensuousness as a core driver for connection.
If I were to assess my current requirements for GF 2.0 they would be: 1. ability to express affection through touch (love language: touch); 2. ability to feel and express deep emotion; 3. the spark of sexual chemistry that turns up the fire in my heart.
One thing is for sure, the girl I am kissing at the moment, is very much in my constellation for becoming my next “relationship.” Dating seems to denote, temporary, casual, without intention. And while that has its place, and the “field” of women seems to be opening slightly for me, I’m not really looking to DATE. I keep telling myself that.
But I have never had the experience of being able to go deep with someone while having another person in the wings. And depth is absolutely what I crave. Ah, and the last requirement: 4. adoration. It seems to me this is the part that grows and is discovered over time. While my first girlfriend adored me like I’ve never been adored before, there was the tiny spark missing. Something. And the experience of missing that, was the experience of not being able to reflect and resonate with that same adoration.
So maybe that’s what LOVE is for me. Finding the person I can adore. The sexual chemistry either happens or doesn’t happen upon meeting. But the adoration is what builds over time to become mutual, exclusive, and intoxicating.
I’m plotting my next kissing session for today.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
< back to On Dating Again index
Resources:
- The Divorce Library (reading list)
- Songs of Divorce (free listening library – youtube sourced songs)
- Laugh It Off (building a resource library of funny videos and other diversions)
- The 5 Love Languages
(book about how love relationships work)
