"NO."

I've been hanging on to this "writing" for a while now, but I felt like blogging twice today...

 

As an older, recently singled person, many issues will tend to block your dating growth. The nervousness of stepping full force outside of what had once been your comfort zone (the ex); perhaps insecurity over your post-teenage body or even misplaced guilt that your last relationship sank like a ship because you weren't good at being the skipper of the boat (when it most likely sank because you had Gilligan as a First Mate). But as a person, you'll begin to ease yourself back into the dating pool and at some point you may expose yourself in a way that makes you feel more vulnerable than a fat girl in a polka dot bikini. Yes, you'll flirt and bat your glued in eyelashes. You may even slip a toothbrush and pack of condoms into your purse. You'll steel your nerves with a bottle of wine or shot of liquid courage and mercilessly throw yourself at some guy only to hear...

"NO."

Now, that reaction will either be followed with nothing in which case you'll simply realize that you've been swimming in the kiddie pool where the only men left at the end of the day are akin to the doo-doo terds kids leave behind or if you've been swimming in the deep end of the pool where the adults play it will be followed by a kind and friendly explanation that on the surface lets you tread water while you retrieve that bathing suit top that's floating away and exit the pool calmly and gracefully.

But, it still stinks to high heaven and makes you feel like you're never ever going to be able to squeeze yourself into a bathing suit again.

Just remember, the waters always coldest until you've managed to get wet up to your eyeballs. You've done that part.  It may have frozen you to your core for a moment, but you never have to be rejected again for the FIRST time. Stay in the water, swim solo for a while, and one day that first "No" will seem like a wave that crashed into you, broke and drifted to shore.