We live in a society where it is taboo to be alone. As they age, many singles feel like they’re nearing their expiry date, causing them additional stress over and above their work tensions, and making them feel older as well.

‘I desperately feel the need to have someone to care for me – someone who’ll be bothered whether I’m hungry or healthy’, one friend told me, adding that he wasn’t able to find the girl of his dreams – either he liked them, or they liked him, but it just didn’t seem to happen together. Those who are undergoing the process of ‘looking’ or ‘hunting’ for boys or girls for arranged marriages, are even more agonized. While a girl whined that she’s just not able to find a man who is willing to take a working and independent woman, and one who wouldn’t ask about the dowry before he enquired about her name, another guy friend complained that girls only seemed concerned about his salary, family property and whether he had scope of working abroad.

What we all need to do here is stop and ask ourselves – Does this really have to be this difficult? And to anyone acquainted with the universal laws of attraction (not talking about male-female attraction here), the answer is clear – NO.

No, it doesn’t have to be this difficult. No, they don’t have to suffer this much. No, not everyone in the world is concerned only about money, and no, you don’t have to settle for that last person just because you’re fed up and have lost hope. No.

It can be easy, yes, you can find that one person you’ve been waiting for all your life. Yes, you can have a happy married life, and yes, you can find joy, freedom and growth in a bright and happy relationship after marriage. But is that what you’re really asking for? Let us begin at the beginning.

We’re going to start with looking inside ourselves. There is just one real requirement to finding a partner – a desire to find one. And before you jump in your seats screaming ‘ofcourse I want a partner!!’, wait. Do you really want one? I mean really, really want one? Are you really, truly willing to let your defences down and allow a person to see the deepest, darkest sides of you? Are you really willing to place all your trust and faith in another person? Are you really willing to share every aspect of your life with another person? Yes? Probably not. There is a fear – and that is the fear that prevents that special someone from stepping into your life and sweeping you off your feet. You can’t be swept off your feet if you’re afraid of letting go of the ground. Let go.

Secondly, all our focus is on what we want from that other person, and not on what we can offer to them. We all want someone to care for us, someone to bother about us, someone to worry about us, someone to wait for us until we get home. But are we ready to give yet? Have we ever focussed our attention on being able to give of ourselves? Are we waiting just as desperately to care about someone? To bother, worry, and wait for that special someone? Are we looking forward to loving someone else with all our hearts for all our lives?

Despite the desperate want for that special someone, we’re afraid at the same time that we will lose our freedom. Marriage is looked upon so frequently as a permanent bondage, that it is hard to think of it otherwise. The desire to find a partner, and the fear of being bound do not go together. Fear sabotages any bright plans for the future. That marriage is not bondage, is a topic that requires an entire essay to emphasize the point. Only if a person is not willing to work at marriage, does it change a person for the worse and binds him/ her. If you want to be a person who doesn’t want to give his/ her all to the marriage and doesn’t want to work at it, you’ll be stuck with an unhappy, miserable relationship for the rest of your life, the type your children will look at and say ‘I don’t want to marry because people get miserable after marriage’.

For those who look forward to marriage and are willing to give it their all, it is a completely different experience. If you’re a person who wants to find that life -partner to love, care for and grow with and are willing to change yourself for the better to help the relationship, you’ll find the perfect man/ woman and live the kind of relationship that people will look at and want to emulate. Don’t resist change, embrace it – because these changes make you a better, stronger and happier person – isn’t that the kind of person you want to be?

A happy married life actually adds much more fun to one’s life! One never has to depend on friends to go on a trip, one tends to be more careful about expenses and hence has more money at one’s disposal, salaries are often double to boot, and you have someone who’s always there to help you become a better person – all you need to do is ask! Marriage is the easiest way to bring out the best in you.You can choose whether you want to be stuck and bound after marriage, losing your freedom, or whether you want to enjoy more than you ever have, and celebrate twice the freedom and love you’ve ever experienced in your life. Its your choice, and you have to make it both consciously and subconsciously.

So all you really need to do is take a good look inside your mind, figure out what is bothering you, what you are afraid of, and eliminate it. Thats all – and your life partner will breeze into your life so fast that you won’t even know what hit you. Trust me, I’m not exaggerating. Follow it correctly and you’ll find someone within a couple of months. It really is that fast.

The steps are simple to list, a little difficult to apply, but certainly doable, and bring great results.

1) Identify the emotion / fear that is preventing you from allowing yourself to totally submit yourself to another person.

2) Eliminate the fear/ blockage, talk to someone wise at this point if you have to. Or just talk to a happily married couple and get their views on the topic.

3) Start dreaming about the life you’ll have together. No matter what you do, think about that person. Think about how you’ll cook for each other, how you’ll make your birthdays special, how you’ll go on long drives together, etc. Whatever you do, think, how would this moment be once I find my partner? Dream about him/ her as you fall asleep.

4) Prepare for that person to step into your life. Start saving up for the life you’re going to have together. Look at romantic greeting cards. Stop to look at that wedding dress hanging in the store window. Read articles on how to be a good husband/ wife. Learn cooking. Take the plunge. Believe.

And lastly, LET GO. Several studies have shown that those who are incapable of being happy before finding a partner, are incapable of being happy after finding one. Provided you find the perfect one, it will bring you at most 2 years of a ‘high’. Identify the desire to chase this belief that you have everything except ‘this one last thing’, and drop it. Be happy now. Romance life, dance with every moment and if you’re lucky, you’ll find someone else doing the same dance too.