JUST WISHIN' AND HOPIN' AND THINKIN' AND PRAYIN'....

If you haven't seen the opening skit of the movie "My Best Friend's Wedding," go see it now...Do not pass go, Do not collect $100...Just GO! (But then come back!;)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c74BSImG4xM

This spoof is a play on the song "Wishin' and Hopin'," but how many of us women, whether we realize it or not, practice what the song preaches?

Show him that you care just for him
And do the things he likes to do
Wear your hair just for him, 'cause
You won't get him
Thinkin' and a-prayin'
Wishin' and a-hopin'...

I know I, for one, was a devout believer in this type of philosophy for most of my dating life. I thought that if I became the person he wanted me to be then I would "be his." For example, I suddenly had no opinions of my own; I lowered my laughter bar and laughed at everything he said, funny or not; I dressed in a way that I thought he would find to be sexy....It goes on and on. I was basically a Stepford Wife minus the husband.

And I was always baffled by the fact that it was the guys who I wasn't interested in romantically who would fall for me. Was life just so cruel? Or Ironic? (I know, I know....that's not what Ironic really means...just let it go and let Alanis off the hook already!)

It was by accident, after becoming romantic with my current partner, that I discovered why this happend. It was this: The guys who fell for me liked me not because life was cruel, but because they got to see the real ME. They liked that I had opinions, wasn't afraid to argue and get annoyed with them, wouldn't patronize them by laughing at jokes unless they were actually funny, and was able to say what I wanted and needed without sugar-coating it to appear less needy.

The guys with whom I practiced the "Wishin' and Hopin' and Thinkin' and Prayin'" philosophy were, understandably, turned off by me because they were smart enough to know (or at least sense) that the real me was hiding behind this fake, Stepford Wife-type person.