Recently, I watched an interview with Ciara and her husband Russell Wilson. It seems like for years, many had been obsessed with how Ciara seemed to have lucked out so much once she found Russell Wilson. After seeming to have hit rock bottom with a failed relationship with Future and finding herself as a single mom to a newborn, Ciara became a modern hip-hop Cinderella after she met football quarterback Russell Wilson. The couple is now married, Russell stepped in as a father to Ciara’s first son, they added a daughter to their brood, and are currently expecting their third child.
You see it all the time on social media, people ask, “Sis, what was the prayer?” Women all over America are hoping to have the same stroke of luck or divine intervention in their own romantic lives. Lala Anthony sat on a video chat with Ciara and Russell Wilson and asked Ciara to finally answer that question. Ciara’s answer was very anticlimactic and she basically said she prayed many nights after being down and out. Then Russell took the mic and explained, clarifying once and for all that it was he who had actually set the intention and manifested the magic of his relationship with Ciara. It wasn’t a prayer at all, it was clarity that did the trick. He knew exactly what he wanted and what was nonnegotiable for him. When he finally came across it there was nothing left to do but embrace it.
The key is clarity!
My husband and I have been together for fifteen years and married for eight. Many people ask me how I got so lucky. He likes to cook, loves his family, helps with the kids, is a great provider, and easy on the eyes. Many say, I’ve won the husband lottery. I won’t get into the work that it takes to maintain a relationship because that’s a post for a different day. I will get into how I was able to find someone that had what I was looking for even though we met at such a young age. It was not magic, it was that even though I was young I had enough life experiences and learned from the experiences of others. It all gave the conviction I needed to identify what I wanted and expected in a partner and a relationship.
I have a very close relationship with my family so a good relationship with family was always at the top of my list. I always made sure my boyfriends had a good family base. Growing up, I watched my mother struggle with all of my dad’s shortcomings as a partner. He was a womanizer, unreliable, unstable, messy, a bad provider, and they did not have a good friendship. It seemed like besides their kids and living together they barely had anything in common. My mother and father met when they were both in other relationships. While my mom divorced her ex husband after meeting my dad my father stayed with his then partner who already had three children by him. She stayed with him as the other woman, actually one of many. Eventually, by the time I was about five years old my dad moved in with us full time. My mom loved my dad wholeheartedly and they had a complex relationship but they made it work in their way.
When I was about fifteen my father cheated on my mom and she was completely heartbroken. My parents had struggled financially for years and when things were finally looking good and they were both working and doing well, he failed her. My mother never got over it. She even kicked him out but he came back and she accepted it. To this day, over 18 years later, she is not over it and can’t forgive him completely for what he put her through. As a young person watching this happen I remember feeling so sad for my mother and telling her to leave my dad. I remember telling her that we knew she wasn’t happy and that she should let him go. She had a hard tine with breaking up her family and an even harder time with the thought of bringing in another man into her home, so she made her bed in misery and stayed with the devil she knew.
Living through all of that and being so aware of it from a young age gave me a great degree of clarity. My parents have been together for over thirty years and have never married. I wanted different. I knew that I wanted a marriage. I wanted communication, I knew that I wanted to be with a man who cared about his family and wanted a monogamous relationship. Even if I wasn’t ready for that at nineteen, I knew I did want someone with my same values. I also wanted security and I was ready to provide that along with my partner. Because we grew up poor and there were struggles it is very important for me to be financially independent. I never need to rely on a man. I am very ambitious and I am not here to be a trophy wife. I watched a lot of women struggle after they stopped being the latest shiny object. I also needed someone I could trust, someone who would be there to take care of me emotionally. Lastly, I knew I didn’t want someone like my mom who would just want to suffer through a relationship for the sake of the kids.I wanted someone who wanted to be in a healthy relationship with their partner.
The next lessons I learned came from my own relationships before meeting my husband. These helped me discover what an ideal partnership would look like for me. In high school, freshman year I dated the cutest guy in our class. He had green eyes and all the girls swooned over him, but he was a player. I knew that about him and went in with eyes wide open. We actually had very good communication so he messed around and so did I. We were young and I figured I should get that out of my system as a kid anyway. I realized that’s just not me. I’m a monogamist. After that, I had great boyfriends who were loyal and loved me immensely, but there was always something. Even as a young girl I was always hard working and ambitious, I wanted to do well in school and be the best that I could at whatever I was doing. After dating someone who I felt was not giving himself the best chance at life by succeeding at school I knew that I needed someone who saw a bigger future, like I did. Another lesson came from someone who made me their entire world. It taught me that because I was so independent and self-driven I needed someone with their own separate interests and hobbies so that we could each have ways to be fulfilled without relying on our partner to fill that void.
At nineteen, I found myself single and I was living my best life. I had decided to take a semester off college because I STRUGGLED with an undiagnosed mental health issue my freshman year. While I took time off school I had a full-time job at a hotel in Time Square, Manhattan and a part-time job at a sneaker store next door to the hotel. Sneakers were my life back then so I was in heaven, even though the job was just okay.
I was a young woman with a plan! I was thrilled to be working because although I had moved back home, with two jobs I was never there, and more importantly, I was working to save so I could finally rent my very first apartment. I would focus on myself and getting my life on track so I could have my space and get back to school. I was fresh from a break up so I was excited for time alone. As I told everyone, I just wanted to be by myself and get to know me again because I had gone from relationship to relationship in the past. Plus, with my mental health crisis and was in unchartered territory I couldn’t really deal with a relationship to distract me.
“Man plans, and God laughs.”
That Yiddish adage is one of my favorite sayings. The summer I met Joe I had no plans to get into a serious relationship, let alone meet my life partner. What I did have at the ready was a series of life experiences through myself and from watching others that gave me clarity.
Joe checked so many of my boxes. He was very smart and we made each other laugh all the time. I was nervous because he was a young and attractive so I thought he could be a player. I also did not want something serious, so I took a chance and am discovered he wasn’t. He had strong friendships, a job, and went to school full-time. That was great because he had a life that wouldn’t just revolve around me. Hey, I was (and still am) a very busy girl. He had very good grades, big plus for me, because I knew he was working hard to achieve his goals. I couldn’t just date a pretty face. He had also just cared for his aunt who he was very close to while she struggled with cancer so I knew he had good family ties and would be a good care taker for someone he loved. He lived alone and his place was always impeccable, very important because I can be a neat freak. He also knew how to take care of himself, he did his own laundry and loved to cook! And did I mention I had an affinity for light eyes, check!
Although I wasn’t planning on meeting my life partner, I am always open to the universe having my back. I knew enough about what I wanted that when it came along we were bound like magnets and haven’t detached since.
Now get out and find your life partner!
Setting the right intentions to help find your life partner is key but you also have to be in the right mental space. Note that I said, life partner not perfect partner. There’s no one perfect in this world but there’s someone out there who’s perfectly imperfect for you, if that’s what you want. The key is to know and CLEAR with what you want. Only focus on what you want and expect.
The next key is to be open to finding it. Be realistic, if you want to find a new partner you’re not going to do it while you’re stuck hibernating at home or following the same routine that hasn’t led you there yet. Focus on yourself but also, don’t be afraid to try new things. Join a dating app, sign up for a class, or do some career development. Try something you’ve always wanted to do so that you’ll be in the right mental space and open to new things. You won’t attract what you want if you’re closed off or in the same funk you’ve always been in. Do things that will make you feel good, excited, and fulfilled. This will put you in the right energy state.
No excuses! Even in quarantine, I’ve seen stories of people “meeting” and dating virtually. https://time.com/5809894/drone-tiktok-coronavirus/ People have nothing but time right now, and we are all going through this crisis at the same time, so what a good moment to spend time getting to know someone.
Good luck!
Are there any of you who can you attest to this in your own relationship or anyone else’s you’ve seen?
