Experience Date Coaching Through My Eyes: New Date Coaching ...

This is part 1 of my new series on date coaching, where I undergo a series of date coaching sessions with Kydon Tay, a leading date coach in Singapore, and blog openly about the process.

Hello everyone! Those of you who have been reading my Lunch Actually series would know that I?m currently a registered member at Lunch Actually and going on one-to-one dates as arranged by the agency. I just blogged about my first match and first date here: Part 4 of my LA Journey: My First Match and First Date!

My initial membership package with Lunch Actually has been kindly sponsored by them; I personally wanted to blog about the journey (even before the sponsorship was offered) as I figured some of you might be interested to try/use LA?s services and me openly writing about my journey will help you know more about their service. I also feel that there will be things that I?ll learn along this journey which will be worth sharing with all of you.

As part of my Lunch Actually journey, I was offered LA?s?suite of value-added services, complimentary of the agency. These include image coaching (which I have since blogged about in?Part 3 of my LA Journey: Going Through Image Coaching!) and date coaching.

I?m currently going through date coaching which will be seven sessions long (with one session every fortnight). As such, I?ve decided to start a new date coaching series to openly blog about this date coaching journey, in hopes that you can learn a thing or two from this experience as well.

Foreword on This New Series

If you?re currently single and open to being in a relationship, I reckon this series will be highly, highly useful for you, as I?ll be sharing many of my lessons and revelations from undergoing Kydon?s coaching. Take it as you receiving free, top, advice from a dating coach (Kydon) through a life coach (me) that?s presented in a way that?s relevant for you (through my writing). You?ll be experiencing date coaching through my eyes and will probably learn many things that will be relevant to you too. I say you should most definitely follow this new series and keep your eyes peeled for each part!

For those who are not single and/or are not looking to be in a relationship, simply ignore my weekly to fortnightly entries about my date coaching progress, though I think you can learn something from reading them (I?m sure anyone would). My plan is to share some substantial dating thoughts and advice with each entry (so I might break up a session into several sessions if there is much to share).?I?ll continue to write (free) articles on personal development on my LA and date coaching entries, so don?t worry about PE turning into a relationship/dating blog.

It is important, though, that you recognize that relationship/dating is a part of life and a part of personal growth, which is why I?m even covering these series on PE to begin with.

Personally, I write about LA and date coaching because PE is partly about me sharing my life?s lessons and life?s journey with you. I?ve come to the point where having a relationship has become a priority on my intentions list, and hence these new articles surrounding dating. I also feel that dating and romance is a personal growth topic that is often fuzzed with misguided advice, so I?d like to share firsthand advice with all of you by openly embarking on this journey.

Hopefully you will follow my journey and learn a thing or two from my new date coaching series. Thank you and enjoy.

Date Coaching: Introduction

What is?date coaching? It?s coaching to help someone present his/her best self during dates, get the best out of his/her dates, and maximize his/her chances for relationship success.

Is it necessary to have a date coach? Most people would probably resist to the idea of having a date coach (or even image coach for that matter), as it would suggest that the he/she has issues with his/her dating skills (or image).

I?ve never thought of getting a date coach, to be honest. However, when Violet?and Jamie (the co-founders of LA)?asked me if I would like to be dated coached, as part of my LA experience, I thought?hey, why not?

As a (life) coach myself, I know that coaching isn?t about ?fixing? someone, but about betterment. There is never anything ?right? or ?wrong? with anyone, only a whole well of potential to be harnessed and released. Throughout my years of running PE, I?ve continuously coached very talented, capable, and intelligent individuals to reach elevated levels of success; in fact, many of my clients are more successful than people I know who shy away or resist from coaching. I?ve come to realize that it is the people who openly seek my coaching who actually better achievers than those who resist being coached, because the former are open to change, and allow themselves to receive valuable feedback to improve and achieved their personal goals.

Hence, I?m gamely opening myself up to date coaching to improve myself, uncover my?blind spots?in the area of dating,?and (hopefully) become a better date and relationship partner!

Date Coaching with Kydon

For the value-added date coaching services (not part of the default LA package, but a value-added service which a member has to sign up for), Lunch Actually has partnered with Kydon Tay from?Courage Gym. (And uh,?no, it?s not a fitness center but the name of his company which specializes in dating and relationship coaching).

Kydon is a leading date coach in Singapore who coaches and trains people on how to go from ?forever single? to happily married. He started his date coaching business two years ago in 2010, which has since grown quickly to become a successful coaching business today. Kydon has acquainted himself with the art of dating and relationship success since over a decade ago, and having achieved success in his personal dating life (Kydon is happily married today!) and helped his friends to achieve relationship success, he decided to start?Courage Gym?to help other singles out there do the same!

So far, I?ve?one pre-coaching session (three weeks ago) and one official date coaching session (this week) with Kydon, and I love, love, love him! I?ve been?unofficially referring to Kydon as my relationship and dating shrink , and I?ve no doubt that our upcoming sessions will be phenomenally helpful in my dating journey.

While each session is supposed to be one hour long (there are supposed to be seven sessions as part of the official date coaching journey, not including the pre-coaching session), Kydon has been very gracious in his time with me. Our pre-coaching session lasted almost three hours long, while our first official session yesterday was about two hours long! I appreciate him spending all this extra time with me, as I know that timeliness is quite important in the area of coaching (especially when you bill by the hour).

Key Lessons I?ve Picked Up So Far

For my date coaching series, I?m going to focus on lessons I learn, rather than a step-by-step account of what we cover, as that can be quite rhetorical.

In the two sessions we?ve had so far, Kydon and I discussed and shared?many things with each other. Below are the top valuable?lessons I?ve picked up from the sessions so far.

1. Be a more open dater (and how to do so).

I used to be quick (and harsh) at evaluating whether I would want to go out a guy (on a date or subsequent dates). It was part of having a terminal view (as opposed to a nurturing view) in relationships, something which I?ve written about in Tip #8?of?8 Tips on Attracting Authentic Love Into Your Life. (I?ve changed that manner of thinking (even before I embarked on date coaching with Kydon).)

Kydon gave me a framework to use in dating which I found very useful.

1. When dating, open yourself to a first date if the person gets a score of 4?10/10 on your interest or ?like? scale.?Meaning, if you utterly detest this person and he/she gets a 0, 1, 2, or 3/10 score from you, then no, don?t go on a first date with him/her; otherwise, open yourself up to a first date.
2. Use this same approach when it comes to deciding whether to go on a second date.
3. Only make conclusions about whether you want to continue dating a person when you?ve gone for at least two dates with him/her.

2.?Everyone can be the ?right? person.

Many of us commonly cite the reason ?not meeting the right person? behind our single status. While this reason is perfectly valid, Kydon made a comment which really caught my mind. He said that there are people everywhere and all these people are potential relationship partners.

Yes, yes, I know some of you are probably balking at that statement, thinking, ?But those people are not compatible with me,? or ?I?m not interested in those people at all,? or ?I have certain expectations for who I want as my partner and those people are simply not that.? These are the same viewpoints I had adopted in the past, so I totally understand where you are coming from.

Sure, it is true that we want to be with someone who shares compatible values. Sure, it is true that the other party should at least share some fundamental commonalities with us so as to build a meaningful bond. These are also what I call the ?big rocks? of a relationship, i.e., you need to have some core fundamentals in place for a relationship to work out in the long term.

However, I feel Kydon?s point is that rather than be enclosed about who we can (or want to) be with, we should consider that everyone is actually a potential relationship partner, and that it?s a matter of whether we want to make things work out. Adopting this view has really opened my mind actually; I see this as a huge step up in embracing a nurturing rather than a terminal view in relationships (reference to Tip?#8?of?8 Tips on Attracting Authentic Love Into Your Life). This is undoubtedly critical in increasing your odds of being in a healthy, long-term relationship.

3. People are always changing, so never say ?never?.

Still in the same line of thought about how we should have a more nurturing rather than terminal view, Kydon said that people are always changing, all the time. We change as we enter different phases of life; we change even on a day to day basis. You change, I change, and so do other people.

Hence, just because someone may not be compatible with you today, doesn?t mean the person wouldn?t be compatible with you tomorrow. So don?t be quick to write off someone when it comes to dating. You never know how things may be in the future.

4.?Create solutions, not focus on problems.

There?s a tendency for us to obsessed with differences when with someone. Always focus on creating solutions, rather than harp on the differences. There will always be differences and it?s up to you to work through them with the other party.

(These are in line with what Principles #2 and #7 in?10 Timeless Principles for Lasting Happiness.)

5. See the person for his/her potential, not who he/she is today.

What do most of us do when we want to assess if someone has what we are looking for as a relationship partner?

Most of us would probably look at the person?s accomplishments, life history, current career, possibly income, physical appearance, current assets (such as house, car, and wealth), personality, etiquette, behavioral patterns, and so on. These are external aspects of the person that have already been realized and are part of the person?s makeup today.

How about seeing the person for his/her potential instead? How does that sound?

Kydon introduced this idea to me which I found incredibly insightful. I?ve never really thought about assessing potential relationship partners this way; it was an eye opener for me. So rather than consider the person for what he/she has already done or already is today, evaluate the person based on the person he/she can be?in the future. See the potential that is in him/her (and everyone has infinite potential, so disputes about that). Then, inspire that potential out of the person.

I suppose this is why people become so much more successful and accomplished when they are in a fulfilling relationship?because their partners are able to inspire the potential out of them.?Kydon shared with me the example of Rosa Lee Beeland, Napoleon Hill?s wife. Napoleon Hill was the author of the critically acclaimed Think and Grow Rich!?(1937), one of the best-selling books of all time.

When Rosa married Napoleon Hill, he had not reached the peak of his success yet. Rosa married Napoleon because she saw the potential for greatness that was in him; she subsequently inspired this greatness out of him. It was with Rosa that Napoleon wrote Think and Grow Rich!, which was initially balked by Napoleon?s publisher; it was under Rosa?s insistence that Napoleon?s publisher gave his manuscript a more thorough reading. Think and Grow Rich!?was subsequently published, became Hill?s greatest work, and is now regarded as one of the greatest self-improvement book of all time, with more than 30 million copies sold worldwide.

So rather than size people up for who they are today or what they have done, now I focus on seeing the potential that lies in people. The funny thing is that I?ve been doing this in the area of coaching and helping others, but never thought to think this way where it comes to dating and relationships. I think this will definitely be essential in helping me to meet and be with the right person.

Next Up?

Kydon and I have touched base on several other topics, which I?ll share in upcoming entries.

I want to make the parts of this dating series digestible rather than stuff everything in one post, especially since the five lessons I?ve shared above are already critical lessons in themselves. I think simply taking those five lessons to heart and applying them religiously will increase your ?dateability? (quality of being dateable) by like, two to three times at the very least.

My next entry?will be about the Wheel of Dating (like the Life Wheel, but applies to dating), a wheel that Kydon created for his date coaching, and how I fared in it. Stay tuned!

Feel free to share any comments or feedback in the comments section. Do you appreciate this new series? What do you think about the lessons I?ve shared above? I?d love to hear from you.

Till next time, smile more and love openly everyone!

Source: http://personalexcellence.co/blog/date-coaching-part-1/

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