Michelle Cove - Seeking Happily Ever After: Navigating the Ups and Downs of Being Single Without Losing Your Mind (and Finding Lasting Love Along the Way)

Seeking Happily Ever After: Navigating the Ups and Downs of Being Single Without Losing Your Mind (and Finding Lasting Love Along the Way) — read online for free the complete book (whole text) full work

Below is the text of the book, divided by pages. System saving the place of the last page read, allows you to conveniently read the book "Seeking Happily Ever After: Navigating the Ups and Downs of Being Single Without Losing Your Mind (and Finding Lasting Love Along the Way)" online for free, without having to search again every time where you left off. Put a bookmark, and you can go to the page where you finished reading at any time.

Light

Font size:

↓

↑

Georgia Tahoma Arial Verdana

Reset

Interval:

↓

↑

Bookmark:

Make

1234567...62

Table of Contents

Praise for Seeking Happily Ever After

Finally, a book that single women can relate to! Too often, self-help books operate on fear-mongeringaiming to convince women that they have some major defect preventing them from finding Mr. Right and they better fix it. Michelle Cove starts with the assumption that single women are just fine as they are and then provides warm, friendly, and wise advice to help women be their happiest selves, no matter what stage of being single they are in.

COURTNEY E. MARTIN, EDITOR, FEMINISTING.COM, AND AUTHOR OF Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters: How the Quest for Perfection Is Harming Young Women

This book is for every woman whos single and been told to rush toward the altar, but who knows that her lifeher own precious, dynamic, exciting, lifeis full and worthwhile. This book is an affirmation that no woman should settle for less than she deserves. Its a toast to all the young women who know they deserve everything they want, and it reminds them that they shouldnt settle for lessnot in friends, not in careers, and certainly not in romantic partners. Michelle Cove is a storyteller, helping women script their own contemporary, sassy, happy endings.

BETH JONES, COAUTHOR OF Three Wishes: A True Story of Good Friends, Crushing Heartbreak, and Astonishing Luck on Our Way to Love and Motherhood

If the question is, Why are you still single? the answer can be found in this book. Michelle Cove has created a boot camp for single women who need a reminder that they are islands of sanity in an insane worldnot the other way around. Every woman will relate to at least one of the real-life stories. It should be required reading for women over thirty who are tired of feeling pressure to marry. Give it as a gift to your married friends and family who have forgotten what its like to be single, since they keep asking, When are you gonna get married?

LARA D YAN, COHOST OF ChickChat

While so many books on the market for single women try to teach readers how to make men love them, this is a book that gives women the steps to help them genuinely love themselves. Better yet, Michelle Cove offers these steps in a friendly, compassionate, even humorous tone so it feels like spending time with your wisest best friend.

JOSIE BROWN, EDITOR, SINGLEMINDEDWOMEN.COM, AND COAUTHOR OF The Complete Idiots Guide to Finding Mr. Right

Michelle Cove delivers. In the opening pages of her book, she says her book will not help the single woman fall in love. Instead she offers strategies for creating lasting love. Her book brims with action plans that enable a woman to use her inner voice. Cove believes in joy and balance, not stress and relentless pursuit. I happen to be married and yet the book spoke to me as well. Its a wake-up call for all women (all people?) to get back in touch with what makes them wonderful, what makes them worth marrying in the first place.

SHULAMIT REINHARZ, FOUNDER AND DIRECTOR, WOMENS STUDIES RESEARCH CENTER AND HADASSAH-BRANDEIS INSTITUTE

Cove talks as if shes sitting over coffee with you in the kitchen, urging you to listen to your inner voice as well as offering good solid adviceadvice youll want, regardless your shade of single.

DR. KAREN GAIL LEWIS, AUTHOR OF With or Without a Man: Single Women Taking Control of Their Lives

What I love so much about this book is its friendly but no-nonsense approach to what its like being single today, and how much better life can be with just a tweak of your mind-set. Michelle Coves steps are so specific and easy to use that right away readers will learn to tune out the outside voices questioning them, and readers will feel truly empowered. This is a book that will inspire single women of all ages to take charge of their lives!

KERRY DAVID, AWARD-WINNING PRODUCER OF Seeking Happily Ever After AND My Date with Drew

MICHELLE COVE

JEREMY P. TARCHER/PENGUIN
a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
New York

For the bold single women who trusted me with
their personal stories and allowed me to
share these stories for the greater good...

Introduction

Scene from the 2008 filmBaby Mama:

Kate (played by Tina Fey) is sitting at dinner with her sister and her mother:

Mother: You know, Kate, not everyone is as tolerant of your alternative lifestyle as we are.

Kate: Being single is not an alternative lifestyle

Mother: It is when youre thirty-seven!

What single woman hasnt been made to feel like she is a social screwup? According to a 2007 New York Times article, 51 percent of women are singleand yet somehow being unmarried is still considered an oddball lifestyle. If youre like most singles, youve been bombarded with questions like, How long have you been alone? and Are you doing that online dating? and Why is someone as great as you still not married? The message is clear: There is something wrong with you, and youd better fix it.

On vulnerable days, its easy to buy into the idea that you have a major defect. After all, it sure seems easy for billions of other women around the world to get hitched and have babies. Youre a bright, lovely person. Why not you? On other days, the commentary seems ridiculous, and you feel secure knowing you didnt settle for the wrong guy. Sure, Id like to find someone, you think, but there is nothing wrong with me. Heck, maybe you dont even want to marry.

How confident you feel may depend on the day. There are times when you appreciate the upsides of being single: You get to choose how you want to live without major compromise; you dont have to check in with anyone if youre enjoying yourself and want to stay out longer; you dont need permission before making vacation plans or spending money however you see fit. There is the thrill and endorphin rush of that first kiss that most married people will never experience again. Oh, and theres the joy of walking past screaming babies in strollers and knowing you dont have to deal with that.

Then there are days when you wonder if you will ever find the right person, or whether the guy youre currently with is him. If youre not dating, there are moments of loneliness, cravings for intimacy (or flat-out sex), maybe fear of what a life without marriage looks like, and an urge to feel more settled. If you are dating, or even committed, you may have doubts about whether you picked the right guy and/or what kind of relationship you want with him.

You know from listening to your married friends that its not perfect on their side of the fence (they tell you routinely how lucky you are that you get to focus on yourself). But whats clear is that married folks, content or not, are on the right side of the fence, the one that proves they are normal. We live in a culture where the wedding is the finish line. If thats true, youre falling behind.

EVERYBODYS FAVORITE PET PROJECT

Having married in my thirties, Ive lived on both sides of the fence. As a single woman, I found my life was frequently considered a puzzle for others to solve. Strangers sitting next to me on the plane or at a dinner party would ask, Are you married? When Id say no, the onslaught would begin: My closest friend was single for the longest time, but then she met someone on Match.com and she couldnt be happier! or I have a second cousin in Kentucky who I think is single and Im going to tell him about you, or My mothers sister waited too long to think about marriage and now shes aloneits so sad.

Next page

1234567...62

Light

Font size:

↓

↑

Georgia Tahoma Arial Verdana

Reset

Interval:

↓

↑

Bookmark:

Make

Similar books «Seeking Happily Ever After: Navigating the Ups and Downs of Being Single Without Losing Your Mind (and Finding Lasting Love Along the Way)»

Look at similar books to Seeking Happily Ever After: Navigating the Ups and Downs of Being Single Without Losing Your Mind (and Finding Lasting Love Along the Way). We have selected literature similar in name and meaning in the hope of providing readers with more options to find new, interesting, not yet read works.

Lisa Skriloff

Men Are From Cyberspace: The Single Womans Guide To Flirting, Dating, & Finding Love

Marcia Naomi Berger

Marriage Minded: An A to Z Dating Guide for Lasting Love

June Hunt

Singleness: How to Be Single and Satisfied

Leslie Ludy

Sacred Singleness: The Set-Apart Girls Guide to Purpose and Fulfillment

June Hunt

Singleness

Michelle Goodman

The Anti 9 to 5 Guide: Practical Career Advice for Women Who Think Outside the Cube

Michelle McKinney Hammond

What to Do Until Love Finds You: The Bestselling Guide to Preparing Yourself for Your Perfect Mate

Michelle McKinney Hammond

Sassy, Single, and Satisfied Devotional: Inspiration for Todays Woman

T. D. Jakes

Promises from God for Single Women

Wendy Paris

Happily Ever After: The Fairy-tale Formula for Lasting Love

Michelle McKinney Hammond

How to Get the Best Out of Your Man

Mark Ballenger

100 Relationship Signs: How to Know What God Is Saying to You in Singleness and Dating

Discussion, reviews of the book Seeking Happily Ever After: Navigating the Ups and Downs of Being Single Without Losing Your Mind (and Finding Lasting Love Along the Way) and just readers' own opinions. Leave your comments, write what you think about the work, its meaning or the main characters. Specify what exactly you liked and what you didn't like, and why you think so.