Luv Coach Q&A: Single and in a Slump!

My wife and I have been married for only three months and it seems as if our relationship has gotten boring. All we do is work and pay bills. Please help !The key to a healthy marriage is to find a balance between work, social time, and rest. It sounds like you and your wife are settling into a rut. Choose to change the way you live or your relationship will suffer. Sit down with your wife and work out a schedule that allows the two of you to enjoy a date night at least once a week. Plan to get tickets to a concert, theater show, movie or anything the two of you like to do together. Get creative and take a yoga class or trapeze lessons. Make sure to come up with a list of fun events that you both can share together on your date night. Choose a new restaurant, or if you're on a budget, pick a fun cheap place to dine out or prepare a picnic basket at home and eat outside under the stars. During the week, meet up for lunch, or after work for a cocktail or coffee. This is a great time to be intimate and co-create a vision of the adventurous weekend trips you would like to take. Explore your state by visiting a winery or a historic monument; or try something new and adventurous like white-water rafting or hiking. Life doesn't stop after you get married, and you have to keep doing the work if you want to reap the benefits of a successful marriage. This is your opportunity to set the stage for the type of marriage you would like to experience, so work with your mate and be creative and adventurous.

I am a 30-year-old black male living in Atlanta, a city that has a 12 to 1 ratio in favor of the black male. Well not for this black male. I have tried to meet that special someone, and I always strike out. I have met so many women and they are either not attracted to me or I am not attracted to them. I am always getting played or fall too fast, and I keep running into the wrong women. I have very high standards and know what I want, and I believe that every man has their ideal dream girl. I am a successful black man with a good career and great personality. In the end they say you are a nice guy, but I only see you as a friend and you are not my type. I am a virgin and I have never had a sexual encounter. I am beginning to think maybe something is wrong with me. My younger brother has had more action than me. I just want someone to share my life with. I feel less than a man at times. I have become discouraged that there is no one out there for me. I have even considered giving up and not looking anymore. Can you help me?

Finding the right relationship is a long-term venture, and you want to take your time and be the chooser, so stay positive and refocus. In order to learn how to date consciously, you need to be a successful single. That means knowing who you are, what you want (requirements and needs), and then following the four dating steps that teach you what to look for in a mate. The first step is scouting, which is identifying people you would like to meet on your own or through a support group. Choose someone you are physically and socially attracted to, and who shows a similar interest in you. Next you want to sort, which is the process of quickly determining if this person aligns enough with your requirements to engage the screening process. Do you have similar interests, or do you share any common traits? If you decide you want to move to the screening stage, this is the process of learning enough about them, to see if they align with your requirements (i.e. honesty, fidelity, child oriented, and addiction free, open communication). Lastly, if they pass the screening stage, you will enter the testing stage. In this stage you want to test to see if this person truly meets your requirement before becoming an exclusive couple. Does she walk the talk? You want to make sure that who she says she is, and what she says she believes matches up with the way she lives her life. These are the stages that prepare you for pre-commitment, and if you skip them you may fall into the typical dating traps you experienced before. Take the time to date consciously, and you will find a successful relationship.

10 Reasons He Wont...

Options (other women)
With so many women out there, sometimes it can be difficult to settle down. Like much of the world, women outnumber men and in the black community, the disparity is even more pronounced. Sometimes guys just want to "sow their wild oats."

The family from hell
When expectations don't mesh between the man and the woman's family, sparks can fly creating disastrous situations.

Financial issues
Money can play a large role in a relationship as two people start sharing their income. When you realize that the girl of your dreams can't keep a hold of her pocket book and she's dragging you down in the process, it becomes hard to imagine a future together.

Insecurity/trust
Sometimes relationships can have trust issues, and it makes it impossible to whole-heartedly be with someone, especially knowing they may lie or have cheated. The idea of his future wife with someone else can haunt a man.

Change in lifestyle
There are certain guys who don't want to get married simply because they like their care-free lifestyle. They don't want to compromise, they avoid responsibility and they cling to their personal space. For these men, a woman has to be pretty convincing in order to change their ways.

She already has kids
For some men, when a woman has children already, there may be a feeling that the they will never be his. They may turn away from raising another man's offspring for the sheer fact that she still has that connection to the children's father.

Geography
She may want to live in one area while he wants to live in another. He may get a job out of town that could be full of possibilities and she may be on the fast track in her own field. Simple things like geography can be a relationship killer for men when compromise is out of the question.

Social class or status
Your girl may have more money than you. Plain and simple, it can be difficult for some men to maintain relationships knowing that they aren't the primary breadwinners. This can create insecurity and actually work to emasculate some men as they may be constantly reminded by their situation or even their girl that she does in fact make more than him.

They may not be the right person
A relationship can sputter and yet reluctantly continue despite a bevy of problems and when the idea of marriage comes up, those flaws may become painfully apparent.

Divorce/Parents Never Married
Children learn what they see and if they have no role models to emulate, or if their parents weren't married, it may not be normal to them. Some men may have seen their parents go through a nasty divorce and consciously or unconsciously may fear marriage and the pain it may cause.