Dear Henrietta,
Valentine’s Day is coming and I’m feeling lonely and lost because I recently broke up with my boyfriend. I really want to meet that “special someone” but I don’t know how to find him. What do I do?
Signed,
Looking for Love (In All the Wrong Places)
Dear Looking for Love,
Here’s my best advice: stop looking. Instead, focus on YOU.
Relationships take time, commitment and often an unreasonable amount of energy—especially if you are with the wrong person. If you just got out of a relationship, take time for yourself to regroup and don’t rush into anything new.
The first step is to exfoliate your ex from your psyche. Forget about him!
Next, make a list of things that you want to do for YOU. Have you always wanted to learn to ballroom dance? Take cooking lessons? Volunteer for a local organization? Now is the time to do it. Brainstorm. Talk with your girlfriends. Weed out the ones that are toxic waste-dumps. Start fresh.
Are you feeling comfortable in your own body? If not, start a new fitness plan. This doesn’t have to be a big change…maybe it just means taking the dog for a walk every morning for a week. Then the next week you can add walk again after work. Soon enough it will become a habit that both you and your pup enjoy!
Last, focus on your own values and goals, and in the process gain the confidence you need to start living the life that you’ve always imagined for yourself. Nothing is sexier than a self-assured woman who knows who she is and what she wants.
So there you are! I hope this helps! And remember: romance is the icing, but love is the cake, so learn to love YOU first!
Love,
Henrietta
Henrietta Craven was born and raised in New Bern and enjoys gardening, hunting bears and improvisational dance. She is a self-proclaimed expert on a wide variety of subjects including (but not limited to) fashion, mixology, and automotive repair. Henrietta resides in a lovely Victorian home in downtown New Bern with her five cats: Graffenreid, Bethune, Devereux, Stanton and Carraway.
If you have a problem, and would like Henrietta to give you some advice,
please send a note to: henrietta@newbernmagazine.com