Dating can be difficult, regardless of your age, culture, race or character. Women find all types of personal issues to obsess about when signing up for dating sites or taking other avenues to find a significant other. Although, according to a recent study by the International Journal of Fashion Design and Education, today’s average woman wears a size 16, many women stress about competing in the dating pool with a few extra pounds. Plus-size matchmaker Nekisha Michelle wants women to know that their size has nothing to do with finding love. “The stereotype that the majority of men do not like bigger women is simply not true,” she says adamantly. “The first thing I tell women is love is not about a shape or size; it’s a state of mind.”
While many matchmakers refuse to match plus-size women or men, Michelle believes size and shape have nothing to do with a person being worthy of love: “True love comes from within, so I’ve never understood colleagues who believe they can’t match men or women of a certain size.”
Before Michelle starts giving advice, she makes it clear that she is living proof that men are attracted to all shapes and sizes, especially sizes with a few extra womanly curves.
“None of the men I’ve dated were attracted to plus-size women before they met me. It wasn’t about the shape or size; they fell in love with me,” she says.
Michelle believes she found men that were into her because she exuded BLISS, her personal acronym for beauty, love, intuition, sensuality and significance.
While she heard the same negative talk that many other women do, such as, “Girl if you could lose that weight you would find a good man” and “You have such a pretty face. If you lost weight, you would have it going on,” eventually she learned to tune that noise out.
“As long as I believed those things, that was the reality that was drawn to me, so I would meet men who agreed with me and liked me but wanted me to lose weight in order to be with me. Everything we receive is a manifestation of what we believe about ourselves,” Michelle says.
So how can you find your personal BLISS? Michelle has some great questions and suggestions to help women of all sizes figure out if they are living in their personal BLISS.
Beauty – First you must ask yourself if you’re treating yourself well. If you exude confidence, men will agree with you.
Love – Everyone enjoys the honeymoon part of love but understand that real love is a discipline. You must learn to set boundaries. Do you understand how to receive love?
Intuition – Do you trust yourself? Sometimes women would rather believe a lie, or we give people the benefit of the doubt when we know we shouldn’t. Trust your intuition and let it lead you.
Sensuality – Some women are overtly sexual, while others don’t know how to be soft and sensual. To appeal to a man, turn on a different language – soft and pleasurable. (This btw has nothing to do with sex.)
Significance – Have you found your individual purpose? If you haven’t found your purpose, everyone you meet will eventually bore you. When you are in your purpose, he is the icing but you are the cake.
If you find yourself answering no or being unsure about any of the questions/prompts above, the great thing is you can make the decision to change your reality. Michelle acknowledges most of her clients have experienced some hurt along the way and she suggests they forgive those people but most importantly that women forgive themselves for not taking better care of themselves. Most importantly, know that your destiny is in your own hands.
“You can rewrite your love story,” Michelle suggests. “We are all in control of our own lives.”
