Prototype Issue
The Dating Repair Kit: How to Have a Fabulous Love Life
By Amy Klein
(page 1 of 1)Dating books are like exercise programs: It doesn’t matter which one you pick, and as long as you commit to a regimen—any regimen—you’re bound to garner improvements. It also beats sitting on your couch eating Häagen-Dazs.
Marni Kamins and Janice MacLeod, authors of The Dating Repair Kit: How to Have a Fabulous Love Life (Conari Press, 2007), agree: You’re never going to meet someone sitting on your couch. The authors of The Breakup Repair Kit (Conari, 2004) have created an advice book that doesn’t take itself too seriously—it’s a red, rectangular paperback that’s illustrated with lithe, happy cartoons and peppered with quotes from Rumi,Yoda and other sages.
It can’t be boiled down to one line like some popular dating books. The authors’ five-step program—the steps are removing baggage, fantasizing, taking baby steps, confronting your excuses and dating smarter—boils down to this: The secret to being happy together is being happy alone.
Kamins and MacLeod’s advice is definitely suited to the West Coast’s Tinseltown crowd. They counsel against “flaking” (a local tradition), leaving men hanging (ibid), becoming so busy there’s no room for someone else (a bicoastal phenomenon) and jumping into sex too quickly (their advice is to wait for an antediluvian 90 days!).
While most of their advice is practical, it’s the new age, positive thinking—or, as we say in LA, “manifesting”—that makes the advice fun. Consider the special “prayer” one can recite for 30 days: “I attract a partner who is as willing as I to work at having and sharing a healthy relationship. We are a match made in heaven to better this earth.”
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