This principle is near and dear to my heart. It’s coming up for me today as I read the list of my “Purpose Principles™” for the book proposal.

Early on as a young girl, I remember sitting in the back of my dad’s Cadillac. His friend in the front seat turned around to me in the back and asked, “Travis, what do you want to be when you grow up?”

It was 1976. I was 5. Without missing a beat, I answered, “President of the United States.” There it was. I wanted to be leader of the free world at 5.

I didn’t keep this vision clear through high school or college. I steered more to breaking the rules and “getting around things” than playing the straight and narrow. Didn’t seem like as much fun. What that statement shows is that I wanted to lead early on. Be the leader. Be in front.

Getting into the corporate world of selling clothes, marketing make-up, and creating advertising campaigns, I did not loose the thirst for being the front-runner until my last position. All of a sudden, I was faced with marketing a brand that was all about “living a balanced life,” but no one who I worked with did that. In fact, it was really the opposite. You were seen as an achiever if you could complain most about how much time you put into the job versus yourself, your family, your life. A crossroad of ideals. While I marketed outwardly to live a balanced life, I was flying all over the country only leaving room for work. At this crossroads, I saw a woman who was looking to loose her hard edge.

The hard edge had been dissipating since 2003 as I faced some of my own internal struggles and stood-up to some outward ones. See, for 33 years, I’d been striving to be the leader, not leaving space for anyone else.

What did this bring me in my relationships? The leadership position. Just as the law of attraction states, I got exactly what I wanted. I didn’t realize until I was firmly planted in that position that it wasn’t really the place I wanted to be. I needed to make a conscious attempt to not have all the ideas, not have all the answers and go with the flow where I could.

In Dating With A Purpose, this began to really pay-off. Men stepped up to the plate. They had the plan. The Coach came into the picture. I remember how he plans… not like me, having almost every nanosecond accounted for, but like a man who believes things always work out, a real faith.

He may know what band we’d see, or an idea about something to do, but there was always space for the unexpected. And I mean the goodness of the unexpected. He believes things work out for the best. And you know what, then they do.

Fast-forward to now, and the planning of our honeymoon and living together. My old tendencies are creeping back in. I keep saying outwardly that I don’t want to be the leader of everything, and yet I keep stepping in not leaving enough space for the Coach.

It is amazing to me how I’ll work so hard, be so conscious, and change a pattern. And how a year, two years go by and the pattern creeps back in. I think it’s the Universe’s way of testing me to make sure I’ve really gotten the lesson and changed my ways.

Purpose Principle #7 is not just a dating principle for me; it’s a life principle.

“I’m tired already. Let him lead,” I have to remind myself.

He probably won’t do it like I would (what ever “it” is). And his timeline will surely be different. “It” will always get done. Somehow when the Coach leads, it’s more fun, and there is always a surprise. If I’m always trying to lead, where is the room for the Coach? And the faith that everything works out?

[Photo from nathanborror via Flickr]