There may be many reasons why you haven't found your perfect partner yet. Here's one of the main reasons many of my clients haven't found theirs, and how you can eliminate it as a problem from your life.

BTN Relationships

BTN? Better than nothing.

That may sound cruel, but you can spend months certainly and often years going out with men that, deep down, you know aren't the one.

What you have in these relationships is partial compatibility. Sometimes you'll meet someone who ticks most of the boxes on your checklist but not all of them. At this point you have a choice to make, do you move on immediately or not?

Most of us have at some point been in a relationship that was almost it. It's easily possible to spend years trying to get a relationship to work when it isn't really what you want. In itself that isn't necessarily bad, we learn amazing things about ourselves in any relationship and we're generally going to grow through the experience. However if your long term goal is to get married and set up home or to have kids then you might want to do a better job of protecting your time.

There is a saying within time management philosophy which states that 'the great should never be at the mercy of the good.'

So how do you prevent yourself from getting stuck in a relationship with just the good? How do you ensure you don't get stuck in BTNs over and over again, spending years of your life in relationships that aren't going to last?

The 3 Month Rule

One of my dating clients Sheila, who's been very successful recently, told me of a strategy she's developed that she calls the three month rule. Sheila is convinced that this particular rule has already saved her a couple of years in her pursuit of Mr. Right. She was good enough to give me her permission to share it with you, so here it is.

It's very easy to understand in theory: If whoever you're seeing isn't lighting your lights after three months together then you move on. The things you want to be taking into account include the following: Is this person you're dating making enough time for you? Do you feel truly loved by them? Do you feel like they are one of your best friends? Do you feel like you can really trust your date? Do you still fancy the pants off them? Hopefully you get the general gist of where these questions are going.

Sheila's approach, which I think is brilliant, is to give it a maximum of three months to decide. This allows the relationship time to evolve and may allow you to work out some of the places where you initially feared there would be some level of conflict.

Personally I've always like three as a number, there's a beginning, a middle and then the conclusion. After three months it should be possible for you to make an informed decision about whether your potential Mr. Right is actually right for you. Your understanding of this all hinges on whether you have a clear idea of what makes a partner perfect for you. If you aren't clear on that then it makes it extremely difficult to leave. And remember, you'll be leaving people before you've argued the relationship to death and it often feels much harder as you still love them.

The upside in my experience both personally and professionally is that in the long run you get to keep someone who still feels like a friend even if youre not going to be lovers.