Matchmaking for Marriage Relationship (II)

<b>Why employing matchmaking service</b>
   
Different people would have different reasons when going for matchmakers or matchmaking service. But certainly they have one common ground -- they are all serious love and marriage seekers desperately looking for long-term love and marriage relationships.

The following quotes nearly summarize almost all overt reasons why nowadays more and more people are employing matchmakers or matchmaking service:

"...Tired of chance meetings: Compatible Introductions will introduce you to many more compatible people that you could ever meet by chance in a relatively short period of time.
Time is a precious commodity in the 21st century: You don't want to waste time meeting people who have nothing in common with you.
Safety: All of our members are carefully pre-screened. We meet and interview all our new members personally.
Personalized and individual: we always inform you in advance personally before you are introduced to a compatible member.
No 'blind date': you see the person in a color photo before you are going to me.
Ready for Commitment: Our members are sincerely interested in finding a compatible mate.
You are selective: You want to know whom you are going to meet in advance.
You achieved your professional goals... now is the time to focus on your personal goals..."

"...Matchmaking services are a perfect alternative to pubs and clubs ... completely confidential and you know you are meeting genuine singles who are prepared to invest cash to meet someone suitable for a relationship or friendship..."

"...discreet, safe and caring way of finding a real relationship in today's uncertain environment..."

"...Most busy professionals don't have the time and resources for meeting other single, successful people outside of their own office, industry or social circle. A matchmaker has unique access to quality people.
A personal matchmaker can screen and pre-qualify the right matches for you similar to the way an executive recruiter screens candidates for a specific job.
It's all about TARGET MARKETING.
Sometimes, single people are guilty of selecting Mr. or Mrs. wrong over and over again. A matchmaker keeps you from repeating the same pitfalls of the past.
A personal matchmaker provides the privilege of a wide variety of choices. It's a 'numbers' game, but working with a matchmaker, there's an ongoing supply of highly desirable people to choose from.
It's more dignified and safe. You don't have to suffer the awkward indignity of blind dating or barhopping. With a matchmaker, you are guaranteed to meet people who you want to meet and who want to meet you one-on-one.
No more singles events, clubs or mixers with no guarantee of who you meet and/or if they'll measure up. A matchmaker caters to commitment-minded single men and women. Whether the goal is marriage or an exclusive relationship, an introduction service takes you beyond simply meeting new people. Its sole purpose is to introduce you to a sufficient number of pre-screened individuals who are more likely to be suitable matches.
A matchmaker represents many intangible aspects of a person's identity beyond what a simple photo and vital statistics could ever convey. And nobody likes the arrogance of someone tooting his or her own horn. Instead of bragging about yourself and all that you have to offer, let the experts do it for you in a much more objective and credible way..."

"Quality Singles... introduces you to great people you'd never meet on your own.
No Games - Online chat seldom works... for people who truly want to meet someone special and don't have time to play games.
Meet Serious Singles...don't just want to date. They are interested in meaningful long-term relationships."

Marriage Counseling: Using Games to Reduce Tension

Marriage is one of the most enjoyable but also one of the most painful experiences that people undergo. It carries with it the whiff of romance and eternal bliss, but sometimes you get a pack of thorns instead.

How Do You Ensure Your Marriage Is a Bed of Roses and not Thorns?
One of the major ingredients that a happy marriage needs is a willingness to compromise. But that is much more difficult than it seems. Everyone will agree that they need to compromise, but what happens when the issue is not a simple and tiny one? What then? Who Compromises first? I am sure you must have said to yourself at one point or another that enough is enough. You will no longer be the patsy. You are an independent person and your partner has crossed the line. Maybe.

Maybe your relationship has died and you are just beginning to realize it. Maybe your sentiments are more passionate than romantic. Maybe you no longer love her.

Stop being a fool!
What if I told you that the solution to your marital strife is not divorce. Am I mad?

Look around. How many divorces do you know? Plenty. Me too. But are they really happier off?

What is the first thing that a divorced person does? He or she goes out and starts looking for partners.

Isn't that strange? No. You say that everybody needs somebody to love. Maybe. I say that they had that somebody and they just let them go. So please stop being foolish.

Why not tackle your problems with a simple suggestion? A Game.

Games as a Peace Maker:
Playing brings out the child in us and causes us to express more than we normally would. We also release bottled up frustration and let go of mental thorns in our outbursts of joy and anguish as we win or lose. Games unite people together and therefore I suggest playing together but if you wish one can play against the other. The game turns into a battle but only this time, after its over, you will both feel refreshed from losing all that bottled up pain and anger.

Games to Pick From:
Try picking games that both of you like or at least somewhat active ones. You could even play hide and seek in the house or something else. If you do prefer playing cards, pick a game which does not go on for long and which requires some thinking like hearts, poker, bridge or rummy. Keep score and determine before hand that the loser has to do something for the winner. Chores is not a prize for the winner! If you lose you have to do something that that the other person wants for themselves like give them their favorite massage or cook them their favorite meal.

Conclusion:
Games are a welcome ambrosia to love and will excite you as a couple to disregard all your frustrations and anger and deal only with the good. The anger and frustrations will not magically disappear, but now you can deal with them together calmly and in a good mood.

How to Meet that Special Someone

Chances are unless you are very lucky you will go thru many different relationships before you find your special someone. Finding your sole mate is like gambling. In poker and blackjack you may have to play dozens of hands until you get a winning hand, and it is the same with relationships.

During your life you will probably meet some people who seem like they may be the one, or that they are close, but still have the feeling that something else is missing. My advice is that if you are not happy, because something seems like it is missing, then it usually is not right.

Before I found my special someone, I was in a relationship for over 10 years, and I thought everything was great, until I started to seriously consider getting married. Then I noticed that we had so little in common and in reality wanted so many different things out of life and one day we both realized there was much about each of us that we both wanted from someone, but it was not us that we wanted.

Then one day I decided I had enough of trying to go to clubs and bars to meet people. I was sick and tired of trying to find someone in the time it takes to finish a drink. It always seemed the ladies I would meet were all wrong for me, or they seemed great after talking to them for 5 minutes but they seemed to have no interest in me.

Then one day I had an idea, it was not an original idea but I decided to use the internet to try to find the right person for me. So I proceeded to make a myspace profile. On this page I tried to put the real me and not the funny guy trying to be charming that was looking for love at the bar.

And as I would at the poker rooms I went all in, I poured my heart and sole into this. I wrote what I wanted and wrote down who I truly think I am and not who I want to be, and I was rewarded by 1 email responding to my site.

It was amazing; the response I got was like a dream. Imagine you are sitting in a Las Vegas casino playing poker. You are down to your last few dollars, you go all in and you wind up being dealt a Royal Flush, and suddenly the sky is bluer, the grass is greener, and all your worries seem to just fade away.

At first things were a little awkward for the both of us. We decided to hold of on actually meeting until we got to know each other first. We spent a month just talking everyday on the internet. You can really open up to someone and show them the real you and not have to worry about rejection on the internet, after all you are just a faceless ghost, and if things don’t work out you could be sitting next to her on the bus one day without ever knowing it.

The key to finding happiness is realizing you are going to bust more then you are going to get blackjack, but you must keep trying, trying to remember you only need to find the real thing once.

Curing Cyber-Sex Infidelity

Studies show that about 60% of married men cheat at least once in their marriage and about 40% of women are unfaithful, too.

Both men and women are very capable of being unfaithful in marriage even though society perceives men to be the sex that cheats; this stereotype is not true, though - both men and women are unfaithful in marriage.

Some psychologists even predict that the number of women who are unfaithful in marriage is far higher. Reasons given are that women are not as prone to being caught and men are more honest about it when confronted. So, what really causes a spouse to become unfaithful?

Although unknown for sure, it is safe to say that ever since we have had marriage, we have also had adultery. It is not a likely thing to want to admit but adultery dates back to biblical times.

For example, Jesus went to the Mount of Olives and spoke about a woman who had sex without marriage. Adultery was then punishable by stoning to death. Jesus told the accusers, "Let the person without sin throw the first stone." Since the discovery of social networking sites, dating sites and chat rooms, being unfaithful in marriage - especially through the Internet - has skyrocketed despite Biblical admonitions against it.

Such websites as The Ashley Madison Agency have even turned to making a profit from those who become unfaithful in their marriage. The website is solely designed for those married spouses who are seeking to become unfaithful in their marriage.

Consider this fact reported last year at a convention of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers: Two-thirds of attorneys surveyed said the Internet played a significant role in the termination of marriage in the prior 12 months with excessive interest in online porn contributing to more than half of such cases. As discussed below, many of these instances were uncovered through spy software.

Interestingly enough, this subject has also spawned a new type of software - spy software. Spy software is not spyware! Since it is becoming increasingly difficult to find out whether your spouse has been, or is being, unfaithful, especially through the secrecy of the web, "significant others" use spy software more and more to uncover the truth about their relationships.

Marriage partners are employing spy software to check on the spouse they are suspicious about through the computer.

Studies show most of the time a spouse will begin unfaithfulness on the family computer and that is why spy software is so potent!

The difficulty arises when a spouse starts using a business computer or laptop to abandon their marriage. There is plenty of software on the market for this though, but one brand of spy software that surpasses all of the competition is that of Awareness Technologies of Marina del Rey, California.

The key to spy software is to choose one that monitor's everything your spouse does. The Awareness spy software uniquely monitors Instant Messages, email, desktop activity, websites, and even logs all keystrokes. Spy software is easy to install and in the case of WebWatcher or SONAR, easy to monitor.

Suspecting that your spouse is cheating is a feeling that you do not want to admit, but it is also something that you do not want to disregard, either. Marriage is based on trust and loyalty and while you may only suspect that your spouse is being unfaithful, you have to trust your instincts and verify it with products such as Awareness Technologies' spy software - if for no other reason than to maintain your sanity.

How to throw a Poker game in your Home without your wife finding out

Title: How to throw a Poker game in your Home without your wife finding out Word Count: 552 Summary: It is not uncommon for a man to want to have a night out with the boys, maybe play a little poker. It is also not uncommon to have the plans of men thwarted by their wives. Keywords: Poker, marriage, vacation, poker game, online poker,poker room,scavenger hunt, anniversary, entertainment Article Body: It is not uncommon for a man to want to have a night out with the boys, maybe play a little poker. It is also not uncommon to have the plans of men thwarted by their wives. To help with this problem I am telling you the secrets about how to have some harmless fun at home without the wife catching on. The best way to get rid of the wife so you can have a little “Man Time” is the easiest but most expensive way to do it. For her birthday you get her and one of her friends a trip to a weekend spa place. Your wife will think you the best hubby ever and will never suspect you are going to throw a poker game in her absence, and the best part of this plan is that when it is over your wife will be so grateful for what you have done she may be more inclined to allow you to go out with the boys more often. The next way is a little complicated and will only give you 4 or 5 hours of time at best, but it is much less expensive then a trip for 2. It may seem a little childish and yes I also have seen it on TV but a scavenger hunt scam can work. The trick to the scavenger hunt is that each spot has to mean something. An example would be the first place you ever went on a date as one of the places she needs to go. The end of the game is the most important make the last stop a restaurant and make sure to be there before she does. A good idea is to try to think of something meaning full in the area of where you live so you do not have far to drive, this will leave you the maximum amount of time to lay poker with your pals. I have to admit this is not the ideal way to play poker, but getting away with even an hour of poker without her knowing is more excitement than any regular poker game could ever be. Now that you have a plan to get her out of the house you need to be ready to go. The most important part of this is a large plastic drop cloth. This is so that if anything spills it will be simple to clean up. Make sure you are ready to go with the table and chairs and make sure they get put back exactly the same as when you took them. You may want to use a digital camera to make sure you remember exactly how everything was before the game, because I promise you that you wife does. If you send your wife on the trip I do not recommend using a cleaning service right before she comes back. If the house is too clean she will know something funny is going on The last two tips I have is to make sure that you have a really nice gift around at all times just incase she finds out, and the other is that if your wife and your friends wives are friends do not invite those friends, if one guy gets caught you will all get caught. Good Luck.

A Clothing Optional Vacation - Give A Unique Father's Day Gift

If your husband is like most men, he is the hardest person to buy gifts for. How many new ties, power tools, or bottles of liquor does he really need? Here's a great idea for a gift this Father's Day - a vacation at a clothing optional resort.

Sound far fetched? Not really. Nude recreation is the fastest growing segment of the travel industry. It is a booming travel niche with over $400 million in annual revenues reported by USA Today newspaper. In a recent Roper poll, 25% of Americans have gone skinny dipping in mixed company. You may have already done this when you were young. Now is the time to recapture that lost freedom of your youth.

Traditionally, Americans had to go to Europe or the Caribbean to find upscale topless, nudist, or naturist resorts. In the U.S., most nude places were just rustic campgrounds, the old style "nudist colonies" that movies like the Pink Panther showed. But, in the last decade, the U.S. has now surpassed the rest of the world and has some of the finest clothing optional resorts around.

American clothing optional resorts cater to different customers. Many are still the rustic campgrounds where families with their kids go on the weekends. However, in Florida and Palm Springs, California, you will now find nudist resorts that are able to compete with the best regular 4 and 5 star resorts. Nudism in America has now grown up and some of these new resorts are considered the best in the world.

One of the most popular of these new upscale nude resorts is The Terra Cotta Inn Clothing Optional Resort and Spa. It is very popular as it was the first upscale boutique clothing optional resort to cater just to couples. So, leave the kids with the grandparents or baby sitter an be prepared to be spoiled and pampered. The press reports it is the most mainstream nudist resort in the U.S. It is truly clothing optional. Although, repeat guests go there to go nude sunbathing, sometimes "first timers" are nervous and need some time to ease into nude sunbathing. The Terra Cotta Inn is perfect for couples trying nude sunbathing for the first time. There is never any pressure. Guests go nude as soon as they feel comfortable. And everyone always feels comfortable as 99% of the guests go nude sunbathing. The Terra Cotta Inn is located in sunny Palm Springs, California. http://palmsprings.com This beautiful resort community averages 340 days of sunshine a year and is the sunniest city in America. It has world championship golf, casinos, shopping, theater, and more. Everything anyone could ask for on their vacation.

Who takes clothing optional vacations? Everyone! People have been nude sunbathing for centuries. Even one of our founding fathers, Ben Franklin was a major advocate of nude sunbathing. Now that some nude resorts have gone upscale, more and more people are discovering the fun of nude recreation. Nude sunbathers range from their 20's to 70's in age. They are teachers, nurses, doctors, lawyers, engineers, accountants, police, firefighters, movie stars, Democrats and Republicans, etc. They are everyone. What they all have in common is they wanted to try something new. They were tired of the same old boring, stuffy vacations at chain hotels, They wanted to experience something different. Nude recreation is perfect. It is a great way to add excitement to a marriage or relationship. It is very romantic. Everyone feels comfortable at clothing optional resorts because guests are screened first and everyone knows that they are not wild, orgy places. Romantic? Absolutely! But, everyone always behaves themselves around others. So it is a very safe environment for couples. And once you have stayed at a clothing optional resort, you are hooked for life. For instance, a recent TV Travel show called "Ultimate Hotels" just reported that one clothing optional resort averages just over 75% repeat guests which is one the highest repeat guest rates in the travel industry.

Why go to a clothing optional resort? You go to relax and have fun. Marie Claire Magazine in an article about nudity and body image sent a reporter to a clothing optional resort. She reported, "After a hours of lounging and chatting, I started to feel totally relaxed with both myself and my new environment... As the weekend progressed, I became more and more comfortable being naked and I sure didn't miss the pressure of picking out something to wear every morning! But most of all, I found myself feeling less critical about my body. In fact, since it was clear nobody there cared about body size, I found myself being less self-critical overall- and naturally more health-conscious." And you will have so much fun. At many of the best clothing optional resorts, you get to meet vacationers from around the world. Many life long friendships are started up from guests chatting with each other. Without wearing clothes, people are just naturally more free and friendly.

So this Father's Day, or any day for that matter, if you are looking for a new vacation experience, contact a clothing optional resort and make your next vacation a fun, nude vacation

What’s Love Got to do With it?

The following is an excerpt from the book The Culture Code by Clotaire Rapaille Published by Broadway Books; June 2006;$24.95US/$32.95CAN; 0-7679-2056-2 Copyright © 2006 Clotaire Rapaille I held imprinting sessions all over the country searching for the Code for love. During these sessions, I asked participants to focus on the word “love” without specifying whether I meant romantic love, parental love, sibling love, love of country, love of pets, or even love of a sports team. When I guided participants back to their first imprint though, a vast majority of them went to the same place. “My first experience with the word love, or related to love, was when I was four or five. In the kitchen, mother was preparing a cake, my favorite cake, a cheesecake. The smell was the smell of love. She opened the oven and I told her, ‘I love you!’ She closed the oven, came to give me a kiss, and told me, ‘I love you, too.’ Then she gave me a big portion of the cake and I knew she really meant it when she said, ‘I love you’.” -- 40-year-old man “Mother loved us so much, she cooked all Thanksgiving day. She was so happy to see her family all together again, around the table, eating . . . so much love around the table, so much food. We could not stop eating.” -- 36-year-old woman “When you are little, parents are there to care for and protect you. You have no care or worries. If something bad happens, your family is there for you. I miss this protection.” -- 58-year-old woman “The best way to describe my parents’ room is a nest. The carpet was light brown and the walls were blue. The bed was in the center of the room and had a huge white comforter. It was on this bed that I sat with my mother as a child and asked her about the world.” -- 21-year-old man “I remember lying in my mother’s lap in my early years. I remember talking with my mother and sharing caresses.” -- 65-year-old man Consistently, participants related their first experience of love to their mother’s care -- feeding them, holding them, making them feel safe. This is entirely understandable. After all, for nine months, our mothers provide us with the most perfect “resort hotel” imaginable. The room service is first-rate and available immediately upon demand, the space is neither too hot nor too cold, transportation is free, and there’s even a musical backdrop (her heartbeat) for entertainment. And even though we ultimately must leave this vacation paradise, our mothers are there for us to guide us through the transition, feeding us with their bodies, keeping us coddled and warm, taking us out to see the world, and providing numerous ways for us to occupy our time and delight in the act of learning. The nature of these responses was very consistent with the thinking of an adolescent culture. Adolescents, after all, flit from pressing for independence to acting like children throughout this period of their lives. When in the latter mode, they seek the succor (inwardly if not outwardly) of their mothers, the safe harbor provided by that all-encompassing love. Then there is the former mode, the mode that demands a rejection of home and the right to make one’s own mistakes. When I asked participants to recall their most powerful memories of love, different stories emerged. “I went to college. I was so happy. Free at last. But it did not go so well. First time I started drinking, I could not stop. Then I don’t know what happened next, I was so sick. None of the boys who were after me the night before were there to help me.” -- 50-year-old woman “I was 13 and I liked a boy but he liked someone else. This taught me a big lesson because I thought that I was prettier than her and she was fat, but I was spoiled and sometimes mean.” -- 24-year-old woman “My most powerful experience is when my parents decided to separate. I found out eavesdropping on their discussions late at night. Things were tense, but everyone wanted to be normal.” -- 37-year-old man “I have an image of a white beautiful horse and a blonde beautiful woman in a flowing crepe-like dress with a lush green forest and waterfall and a handsome man meeting and embracing her. I long to be that woman.” -- 38-year-old woman This was a different component of the adolescent experience: the part where experimentation leads to exhilaration and disappointment, to success and failure. The vast majority of these stories expressed some level of discomfort, of uneasiness with the events described, much in the way an adolescent describes experiences he doesn’t like and doesn’t understand. Remember, these stories were about the most powerful memory of love. Perhaps the most significant element of the adolescent experience, however, is the loss of innocence. There comes a point in every adolescent’s life when he realizes his ideals aren’t as gilded as they once seemed. This realization usually leads to new maturity and the acquisition of new coping tools. It also often comes, though, with a sense of disillusionment. When participants wrote of their most recent memory of love, they repeatedly told the story of lost ideals. “I know what boys want. They say they love you, but I know what they want.” -- A 35-year-old woman “I have three children from three different fathers who died in drive-by shootings. Before I die, I want once again to have a baby, to feed him, to love him, and to be loved unconditionally.” -- A 15-year old woman “I purchased a diamond for my girlfriend. I recall her taking it off in the car while we were arguing and I became infuriated. I took the ring and threw it out the window. I told her since it meant so little to her I threw it away.” -- 31-year-old man These three sets of stories -- the first imprint, the most powerful memory, and the most recent memory -- revealed a distinctly American pattern. Participants spoke repeatedly about the desire for love, the need for love, the belief in something called “True Love,” but they also spoke consistently about being disappointed in this quest. A very large percentage of the “most recent memory” stories spoke of loss, bitterness, and sadness. When it comes to love, Americans -- regardless of their ages -- view love the way an adolescent views the world: as an exciting dream that rarely reaches fulfillment. The American Culture Code for love is FALSE EXPECTATION. Without question, losing at love is an international experience. Even in cultures where marriages are arranged and courtship is rare, there are tales of forbidden love and the sad consequences when that love dies. In older cultures, though -- ones that passed through adolescence centuries ago -- the unconscious message about the expectations for love are very different. In France, the concepts of love and pleasure are intertwined. The French consider the notions of true love and “Mr. Right” irrelevant. The refinement of pleasure is paramount and romance is a highly sophisticated process. Love means helping your partner achieve as much pleasure as possible, even if this requires finding someone else to provide some of this pleasure. French couples can of course be devoted to one another, but their definition of devotion differs greatly from the American definition (fidelity, for instance, is not paramount) and their expectations are set accordingly. The Italians believe that life is a comedy rather than a tragedy and that one should laugh whenever possible. They expect love to contain strong dimensions of pleasure, beauty, and, above all, fun. If love becomes too dramatic or too hard, it is unsatisfying. The Italian culture centers very strongly on family and Italians put their mothers up on pedestals. To them, true love is maternal love. Therefore, their expectations for romantic love are lower. Men romance women, but seek true love from their mothers. Women believe that the best way to express and experience love is by becoming mothers. A man is “Mr. Right” as long as he provides a child. The Japanese offer perhaps the best illustration of the differences in attitudes toward love between an adolescent culture and an older culture. Japanese men and women often ask me to describe how westerners marry. I tell them that a young man meets a young woman (often one younger than he is himself) and they begin the process of getting to know one another. If he happens to fall deeply in love, the man will ask the woman to marry him, and if she loves him as well, she will say yes. (Obviously, it’s more complicated that this in practice, but I get the main points across this way.) Stunned expressions always meet this description. “The man is young?” the Japanese questioner will say. “If he is young, how can he possibly have enough experience to make a decision of this type? Only his parents can know what kind of marriage is appropriate for him and will allow him to raise the best family. And you say the woman is younger. That means she is even less experienced than he is!” They save their greatest contempt, though, for the notion that westerners marry for love. “Love is a temporary disease,” they tell me. “It is foolish to base something as important as the creation of a family on something so temporary.” This is still the prevalent sensibility in Japan today, even though the “content” of the Japanese culture has changed. While Japanese teens might date more often than their parents did and might spend more time meeting up at clubs, most marriages are still arranged, and few have anything to do with romance. While this all might sound terribly harsh to American ears, there is at least some logic in this sentiment. While nearly half of all American marriages end in divorce, the Japanese divorce rate is less than 2%. This is not to suggest that older cultures automatically have a clearer vision of the world. In fact, as you will see over the course of this book, there are many instances where the “adolescent” approach is the more effective one. When it comes to love, however, it is obvious that the American culture is currently in an uneasy place. A woman searches for “Mr. Right” because she believes the stories she reads in books or watches at the movies, finds someone she believes she can “change” into her ideal man, and disappointedly sees her efforts fail. A man searches for “Ms. Perfect” for many of the same reasons, finds a woman who excites him, believes it will stay this way forever, and becomes disappointed when motherhood takes her interests elsewhere. This quest for perfection is, of course, on Code -- our cultural unconscious compels us to have unrealistically high standards for love. However, as that 50% divorce rate indicates, the Code isn’t making our lives easier. Here is a case where an understanding of the Code can help those frustrated by love to go off Code in a productive manner. If you realize your unconscious expects you to fail, you can begin to look at love with more sensible goals. While understanding and respecting the tug to find “Mr. Right” or “Ms. Perfect,” one can look for someone who can be a partner, a friend, and a caring lover who can’t possibly fulfill all of one’s needs. A prominent diamond company deals with the Code in a distinctive fashion. One component of its marketing focuses on the “false expectations” the American subconscious feels about love: its ads feature couples using diamonds to profess their forever love or to confirm their commitment after years together. Another component of its marketing, however, deals with the consequences of false expectations in a clever manner: highlighting the investment and re-sale value of diamonds. Both campaigns are strongly on Code, addressing our undying belief in the permanence of romantic love and providing a useful benefit when that belief fails to pan out. Excerpted from The Culture Code by Clotaire Rapaille Copyright © 2006 by Clotaire Rapaille. Excerpted by permission of Broadway, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher. Author Dr. Clotaire Rapaille is the chairman of Archetype Discoveries Worldwide and has used this decoding approach for thirty years.. He is the personal adviser to ten high-ranking CEOs and is kept on retainer by fifty Fortune 100 companies. He has been profiled in many national media outlets, including 60 Minutes II and on the front page of the New York Times Sunday Styles section. He lives in Tuxedo Park, New York.

Marriage or Divorce — Check Your Social Security Number

Newlyweds and the recently divorced should make sure that names on their tax returns match those registered with the Social Security Administration (SSA). A mismatch between a name on the tax return and a Social Security number (SSN) could unexpectedly increase a tax bill or reduce the size of any refund. For newlyweds, the tax scenario can begin when the bride says "I do" and takes her husband's surname, but doesn't tell the SSA about the name change. If the couple files a joint tax return with her new name, the IRS computers will not be able to match the new name with the SSN. This could result in tax assessments or even an audit since the IRS may be under the impression that you are simply evading taxes. Similarly, after a divorce, a woman who had taken her husband’s name and had made that change known to the SSA should contact the SSA if she reassumes a previous name. Failure to take this action can lead to audits. Can you imagine going through an audit with your former spouse? It's easy to inform the SSA of a name change by filing Form SS-5 at a local SSA office. It usually takes two weeks to have the change verified. The form is available on the agency's Web site, www.ssa.gov, by calling toll free 1-800-772-1213 and at local offices. The SSA Web site provides the addresses of local offices.

To Relieve Wedding Tension: Apply Advice, Repeat As Necessary

For increasing the all-around tension of at least two families, there's nothing as effective as a wedding. You're throwing strangers together in a situation that may be alien to all of them. You're encouraging a clash of styles and tastes, with you and the person you love most right in the middle of it. It seems like a situation wrought with danger, disaster, and debt. But there are ways of defeating all the monsters between you and the wedding of your dreams. How about – organization? Yes, the old-fashioned concept of organization can stand you in good stead. Writing everything down. Keeping detailed forms with lists of caterers, musicians, guests, tasks, things to pick up on shopping expeditions. Organization can be better than a purple-haired, Miss-Manners-reading great aunt. When you get organized, you find yourself in control again. You know what's going on, and you know you haven't forgotten anything in the shuffle – like the ring, or the table and chair rental. And the best organization comes from a genuinely complete book. The Ultimate Wedding Planning Toolkit This is a new book on the scene. The Ultimate Wedding Planning Toolkit gives you advice on every aspect of your wedding, from how to do an outdoors wedding to how to manage your budget, how to keep your RSVPs in order, how to keep your divorced parents in order, and how to keep your mental state in order. How about these bits of advice: • Keep an emergency kit at hand for last minute medical issues (Benadryl to treat those hives!) or fashion emergencies. • If you have unruly relatives, enlist your minister or other officiant to help you maintain peace within the family using a neutral party. • Plan your wedding budget early, and take advantage of discounts by catching venues and caterers at off-peak times. But the Toolkit has more in it than just advice. It's a complete repository of all the checklists you'll need for your wedding. From the master checklist of everything that needs to be done, to later checklists of things you need to do for photography, the day of the wedding, and the honeymoon, the Workbook you'll find included in the Ultimate Wedding Planning Toolkit will help you through the whole ordeal – and help you turn it into the event of your life. The Workbook's lists are also included in the form of Excel worksheets, with handy calculations that help you easily keep track of RSVPs, of your music playlist, and of your budget. You can modify them in any way necessary for your wedding. The earlier in the process you find the Toolkit, the more useful it will be. It covers everything from the day you say "Yes," to the day you say, "I do," and afterward. You know the feeling you have when you get in the car and know exactly where you're going? The Ultimate Wedding Planning Toolkit gives you the same feeling with your wedding. What better way to start your marriage than with a beautifully-planned ceremony? For more information please visit http://www.weddingtrix.com