Relationship Stages

Star Jones Reynolds, author of 'Shine: A Physical, Emotional and Spiritual Journey to Finding Love,' recently spoke to AOL Book Maven Bethanne Patrick. Here are excerpts of that interview:

Bethanne Patrick: Star, of course we all know, is on 'The View,' but right now we're talking to her because she is our newest AOL Love and Relationship Coach. And the author of a new book! What is your book about?

Star Jones Reynolds: It's funny. My book talks a lot about love and relationships. The subtitle is: 'A Physical, Emotional, and Spiritual Journey to Finding Love.' Now a lot of people think the 'love' that I'm talking about is 'the Right Guy,' but in all honesty the right guy comes when you find yourself.

Bethanne Patrick: So it's about loving yourself.

Star Jones Reynolds: It's about loving yourself so that all of the junk that you have – physically, emotionally and spiritually – is gone so that the guy can actually find you. The best part of my spiritual awakening was learning that 'a man findeth a wife' – a woman doesn't find a husband. You will find that your desires, hopes and dreams all come to fruition when the guy chases you.

Bethanne Patrick: One of the things you discuss in your book that I think is so compelling is about the stages of a relationship.

Star Jones Reynolds: I cannot believe you just asked me that. I opened the book – without us talking – to page 194, 'Stages of a Relationship.' I cannot believe you just asked that. I think you know without ever talking to me about it that in order to even start with emotional relationship building you must go through the stages.

Bethanne Patrick: What are the stages?

Star Jones Reynolds: I can't take credit for this – they came from my friend and mentor, Pastor A. R. Bernard, who has been such a great influence on my life. However, I have now refined them to my own stages. The first stage of a lasting relationship is the Introduction stage. Let me run through all four first and then I'll come back.

Bethanne Patrick: Your workshop on AOL deals individually with each stage, so I want you to run through all of them and then we're going to run through one of them in more detail.

Star Jones Reynolds: The stages of a lasting relationship are: Introduction, Acquaintance, Friendship and Intimacy. And I put them in the order that they should come.

Bethanne Patrick: That's very important for everyone to know about your book – you really believe that things have to start with the Introduction phase.

Star Jones Reynolds: Absolutely. The Introduction stage is the 'getting to know you' time. 'Where are you from?' 'What's your background?' 'Who raised you?' 'How were you raised?' 'What's your profession?' All of these things come out in the Introductory stage. The last thing you want to do – and I have heard several people say this – is, 'I woke up next to somebody and I didn't know who he was.'

Bethanne Patrick: And that can happen, not just because you've woken up next to someone after one night, it can happen later on in a relationship too.

Star Jones Reynolds: Absolutely, because you did not take time to get to know that person. I always say you can tell a lot about a person just by checking into their background. A funny way that I put it – as you know I'm a Southerner – is 'What's your name? What's your mamma's name?' That's the first two questions.

Bethanne Patrick: Now how do you get from Introduction to Acquaintance? What's Acquaintance about?

Star Jones Reynolds: The Introduction is just 'getting to know you.' The Acquaintance is when you find out what you have in common. That's a big difference. Do you both like sports? Do you want to participate in sports or are you a spectator? What about the theater? Do you like drama? Do you like comedies? Do you like musical theater? What about faith? Do you like to share your faith? Is it important to you or not? Do you both like to talk on the phone for hours, or are you somebody that wants to make a plan and get off the phone?

Bethanne Patrick: After you've gotten some of these issues sorted out you come to today's topic, which is the Friendship stage. How do you know when you've reached the Friendship stage?

Star Jones Reynolds: That's the time when you figure out: can you depend on this person? Do you have each others' back? How do you feel about loyalty and friendships and family? Can you guys share emotionally? I once was dating a guy, and when we broke up the guy said to me, 'I hope we can still be friends.' And my response was something I now consider to be a Star Jones Reynolds classic: 'You weren't good enough to be my boyfriend. What makes you good enough to think you can be my friend?' My friend is the person who I can depend on. If you think about it for a minute, the one that you're dating -- the one that you're wondering, 'Is this the one?' – should be the one that, if your house is burglarized is the one you call right away.

Bethanne Patrick: You talk a lot in the book about the fact that those circles are not huge.

Star Jones Reynolds: Not at all. One of the exercises I give in 'Shine' is for you to asses the relationships and friendships in your life, and to put them in their proper places. We tend to call everyone a friend, but there's a huge difference between a 'friend,' an 'associate,' an 'acquaintance,' a 'confidant' and an 'intimate.' An intimate is very different. An intimate is a 'second skin.' The example that I use is when you lose everything you have. For instance, I had a couple of friends who were touched by the hurricane down in New Orleans. They barely got out with a suitcase and a pair of shoes. Everything they owned was gone. The person that you call who meets you at the border with keys to their home to let you stay as long as you need to and bring your entire family, that's an Intimate.

Bethanne Patrick: And of course you want 'the one' to be someone who is an 'intimate.'

Star Jones Reynolds: Absolutely. And I have a certain way to determine 'Is he the one for me?' I heard a sermon many years ago from a very prominent minister who said, 'If you close your eyes and you look to the right of you and visualize the worst day of your life, who's the person with their arm around your waist?' If that is not the significant other in your life, then you don't have the one. Every time I close my eyes, I see Al – my husband's – face, without exception. I close my eyes and I see his face because I know: not only would he be the one standing beside me but holding me up on the worst day of my life.

Bethanne Patrick: A friend can also do that for you, right?

Star Jones Reynolds: Absolutely. Before I met Al, I had two girlfriends who were my best friends – still are – and those two girls would be on either side.

Bethanne Patrick: When you get to that friendship stage and you're really learning about trust, what are the red flags that women should look for that tell you that person isn't going to be there with his arm around you?

Star Jones Reynolds: One of my dear friends is a director: Antione Fuqua. Antoine once said to me, 'If a man is interested, he will let you know.' It's not like you've got to call him, track him down, hunt him down and get the gun. He will let you know.

Bethanne Patrick: He 'findeth a wife.'

Star Jones Reynolds: 'A man findeth a wife.' So what happens is when you make a plan with somebody, do they show up? Are they on time? When you have to go to your mother's because she's in town for just two days – and your mom can be a little annoying – but the guy says 'If you've got to go, I'm going with you.' That's friendship. That's the true friendship. When my New York Jets are having the worst season that I've ever seen and my husband comes in after working out and sees me there with my mouth open and about to cry, he gets down on the floor and he rubs my feet. Because he knows that I'm so sad that I've just had to abandon hope for the season. That's my friend.

Bethanne Patrick: So being in the 'Friendship' stage isn't something that ends when you get to the 'Intimacy' stage.

Star Jones Reynolds: Absolutely not. It should continue to grow. I often tell women, 'If you don't enjoy spending time with him, then why are you with him?' You need to be able to have fun not just in an intimate setting. You need to be able to sit on the beach and laugh.

Bethanne Patrick: What are some of the things you can do to nurture friendship when you go beyond it?

Star Jones Reynolds: I can tell you one of the things that I did – and I know it will generate a great deal of controversy: you need to reserve intimacy. You need to find other ways to be emotionally connected. My husband and I dance a lot. We love to dance – I'm talking about fast dance, sexy dance, dirty dancing – we enjoy it tremendously. We play cards together. We are so competitive we will play until three o'clock in the morning to see who's going to have more game than the other. We actually did that on vacation!

Bethanne Patrick: So it's not just about making sure everything ends up in the bedroom; it's about making sure what goes on in the living room and the kitchen and the kitchen and all of that is healthy too.

Star Jones Reynolds: The living room, the kitchen… brushing your teeth together is an extremely intimate moment. You're in the bathroom, you've just awakened, you still have sleep in your eyes and your pajama bottoms on – not when you've got your 'sexy sexies' on – I'm talking about when it's just 'The Morning.' You wake up and you look into that mirror and you just think 'I love this person so much,' then you've reached that stage. And intimacy is so much better.

Bethanne Patrick: How do you suggest that people make the transition? When do you know that you're ready?

Star Jones Reynolds: That's a hard thing. I don't really put a timeline on it. Everybody knows that my relationship with Al went at warp speed – we met, three months later we got engaged, and nine months later we got married.

Bethanne Patrick: And you were ready?

Star Jones Reynolds: Definitely. I knew. My girlfriend Vanessa always still asks me, 'How could you know?' Because I knew what I didn't want, okay? And once I saw what I did want, it was, 'Enough already. I'm quitting the game.'

Bethanne Patrick: I think that's one of the most important things for people to take away is to know what they don't want. Star Jones Reynolds: I knew exactly what I didn't want. I didn't want to guess. I knew I didn't want to second guess. I knew that when he said something I didn't want to look behind his agenda, I just wanted to take him for what he presented. And I've never been disappointed.