Abel Keogh never aspired to become a relationship expert. But when his life was “completely turned upside down” by tragedy, Keogh inadvertently became a highly sought after source of wisdom.
In 2001, Keogh lost his wife to suicide. To cope with his grief, Keogh followed in a friend’s footsteps and started regularly blogging. He anonymously shared his thoughts, feelings and frustrations and journaled his day-to-day experiences as a recently widowed man.
Keogh wasn’t writing for an audience, but an audience found him.
“I really wasn’t writing for anybody. It was just more for myself. I didn’t tell my friends or anybody else about it,” he said. “Nobody knew about this thing, but somehow it got popular, and people started reading it and sharing it, and started getting really popular.”
As Keogh waded back into the dating scene, he shared “weird experiences and disaster dates” with his newfound followers.
Then, the first email came. A woman sought advice from Keogh on her relationship with a widower.
“My first thought was, ‘Why are you emailing me? I don’t know what I’m doing,‘” Keogh recalled. He provided the best advice he could, and a few weeks later, a second woman asked Keogh for relationship guidance.
Emails kept coming — and at a higher rate.
“I thought that maybe if I wrote a book or two, the emails would stop, and so I wrote some books — and the emails didn’t stop. They kept asking me to write more books."
Keogh received enough email encouragement to publish two memoirs, five relationship guides, two novels and hundreds of blog posts. His ninth relationship guide, “From First Date to Soulmate,” came out last month.
“I didn’t want to write memoirs, I didn’t want to write relationship guides, but there was a demand for what I wrote, and people liked what I wrote. ... The books have been very popular. They continue to sell years after they’ve been published, and they continue to help people,” he said.
‘From First Date to Soulmate’
In his previous four relationship guides, Keogh “focuses exclusively on building relationships with someone after loss,” he said.
His most recent book, “From First Date to Soulmate: Finding True Love in the Age of Narcissism, Addiction and Hooking Up,” is geared toward anyone looking to create a lasting relationship.
The inspiration for the book stemmed from a discovery Keogh made after getting married for the second time.
When Keogh remarried about 15 months after his first wife died, he struggled to understand why he had connected with two women who, on the surface, were very different people.
His late wife was outgoing, outspoken and dramatic, while his second wife is reserved, logical and scientific, Keogh said. They had different hobbies and interests, but he felt connected to both of them.
As he pondered his concerns, Keogh noticed a pattern. Beneath the surface, he felt his late wife and living wife were similar in seven core areas.
“On the outside they’re very different. They have very different personalities and interests. But when you get down to it, when you really dig into it, there’s a lot of similarities and things that are pretty much the same,” Keogh said.
His most recent book explores these seven areas of importance and aids readers in identifying what qualities in a partner are important to them, as well as “deal breakers.”
Once a dater can identify these seven areas of importance in a potential partner, they are set up for greater success in finding a soulmate, Keogh said.
“The truth is, there’s probably hundreds of people out there that can be your soulmate. It’s just being able to identify what it is that you want.”
He continued, “There’s tons of soulmates out there. It’s just knowing what it is that you want, what the deal breakers are, and then (being) willing to do the work to actually find that person.”
Navigating a modern dating landscape
Modern advancements and cultural shifts, such as online dating, have altered the appearance of dating, but many relationship ideals have endured, Keogh said.
Those searching for love can look for guidance from famous historical couples, such as Queen Victoria and Prince Albert or John and Abigail Adams, Keogh believes. He highlights several of these historical relationships in “From First Date to Soulmate.”
“They didn’t have online dating back in the 1800s, but a lot of the concerns and feelings and issues that people have, they’re still the same today as they were 100 years ago, 1,000 years ago,” said Keogh.
He continued, “It’s fascinating to see how people made choices and decisions (back then), because I think they’re very relatable to our decisions today.”
The greatest modern dating pitfalls were not spawned by dating apps, Keogh said. Modern daters are simply lacking intentional action.
“People today, they’re a lot more passive in how they find people,” Keogh said. “They just kind of expect to ... magically find somebody.”
In “From First Date to Soulmate,” Keogh advises daters to maximize their social network and use proactive methods to meet potential partners.
“You’ve got to be proactive, and you’ve got to be willing to make sacrifices,” Keogh said. Once you find a partner, “you both need to be willing to make sacrifices and make each other number one.”