Get to know me
Hi! I'm Rick Soetebier
I’m the son of a baker, the father of a beautiful and talented daughter, a grandfather (K-Pa), a Christian man, a sailor, a snow skier, and a life-long student of self and relationship improvement. I have a love of water and will spend time on almost any body of water whenever I get the chance.
What Do I Do?
In its simplest terms, I help you make better dating and relationship choices by showing you how to create clarity about what you want and need in your relationship. I help you hone your communication skills to be able to talk with your partner on a deeper and more meaningful level. With these skills, you’ll be capable of developing much stronger relationship connections.
I spent more than 20 years as a financial advisor helping people make very tough and emotional financial decisions. Part of my success came from being able to help my clients step back from the emotions of decision making so they could look at the relevant facts.
This same approach applies to virtually all of your important decisions including relationships.
Where Do I Do This?
If you’re in the Kansas City area, I’ve found it easiest to meet at a local coffee shop. Conversations tend to be much less formal and significantly more productive than in an office setting.
If you’re outside the Kansas City area, we can jump on to Skype or Zoom and have a conversation wherever you’re most comfortable.
Why Do I Do This?
I came from a broken home like so many of you. My parents got divorced when I was about 12 years old. I lived with my mom and worked for my dad in his bakery. But, unlike many kids, I had both my parents involved in my life almost daily. As dysfunctional as my family was, it helped set my foundation for a strong work ethic and Christian morals and values.
When it was time for me to get married, I was bound and determined to avoid the mistakes of my parents. I wanted to make my marriage a forever thing. I was “in it to win it” as the old saying goes. Well, I made it about 25 years and that was it.
As we struggled the last few years to make our marriage work, we read several of the most popular marriage and relationship self-help books that did little to bring us back together.
What I came to realize after we divorced is that we had made bad relationship choices in the very beginning. We were young and didn’t know any better at the time.
As a newly single man, I was certain that within 9 or 10 months of my divorce, I would be with my soul mate and live happily ever after. Well, God had different plans for me. I needed to learn a lot more.
He started to show me things about relationships that I didn’t know as a young man. He showed me the importance of extraordinary communication and unconditional love. He also showed me that there are a lot of pieces to a great relationship and if any one of those pieces is missing the relationship is not as strong as it should be.
Through God’s prompting, I co-authored a book on dating and relationships titled Dating Backward: A practical guide to dating and finding your soul mate. It’s a guide that covers many of the basics that most people overlook when they re-enter the dating world and dive into a new relationship.
About four months into the writing of the book I realized that helping people through the dating process is where God wants me to be. I promptly made arrangements to sell my financial planning practice so I could focus on helping singles like you make the best relationship decisions possible.
How do you get started?
- For personal coaching, go to the Coaching tab and request your free 30-minute consultation. We’ll spend that time getting to know each other and make sure we’re a good fit to work together.
- Order your copy of Dating Backward: A practical guide to dating and finding your soul mate in paperback or Kindke version directly from Amazon.com.
- Watch for the cart to open in mid-August for my new new online course, Dating Made Simple Academy. You'll learn much of what I share in my personal and group coaching sessions and you can do it from the comfort of your home whenever it’s convenient for you.