Monday night was the much anticipated finale of ABC's The Bachelor. All of America was waiting with baited breath to see who Ben was going to choose and who was going to get that gorgeous Neil Lane ring. However, wasn't it always so obvious? There was never a doubt in my mind that Ben was going to choose Courtney. And, I have to tell you, whether you liked her or loved to hate her, she was the right choice for Ben.
I am a professional matchmaker and here's what I know about why Ben chose Courtney and not Lindzi...
-- Chemistry is always an intangible. There is no rhyme or reason for it, it just happens. Ben and Courtney had undeniable chemistry immediately and it never waned throughout the whole season.
-- Lindzi, without a doubt was the nicer girl of the two and if we were giving out the award for "Miss Congeniality" or "the nicest girl there," she certainly would have gotten it, but her niceness has nothing to do with whether or not Lindzi would be the best girlfriend, fiancé and/or life partner for Ben.
-- Every season, the girls waste time focusing on whether another girl really "deserves" the Bachelor and how they are more deserving than other girls of that rose. Finding your life mate is not about who deserves it, it's about connection, attraction and seeing a life together.
-- What Lindzi didn't understand was that just telling Ben that she was in love with him wasn't enough. She needed to be spending more time deepening their relationship, connecting on lots of different levels so that Ben could see a future with her. Their relationship was too surfacey, whereas his relationship with Courtney had more depth.
-- The girls in the house were instantly threatened by Courtney. Even though there were other girls in the house who were just as pretty , the mere fact that her title was "Model" created an immediate stereotype and very few of them took the time to look past that.
-- Contrary to popular belief, in the beginning Courtney was no more or less bitchy than any of the other girls. I am not saying that I approved of Courtney's antics but if you really watched the show, you would agree that other girls were just as bad, if not worse. Take Blakely or Monica for example, they were both awful. And then Emily manipulated the whole house against Courtney just because she felt threatened and jealous about Ben's connection to her.
-- Courtney's downfall was that she rubbed her "winning" in the girls faces too many times. The girls were already jealous of her because they knew deep down that Ben was noticing Courtney more than anyone else, so her pointing it out constantly made things worse. However, the girls were bullying Courtney as well, so she just lost it and then she didn't know how to stop. We saw an ugly side to Courtney in the house and only time will tell if that her true personality and what her true intentions really are.
-- When the girls in the house were constantly criticizing Courtney for being an awful person, they were missing the point. They never thought about whether or not Ben was falling for her. They only thought about the fact that they didn't like her. They made it be about them, when it was supposed to be about Ben and who would work for him in the end.
-- The reason why Ben wasn't truly bothered by the fact that Courtney was a little snarky and had an edge became VERY evident when his mother and sister showed up in Switzerland. His sister has a very similar personality to Courtney's in that she doesn't sugar coat and she tells it like it is, so it's not surprising that Ben felt immediately connected to Courtney because she felt familiar to him, like home. Additionally, did anyone notice that Courtney was actually a prettier version of Ben's sister?
-- Lindzi's comment on Good Morning America that if she were the one who went skinny dipping, Ben would have proposed to her instead of Courtney was naïve. Regardless of whether or not Lindzi got naked with Ben was not going to change the fact that Ben fell for Courtney. Ben was captivated by Courtney's flirtiness, their banter and her sexiness. In my opinion, he was a goner the moment they had that connection.
Samantha Daniels is a well known professional matchmaker, president of Samantha's Table Matchmaking and the author of "Matchbook: The Diary of a Modern Day Matchmaker" (Simon & Schuster). You can read more from Samantha on her personal blog, Matchmaker in the Know. Follow Samantha Daniels on Twitter @Matchmakersd.