No one likes to be alone. In fact, people actually hate it. And so we conflate happiness with companionship, and derive satisfaction from a significant other. Not only is the connection fundamentally flawed, but its ramifications prove detrimental.
True happiness isn’t achieved by haplessly filling a void in your life, it’s finding happiness within yourself, and consequently the right person. So the question remains: how do you really know if someone is right for you?
Society has a massive influence in our lives. Too many people have forced themselves into unhappy relationships either because their friends have deemed someone right for them or they’re too afraid to be alone, and look for rebounds and place holders. They go the route of just settling for anyone that they meet because they think that just by simply having someone in their lives, they will be a lot happier than they were beforehand.
My best advice is quite simple. Society looks at the concept of love in the wrong way. They see it as two people coming together to create happiness, whereas it should be two people who are already happy in life and can share one another’s happiness.
Using each other as a parallel rather than a security blanket to make them feel better when things aren’t going well. There are so many diversions from finding your happiness, and so many wrong choices splayed before you. This is where we go wrong; we rush ourselves just to fill a void.
And so it is essential to harness the fact that before you even start looking for someone to get serious with, you have to make sure you are where you want to be in your life. Depending on someone else to make you happy will only lead to an abundance of disappointment, which leads to fighting and a brutal break up as so many of us have experienced before.
The truth is that no one is perfect, and there is no perfect fit for any one of us. There’s no idealized soul mate that we will be happy with forever and with whom we will never have a fight. So what we must understand is that we have to stop looking for perfect.
And when we do start looking for something, we have to ensure that we have left all of our past lovers behind us rather than still lingering on. The only one that can judge if someone is the right one for you is you. Not your friends, not your co-workers and not anyone else close to you. Sure they can have their opinion, but at the end of the day if you are not happy with them, constantly complaining about them and you feel like they don't deserve you, then clearly they are not the right one for you.
It truly is a sad thing to see people be unhappy in relationships because all they are doing is wasting their time and giving up on the other opportunities that are out there for them. They know deep down inside they shouldn't be with them and instead of walking away; they let it linger and look at it as something they will deal with later. There is no reason anyone should be miserable in a relationship. And it’s often rooted in mistaking lust for love.
The honey moon stage (the first 3 months) is usually the phase where everything is going great and you actually think that person is the perfect match for you, when instead they are most likely far from it. It is important to be able to keep clear eyes within the first three months, as the true test comes later, and if you two can still stand each other after the rigorous fighting and the (most likely) cheating on each other.
Too many times people associate relationships with a miserable experience and constantly complain about how shitty they have it with their partner, but no one said it has to be that way. Actually being with someone is supposed to be a positive feeling rather than a negative one and that is where so many make the mistake. It’s the misinterpretation of love and rushing into things while not seeing who the person really is, but rather seeing how we want them to be.
The point in fact is that when you have someone that you project as someone else (most likely a past lover or your perfect idea of a person), they will never live up to it, which will ultimately lead to your disappointment and disapproval. You should never settle for anything less than what you deserve and don't ever think you can change someone because it’s wasted energy.
You’ve got to be smart about finding the right one. You can't settle for crap and you can't look for ultimate perfection because that doesn't exist. What you have to find is something in the middle and someone you truly enjoy being around. If you have any doubts about the person you are with then you should just end it right then and there, and if you know they are not the right one for you, you shouldn’t waste either of your time.
Finding the right one for you means being open-minded and understanding that you will find what you want and what you are looking for if you look in the right places. I assure you that you won't find the love of your life on Tinder or at some gimmicky nightclub in Vegas.
The right one for you should be someone that brings the same exact energy into the relationship as you do. It should be someone that never grows stale and constantly interests you with what they have to say or with what they are doing in their lives. And lastly it should be someone that challenges you because what fun is there without a chance to better yourself for someone else?
If you haven’t found the right person in your life or if you thought you have and they have walked out on you, then they probably did for a reason and you need to get past that. You will somehow someway stumble across the person that is right for you, so you have to ensure you’re ready for it in your valuation of self and that you are capable of making the right choices towards it.
If you are not happy in where you are with the current lover in your life, or the lack thereof -- then change it. Complaining about it won't do much for you at all. And lastly, don’t forget that it is perfectly okay to be alone, as I assure you 99 percent of people who have someone in their lives are miserable because they are not with the people that are right for them.
Preston Waters | Elite.
