Why Mr. Wrong May Just Be Mr. Right

The world is filled with all different sorts and types of people. Somewhere amongst this plethora of potential candidates stands the one — or one of, depending on your views on love — person that is perfect for you. Finding this person is a matter of luck or, if there is such a thing, fate. But how does one know when they found Mr. or Mrs. Right?

Does one hear wedding bells ringing in the far off distance? Do fireworks start exploding in all their grandeur high above your heads? Probably not — although, that would be pretty friggin awesome, not to mention easy.

I have yet to find Mrs. Right myself, but have to assume that the relationship will begin the same as every other serious relationship does: with love. Just as important as finding someone that you love, the timing must also be perfect. If two people who love each other start their relationship before either one is ready to settle down, then it won’t work out and the candidate will fall through. There are so many factors that go into “perfect timing” that I have no choice but to conclude that timing itself is completely out of our control. The only thing that we do have some say in is whom we fall in love with.

Growing up — especially if you are a romantic like me — you put together your perfect lover piece by piece; you considered how they would look, how they would dress, act, talk. You considered how they would treat you and how your life together would be. There are two main problems with this. For starters, most of us don’t know ourselves — let alone know the ideal kind of person that will make us happy. If you don’t know you, then how can you know who will make for the perfect partner?

Secondly and more importantly, when looking for a prospective mate, we tend to search for someone who is perfect — someone without faults. As soon as we find imperfections — because we always do — we start to focus on these imperfections, both physical and psychological, and we start to question our love for the person. Once you question whether or not you love the person you previously knew that you did love, then the love you have for that person becomes tainted and begins to rot.

When someone tells me that they are in love because “this person is perfect,” then I begin to question how long this “love” will last. The one way you know when a person has found someone they are likely to spend the rest of their lives with, you’ll hear them say not that the person “is perfect,” but rather that the person is “perfect for me”.

When you hear your friend tell you that the person they found is perfect for them, then you know what that friend found is legit — the real deal. The difference between “perfect” and “perfect for me” is the difference between a relationship that is based on shallow knowledge of the other person and a relationship based on knowing the other fully. True love is knowing the other’s faults, accepting those faults, and loving them even more for them.

One of my closest friends has somewhat recently found himself in this exact ideal situation. Oddly enough, they met through me. I had hired this girl to work as a waitress in the restaurant I used to own — she was visiting from Paris for the summer, trying to work and make some extra cash. They have been basically living together ever since. This relationship wasn’t the first serious relationship he had been in, so of course at first I was a bit skeptical.

The moment I knew things were going to get very serious was the moment his girl admitted to me that my friend was “perfect for her.” Then my close friend told me that although he still wanted to sleep with other women, he wouldn’t because he was afraid of losing her — that convinced me.

So who is the perfect person for you? Not the perfect person, not the person you think it would be nice to date, not the person your friends and family tell you to date and not the persons you used to date — who would be the perfect person for you specifically? This, I’m afraid, is not a very easy conclusion to arrive at. You will need to know yourself first and foremost — and you’ll need to know yourself very well. You will need to figure out what person you are now and what person you want to be.

Once you know the person you want to be, you know the person who you will be — assuming that you are passionate enough about life to work towards it, of course. Only then can you begin to decipher your ideal lover, your soul mate. The better you know yourself, the faster you will be able to decide whether or not the person you went out on a date with is a person that you will at least be capable of putting up with.

Focusing on finding the person that is perfect for you, who perfectly molds into you, is crucial to living a life full of love and happiness. You never know, a person who you at the moment think is completely Mr. Wrong, you may very well one day deem Mr. Right.

Paul Hudson | Elite. For more from Paul, follow him on Twitter @MrPaulHudson