You Should Never Have To Remind Someone How Incredible You Are

I’m not sure what’s more difficult: finding someone to love and share your life with or doing whatever you can to hold the relationship together, to keep it from falling apart.

Growing up, I believed love and relationships were much simpler than I believe them to be today.

I never imagined how many hurdles I’d have to jump or rivers I’d have to swim in the name of love.

Whenever we hear a love story, all the dirty little details are left out. No one wants to share his or her real story because the real story has no heroes. It has no villains. It simply has two people who messed up a bunch of times and somehow still managed to hold it together.

Of course, how well they’re holding it together is another story -- again, a story no one wants to tell.

I can’t imagine an actual, existing relationship that fits the mold we’re used to hearing and speaking about. I don’t believe it’s possible for two people to meet, fall in love and live happily ever after.

It’s never that simple. It’s never that clean, that basic -- there are always layers and layers of complexity.

Maybe things used to be different once upon a time, when life was simpler, options were minimal and both life expectancy and quality of life were of a lower caliber.

In this day and age, we have endless possibilities. And with endless possibilities come endless choices, endless self-imposed pressures to make the wrong decision.

A love story is only as beautiful as it is sad and ugly. You will both make mistakes. You will both hurt each other and live lives that are somehow in unison and separate at the same time.

The real question: How do some couples manage to make it work and others fail?

Some people will say it’s love -- love is the force that makes two people choose to stick with each other through thick and thin, through the highs and lows.

I’d have to argue, because most people don’t understand love exists solely in their minds, their definitions of love don’t actually exist. In the end, the only thing that will make a relationship work is when both parties understand how incredible the other is.

What most people consider to be love is the emotion that arises when we’re in love. Love is not those emotions but rather the cause of those emotions.

All love really is is understanding, without a single doubt in your mind, the person you’re with is a beautiful soul -- a soul you never want to lose because the thought alone breaks your heart.

The one thing you should never have to do in a relationship is remind or convince the person you love how incredible you actually are -- ever. It isn’t something he or she should be convinced of because it isn’t something you can convince someone of.

I understand the urge to do so, the urge to somehow convince someone to hang on, to fight for you, fight for the love you know you still share, fight for the future you know you can build -- but it isn’t going to work.

What you need to understand about people is they never want to be taught. They never want to be convinced or proven they are, in some way, wrong.

The level of stubbornness will of course vary between individuals, but generally speaking, it’s almost impossible to convince people to believe something they don’t want to believe. Unless, however, you manage to get them to arrive at that conclusion on their own.

The only thing you can do is live your life, be your own person, do your own thing and hope they realize how amazing you truly are. It’s not even reminding them how incredible you are but simply being incredible and hoping they take notice.

Trying to remind someone of how amazing an individual you are is somewhat futile. People change every single day.

Our perceptions of people -- even those closest to us -- change over time. Even if you manage to remind someone how incredible you are, what you’re really doing is reminding him or her of how incredible you once were.

You can’t rely on your past to build your future. You can’t remind someone of how amazing things used to be, how much you loved each other in the past, how well you treated each other before because it isn’t relevant.

All that’s relevant is the person you are now, the person he or she is now, how well you treat each other today and how much you’re willing to do for each other tomorrow.

Sometimes lovers drift apart. Sometimes they tear themselves apart. Sometimes, after years and years of soul searching, we arrive at the conclusion that the one we lost is the one we need most.

Regardless of your situation, why things are as difficult as they are, you really only have one good option: to be incredible.

Be the lover, partner, man, woman he or she wants and deserves. Be the person you know you, yourself, want to be.

Love your partner the way he or she wants to be loved. Care for him or her better than you’d care for yourself.

Don’t rely on history or reasoning. Don’t rely on trying to remind or convince the person you love of how amazing you are. Just be amazing.

If this person doesn't take notice, if he or she doesn't understand or isn't able to appreciate you, then consider yourself lucky. I know it hurts, but in reality, you just dodged a bullet.

Otherwise, you’d spend the rest of your life being miserable, trying to convince the person you love you’re worth loving too.

That’s a kind of hell I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemies.

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