theWoman- Whenever I’m at the gym I’ve found that there’s always a bunch of magazines geared toward women – the type of magazine that has a female celebrity on it and then a bunch of tips from how we women can lose weight without dieting, the ultimate sex tips to blow his mind, and where to meet the perfect guy. Well, I’ve read my fair share of these magazines on where to meet men and I believe they lack some common sense.
I believe that in order to meet someone you can have a relationship with you need to put yourself in the situation where you can be successful. If you want to meet someone to just casually date then the tips below aren’t for you. But, if you’re looking to meet your life partner I would suggest the following:
1) Find someone with common interests or characteristics as you – it’ll be easier to start up a conversation with someone and then keep the spark if you share the same passions
2) Set yourself up for success – the best places to meet someone is when you have a captive audience. For example, if you are on a trip with a bunch of other people, whether it’s touring another country or the US, you will undoubtedly be spending a lot of time together and building mutual memories.
3) Be self aware- this is perhaps the most challenging tip out there. My belief is that if you don’t know what you want then you won’t know when you’ve found it or how to find it. Knowing what you want isn’t just having a feeling about a person when you meet them – it’s being able to articulate what you are looking for. The key to this is to be specific enough that you can avoid wasting your time with a majority of people but open enough that you don’t rule out everyone in the world.
4) Work on your self – If you’re in the dating field and haven’t found someone – that’s ok! In the meantime, work on yourself and your development. If you have mastered tip number 3 then you know what you want, but would you fit the other person’s requirements? Working on your self will make you more confident and will prevent you from being in relationships that aren’t going anywhere or are with the wrong person.
5) Self love- if you don’t love yourself, no else will. As sad as it is – I know a lot of people that really need to work on building a relationship with themselves. If you want to be treated well by others, you need to treat yourself well as an example.
The common theme I took from this is: be realistic. Don’t think in black and white extremes. Don’t over- or underestimate yourself or others. Other people rarely come out and tell us that we are being unrealistic, and when they do, we often dismiss what they say because we’d rather feel psuedo-correct in that moment than “challenged but happy.”
In practical terms, it’s unrealistic and against your own long-term happiness to have preferences that are either too restrictive *or* too lax. We may or may not explicitly think the words, “I won’t date someone unless they are x, y, z, etc” but think back on who you *do* date and look for patterns and commonalities. It’s fine to have limits and preferences of “must have x,y,z,” but try not to have half or even the whole alphabet. In other words, each “must have” eliminates a lot of people, perhaps against your own happiness. So select them wisely and re-evaluate them often (i.e. don’t use the same childhood or teenage “list” of criteria). Try to think about where you fit in the minds of other people.
If you expect a lot more from a partner than you bring to the table, that’s not a recipe for long-term happiness.
The converse is also true. Thinking, “I’ll be with anyone who really likes me, is within 15 years younger or older, and is not insane or terribly ill,” will put you in relationships with people who, after months or years, will simply not keep your interest. You don’t have to justify to anyone but yourself why you strongly prefer certain values or characteristics in people.
If you cxpect a lot *less* from a partner than you bring to the table, that’s also not a recipe for long-term happiness.
When we are madly in love with someone, we tend to overlook this person’s shortcomings. We forgive their habit of making mess and not cleaning after themselves, we find it to be cute when they do not close tooth paste tube, and even mess in the bathroom does not feel as irritating. Things dramatically change when we get married or moved together. What happened with our patience and our willingness to close that tooth paste time after time without even mentioning it?
Living together happily is an art, and it is not thought at school. Not only you learn about other person by very closely observing/scrutinizing everything this person does, but you also learn a lot about yourself. All of a sudden you realize that you can easily overlook a mess on the table, but forgotten item on a grocery list infuriates you.
At this point many relationships fall apart. People become annoyed with each other, and then they launch a new adventure of finding a” right” person. As statistics shows, the second marriage is even less successful.
So, what is the answer?
The answer is a commitment and knowledge. Person needs to understand what the reality is and accept that hard work is a key to a successful relation. If you are aware of all the difficulties you will face upon moving in/getting married, and you are committed to work on it together, you will prevail.