When I was younger, I thought a relationship would cure all ills. Having someone to love, to take care of, to slog through life with, seemed like a wonderful cushion against all the bad things life can hold. I've dated exactly three men in my life (with a few casual dates sprinkled in here and there, few of which are worth mentioning unless you want a laugh.) I married one of them. So I wouldn't say I have a vast array of experience compared to other people. But I've been with a manipulative bastard, and a kowtowing doormat, so until my husband, I haven't had your usual relationships. A whole lot of learning was packed into two very extreme situations.
But I found my One, married him, and figured that was it. happily ever after, here I come! I should feel whole and complete and nothing bad can touch me, right?
But then my dad died of leukemia. My aunt had surgery for a brain tumor. My 87-year-old grandfather went in for a triple bypass heart surgery and ended up with a pacemaker, as well. My dog started having seizures. My cat had a bladder cancer scare (he's all right, thank God.) And this all happened within a span of three months.
I can't say I was happy, then. And it's taken me a while to pull myself out of the depression I sunk into. I'm still in the process. But I'm the one that has to work through it. My husband can't do it for me. And he couldn't protect me from those things, though I wish he could have.
The thing is, people expect that a relationship will fix everything that's wrong in life. Money won't be an issue, self-esteem issues will get fixed...basically, problems won't affect you because you're with someone, right?
It doesn't work that way.
Even with the healthiest of relationships, just being in one doesn't make you happy by default. You may be happy with the relationship, but if everything else goes to shit around you, how will one good thing keep you bright and bubbly and feeling all is right with the world?
It won't.
The key to happiness? It's feeling comfortable in your own skin. It's accepting who you are--flaws and all--and loving yourself for every nuance of your being. You have to love every flaw and foible before you can be happy. Because, I'll tell you, life throws things at you that you won't expect. It strives to break you down and leave you in rubble, and there's nothing a partner--even a great one--can do about it.
As I approach my thirties, I hear my single friends lament their single status. Why? A relationship doesn't change anything except your relationship status. You're still you, and you still have to face the struggles of everyday life. Sometimes a relationship does ease the burden, but sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it even makes it worse.
Crying over your single status--the fact that nobody loves you, you're worthless, you're nothing, you're an Undesirable--will do nothing to help you. You want to be happy? Quit waiting for someone to share your life with and
just start living it the way you think it should be lived.
Do you really want to be crying at home in a dark room about a lack of love in your life? Is that really how you think it should be lived? Staring down the barrel of a gun because nobody loves you is
not the way to go.
Now, I've been there (well, minus the gun thing.) I've written the bad poetry and listened to the sad songs with a big glass of wine at my elbow. I've moaned and cried and convinced myself I would be single forever and would never be happy, blah blah blah, boo hoo.
And as soon as I stopped and realized I had value
on my own, and didn't
need somebody to complete me, I discovered a great deal of happiness. I went to concerts on my own. I caught movies, went to restaurants, all those things people dread doing alone. I changed my view of things, and changed how I was living my life. (And, ironically, met my husband soon after, but that is beside the point.)
In life, you have more control over people's perceptions of you than you realize.
How you view yourself has a great deal of bearing on how others view you...and how happy you'll be. If you only focus on the negative--flaws in your character, bad things that have happened to you, or times you were treated unfairly--then guess how people will perceive you. And you'll continue to find relationships that validate those negative thoughts. You'll keep ending up with the abusers, the manipulators, the users, and the players. It will be a vicious cycle, a self-fulfilling prophecy.
It's up to you to change your mindset. Change how you think. Replace the negative with the positive. Even if you have to fake it for a while, eventually, the positive will become a habit, and the negative will only rear its head occasionally.
But it's up to YOU.
Not a relationship,
not a significant other. Being in a relationship doesn't validate your existence. Don't give someone else that power. You're the one who has to live your life. You're the one who has to change how you think about things.
You're the one that makes yourself happy. No one else can do that.
So stop whining. And if you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, work around it. You don't need a relationship for a happy ever after...
only you can give yourself that ending.Thoughts?
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Comments (64)
Agreed. The best relationships of my life always took place when I was feeling the best about myself.
Agreed. I was depressed 6 and a half out of the 8 months my boyfriend have been dating. He doesn't fix everything, but he supports me through everything even though its rough. I'm my own independent woman who just has a man there to be her best friend, have fun with and help me through things. Its sort of like when a couple has a baby because they think it will fix their crumbling relationship. You have the baby, but you still have to work at the relationship for it to stay together.
I'm going to say it before someone else does. Easy for you to say not being single. The more we accept our single status, the more likely it becomes that it will stay this way. In the long run, unless you really want to be single, it's good to not be okay with it. I'm scaring myself constantly with being comfortable by myself. I can't get too comfortable because then I'll never date again.
While I understand your point of view (and I agree), to think it would cure ALL factors is silly. It would cure loneliness if you are seeking companionship. That's... probably about it.
I disagree.
When you are going through a lot of crap nobody can change, like you mentioned, nothing feels better than a hug from the man/woman with whom you share mutual love. Neither that hug nor SO will fix the unchangeable but it sure will feel a bit better. Try going through what you are going through with but alone. That isn't any fun at all. There is no one there to hug you and make you feel better for that brief moment of time giving you some respite.
Well I think I can speak for both parties here. When you're single you're craving that feeling of being loved, wanted, and needed by someone that you just can't seem to get enough of...shall we say the honeymoon phase? But once you've been in a relationship for awhile you realize that the "happily ever after" feeling soon wears off and that you can't rely on that relationship to make you happy...because it actually takes work to make it last.
I will say this to the single ladies out there feeling depressed or lonely...if you're inside crying then you'll never meet anyone. If you're desperately seeking that special someone you're never going to find him. He's going to find you when you least expect it. It's kind of like when you're looking for something and can't seem to find it, but once you forget about it or are looking for something else..there it is. What you shouldn't do is base having fun on having a significant other. Single women are great...don't be in a rush to meet "the one" or you might find yourself in a relationship you have no business being in.
And for us taken chicks...so right that we are the only ones who can make ourselves happy. If we think our happiness lies within our relationship we will all be very disappointed. In the back of our minds a lot of us secretly hope to find that prince charming type romance, but that's most likely never going to happen. That is why movies usually end with the marriage, the death of one or both people, or with them being seperated from one another for years until later on they are reunited. That is fictionalized romance, and we can't live by that.
I agree. No relationship is going to mask the very real problems all of us face and are sure to face in our lives. I do believe, however, that a healthy loving relationship with someone can make it easier to push through the rough times. I've been with my husband for almost 5 years and he has been with me through some very tough times in my life. Without him by my side I would have lived, but I don't know if I would have fared so well in the end.
Don't look for a relationship just to try and solve your problems, but if you have a great relationship with someone you truly love and care for, it can really make life much easier. You don't have to feel so alone. When you're in love, you feel each others pain and you can lean on each other when you don't feel strong enough to stand on your own.
I don't mean to do a shameless advertisement for myself but seeing how I've already done a post similar to this I'll just copy and paste a bit of it here.
-Never take someone's affection for granted and never let someone take yours for granted.
-Do not become addicted to relationships.
-Don't
EVER think of someone as your "Other Half". Be a happy, emotionally
grounded, whole individual. Then find someone whose the same.
-Don't
make someone else responsible for your "Total Happiness" as a person
and don't let someone saddle you with the same thing.
-Being happy on your own (single) will allow you to get out of a relationship if it turns out badly.
As zen or cliche as it sounds, True Happiness comes from within. Seeking it outside yourself will only create a temporary feeling of satisfaction or joy. No amount of affection from your SO or fresh starts will help either.
I met my fiance when I was going through a "bumpy" stage. I had broken up from a 10 month relationship and I was in a phase of "I'm going to just date until I get my eye on someone." I wasn't exactly happy with my single status, then. I was okay with it, I was coping with it, but I wasn't happy. But then, I'm also social and I filled in my gaps with friends, events and networking. I was working, I was going to school, I had a lot on my plate.
Was I always "bubbly" and joyful? Not really. I was doing poorly in ONE class that I just didn't get but had to in order to graudate; the job market was starting to dwindle in my field of interests, I think there is a fine line between "seeking with eye lamps on for The One" and "keeping yourself open" for anyone that might catch your eye. I went to catch a buddy for drinks after an event, and met my fiance. I asked him out, we went out, I did the leg work to get his number and do the uncontentional thing: "ask a guy out more than once?!" I would never use to do that, but I thought he was worth it.
Being comfortable with yourself doesn't necessary mean, forgo company of others so you can be by yourself. Being independent doesn't mean you're anti-social, does it? Being in a relationship does not solve ALL problems in your life; crying about how you don't want to be single can only get you the temporary shoulder to cry on once or twice, after a while, you can't help but not want to be dragged down in self-pity fest. If you find yourself unattractive, what sort of a guygirl is going to want to spend time with you?
If you don't love yourself, who will?
fo sho!
meh.
"Because, I'll tell you, life throws things at you that you won't expect. It strives to break you down and leave you in rubble, and there's nothing a partner--even a great one--can do about it."
Really? Because my boyfriend makes me pretty happy and he's the only one who has gotten me through some pretty rough situations.
good post :)
@HollowTendencies@xanga - That's what I think too. If it wasn't for my bf, I wouldn't be alive or even be half as happy without him. He has gotten me through very rough things that I couldn't do alone.
@Hinase@xanga - *some
I agree with everyone who argued against this post.
The bottom line is everyone's going to lose someone close to them and everyone's going to go through some sort of tragedy in one way or another. While none of that is easy or enjoyable, having someone who loves you as much as they love you and is there to cry on their shoulder, hug you, help you through it and just listen to you is much better than being alone.
My boyfriend's little brother died last year and to everyone but me he acted like it was okay. But in the middle of the night he'd breakdown and cry and he still continues to thank me for helping him deal with the situation. I'm sure he misses his brother dearly and there's nothing he can do to change it, but I also believe it'd be a lot harder to accept and deal with if he hadn't opened up to me.
@vicdaily@xanga - Until you're comfortable being single, you probably won't have as fulfilling of a relationship as you could, as odd as it may sound. Complete people want to be with other complete people (and of course I'm talking long-term here) and gravitate toward them. Personally, I don't want to date someone who's just a shell walking around and looking for a relationship. I want that person to have other facets of his personality besides wanting to be with someone.
@lttlegel@lovelyish - I think the post went about saying "you control your own happiness" in a roundabout way. Perhaps it doesn't work for situations like grief, where having a shoulder to cry on is good, but I think people need to understand that at the end of the day, if you are not happy and complete outside of a relationship you will not be happy and complete inside of one. A relationship won't boost your self-esteem or self-worth (it might seem to, but seeking external affirmation isn't healthy) and it's up to you to do that by yourself. I've seen I don't know how many teenagers fall victim to this-I can still remember being in jr. high with girls who would literally be in tears over the fact that they didn't have a boyfriend and everyone else did, and their lives would be PERFECT if they were dating someone.
i hate to be blunt, but really...who cares? just love yourself and do everything you can to be with the one you love. end of story.
because awesome relationships WILL make you happy and improve your life!
I absolutely agree that if you aren't happy on your own, being in a relationship won't just magically fix everything.
However, if you're with a really good person, they could really make the difference in your life. They could show you ways of coping with your issues, perhaps you'd trust them more and be willing to talk about things you never shared with anyone else, maybe they could point things out to you and you'd actually listen....
& then, if you are happy by yourself, being in a really good relationship can and should make you even happier!
I have always been a positive and happy person, but I'll tell you I find myself smiling even more as I think about my wonderful boyfriend:)
Someday, people just might stop thinking that we don't need anyone to make our lives better. Thing is, we do. We may be fine being alone from time to time, but ultimately we belong with someone else. I don't believe that we're supposed to go through all of the sorrows and joys in this life without sharing them with another.
Self-empowerment is great. Being able to support yourself is great. However, it's not weak to admit that your quality of life vastly improves when you're sharing it with the right person.@chicbananas@xanga - I agree 100%
I LOVE THIS. One thing i realized is that no one cannot make you happy but you.
superb, excellent and uplifting post!!
I'm in a relationship current, but sometimes it's so easy for me to fall back on him and validate my self esteem and happiness with his happiness...big mistake. The sooner I learned to take care of myself and focus on my own needs, I became much less co dependant and much more in tune with who I am as a person, and he began to love me even more...as well as the love I have for myself.
I know too many people who put so much emphasis on being in a relationship and what their happiness means.
I've never been the type of person who thought that I had to be in a long term comitted relationship to be happy. Yes, I've gone through my share of harsh and great relationships, but I knew that I had to learn to love myself and be happy by myself before I would be happy with anyone else.
The fact that I thought that was is one of the main reasons I think that my common law partner and I now have such a solid relationship. He knows how to make himself happy without me being around, and so do I, but the added little spark of our relationship just makes us shine, and we are thankful for that.
I've never had patience to listen to people talk about 'Oh, I've been single for two and a half years, I'm so lonely, everything would be better if I just had someone to come home to at the end of the day. Nothing else bad would matter anymore". I feel like they are choosing their own path by being so needy.