You Can’t Find Everything in One Person. Still, Don’t Cheat.
Most people dream of finding their perfect partner, a person who satisfies all of their needs and wants. The person who completes them. In reality, that’s not a thing. People are flawed and one person can’t do everything. So, your partner isn’t the whole enchilada. Guess what?
It’s still not okay to cheat.
In modern relationships, people use these perceived deficiencies in their respective partners to rationalize some incredibly bad behavior. For those people, I say it’s time to grow up and accept your partner for who they are. And if you can’t, be an adult, make the hard choice, and move on.
The RomCom Illusion
I’m not going to pretend for a second that I don’t enjoy a good romantic comedy. They’re few and far between these days but there are some absolute classics of the genre which are entertaining as all hell. I’ll still prefer John Wick or Wayne’s World first, though.
The problem is that RomCom’s have a number of fallacies at their core which simply are not realistic. This genre functions on the idea that everyone has a perfect partner who gives them everything they need, all in one convenient, and borderline magical, human being.
While that’s great for a movie plot, real life doesn’t exactly work that way. Don’t get me wrong; some people actually do find that partner. Those scenarios are few and far between, though. For most of us, things don’t usually end up that way.
We find a person who has hopefully several of the traits we’re looking for in a life partner. Usually, it’s only a few of them. That’s not a bad thing. Well, it shouldn’t be. In the world of modern relationships, perfection is the only acceptable outcome, no matter how unlikely it is.
Delusional Love
As a culture, we’ve seemingly agreed to subject ourselves to the collective delusion that there is someone perfect out there for everyone. Nope. If you don’t end up permanently alone, which many of us do, you end up settling for someone you perceive as less than perfect.
What we forget is that person settled for us, too. Literally no one is perfect or a complete person. No one can provide you with everything you need in a relationship anymore than you can provide someone with everything they need in a relationship.
If that was possible, relationships wouldn’t take work. They are, in fact, difficult. There’s conflict and issues and rough patches. But if you love someone, you’re supposed to be willing to put in the work. Successful relationships depend on someone being accepting of their partner’s flaws.
Unless you have some truly detrimental flaws, like anger issues or alcoholism, you shouldn’t need to change for someone who loves you. In those cases, you need to change for you, not them. And unless they have detrimental flaws, you should be equally accepting of your partner.
Grow Up
That’s not the way things seem to work anymore. If your partner isn’t perfect, you go out and find someone else one the side who gives you what you need. That’s called cheating, regardless of whether it’s mental, emotional, or sexual, as is too often the case.
Unfortunately, that’s what my ex-wife did. There were things she wanted in our relationship she decided I couldn’t provide. She never discussed any of this with me. Instead, she cheated on me rather prolifically for an indeterminate amount of time. She still prioritizes that part of her life.
I’m not saying her concerns and needs weren’t valid. How she went about dealing with them was not. She attempted to keep me as her husband, caring for the kids and our home while she ran around with other men. It would have been less painful for me and our kids if she had just left.
No one person will ever be everything you need in partner. And if you cannot accept them for who and what they are, just be an adult, let them know, and walk away. Because I can tell you from personal experience that the other options leave wounds that might never heal.
