4 Mistakes To Avoid in Your Search for a Soulmate
Don’t make the search any harder than it needs to be.
You’re tired of casual, you’re looking for a love that’ll last. You’re looking for your soulmate.
You’re trying to find that one person who understands you, and who’s going to be by your side through the ups and downs of life. You want a special connection, and you’d do (almost) anything to find it.
Including a few mistakes along the way.
These mistakes are easy to make, and chances are one or more are getting in the way of you finding someone worthy of your love.
Mistaking chemistry with true love
You think True Love is supposed to make you feel a certain way.
No one can fault you for wanting butterflies. It feels good when they tickle.
Finding someone you have great chemistry with is like magic. The electricity between you could light up an entire city. When you kiss, the sparks could ignite an everlasting fire.
Great chemistry, however, isn’t always the best measure of a great partnership. Chemistry can be misleading, it can blind you to inexcusable flaws of character, and even abusive behavior.
Soulmates are not found, they’re made. And chasing instant chemistry can lead you to overlook potential soulmates, the slow burners that don’t catch on fire immediately, but who keep you warm for longer.
Pursuing the thrill of emotional instability
You want Love to keep you distracted all day long. You want to daydream, you want to forget to eat, you want to make up scenarios in your head that bring reality closer to fiction.
But the reality is you don’t have a lot of confidence about where things are going. You say you hate to wonder where they are and why haven’t they called, but do you, really?
The unpredictability suits your romantic sensibilities, it tickles your RomCom protagonist fancies. Somehow, despite the hot-and-cold behavior, you just know everything will turn out fine in the end.
You believe you deserve a happy ending, no matter how wild the ride.
You can fool yourself all you want, but feeling on edge doesn’t mean it’s real love. The ups and downs of emotional instability make it exciting, but also unhealthy.
The one you’re meant to be with should make you feel safe, not insecure. Loved and cared for, not on edge.
Pursuing security and stability isn't as fun as chasing the thrill of uncertainty, but it’s far more healthy and offers a much better payoff in the long run.
Going for the superficial instead of the subjective
You want someone who is this tall, or doesn’t weigh over a certain amount or is as attractive as a supermodel. You have zero tolerance for baldness or people out of shape.
You rate people on a scale of 1 to 10 — in which appearance counts for most of the points — and you’re confident you deserve at least a 9.
You’d like to find someone with a great sense of style, who has an exciting job and makes a decent amount of money.
You expect someone who never fails to make you laugh, who’s always in a great mood, and who makes you feel butterflies every time you see them.
When you get that, you can’t let it go. It doesn’t matter how emotionally unavailable, rude, or toxic your partner is. It doesn’t matter how much they invalidate your feelings, are unkind, and generally unsupportive.
You end up frustrated in relationship after relationship because you choose your partners based on the wrong set of criteria.
You think you can change the person you love
They’re great.
No, really, they are.
BUT they would be perfect, if only they were more like this, or had more of that. The good news is, you’re just the right person to teach them.
With enough patience, with enough persistence, you can show them the way. You can change them, mold them into exactly what you’d like them to be. After all, isn’t that what real love is for, to inspire people to change for the better?
Going into a relationship thinking you can (and should) change your partner is a recipe for heartbreak and resentment. People do change for love, but they don’t change according to your agenda, or to fit into your view of how things should be.
People change according to their own internal motivations, inspired by love, yes, but determined by their own personal crises and needs.
Trying to change someone you love never ends well.
Consider redefining romance
You’re holding on to the wrong assumptions about what a soulmate should be. You’re holding on to the notion that romance is supposed to be magical, not practical.
But there’s a practical side to any great romance.
Chemistry matters, but dependability and consistency matter more. Daydreaming is fun, but having someone you can rely on, even though they are a little predictable, is a lot less stressful.
If you’re having trouble finding your soulmate, consider readjusting your parameters. Consider the fact that you might have to create and nurture that soulmate connection rather than simply stumble upon it.
And remember, awarding someone soulmate status shouldn’t come cheap. Just because they make your stomach do somersaults, at first sight, doesn’t mean they’re worth it.
