Why you don’t think love exists.
The five disasters of your love journey.
We all have our beautiful love stories and some of us can’t seem to forget the terrible heartbreaks we’ve gone through.
The lies, the cheating, the insensitivity and the pure deceit all contribute to a negative and unforgettable experience which could lead to trauma and the denial of love’s existence.
Apart from trauma, many failed relationship attempts may make you deny the existence of love and It’s this thinking that made me write this piece; to help people understand some of the basic mistakes they make in their choices and relationships.
Love does exist and remains one of the most beautiful things in nature. Only humans are to blame for what this endearing phenomenon has become.
Here are five ways we jeopardize our relationships. I call them the five disasters of your love journey. Dive in.
Disaster 1: Wrong Perceptions of Love
Love is a complex emotion that can be misunderstood and misconstrued in many different ways. When we start with wrong ideas of love, we simply open the door to failure before we even begin our relationship.
From our choice of partners to our definitions of love, we can continue making awful decisions for our love life.
For example, when you expect love, by some miracle, to be easy with no conflicts and challenges, you set yourself up for a disaster, waiting to explode in your face.
Another erroneous perception would be thinking love solves all your problems and gives you a sense of purpose. You set an expectation for your relationship that can’t be met.
Love is not meant to fill a void in your life. Sure, it helps you grow to have someone who cherishes you, but you still have to chase your dreams and fight your demons. A relationship with someone that you feel completes you doesn’t automatically save you from that responsibility.
Furthermore, controlling behaviour, possessiveness and jealousy are not signs of love, they are what they are; toxic unhealthy behaviour that leads to emotional abuse. If you find yourself accepting these behaviours as signs of deep affection, then you set the tone for your abuse and discomfort.
Disaster 2: Persisting regardless.
When your relationship starts to get tested and of course, starts to fail because of your faulty perceptions, you do one of two things; Bail or Persist.
This happens from a week to about two months of being in a relationship and constantly seeing each other. For long-distance relationships, this time frame may vary depending on several things.
What this means is that you are given a period shortly into any relationship to yet make the right decisions — a second chance. Many don’t notice this grace period.
It’s a time when you’re starting to notice some red flags you thought you didn’t see before you said yes to your partner and your relationship.
Those that bail often get to the fourth disaster quite quickly and then return to do the cycle all over again because they fail to recognize the core problems. The wise ones instead do retrospection and introspection to find out what could’ve gone wrong and take some time before diving into a new one.
Those that don’t bail or take a break at least, fall into the second disaster of a relationship heading for a painful end. They persist!
Even with the signs staring in their face, people diving deep into the second disaster seem to drag things a little further. They think, perhaps this is just a minor setback, perhaps things will get better, we just need a little more time and some things like that.
This, most of the time, doesn’t work. All it does is drag you deeper and deeper into the relationship to waste more time, and resources, making the heartbreak a little more painful when it occurs.
I would like to point out some exceptions at this point though.
You could persist and still get things right if you’d detect the core issues quickly and got a partner that’s willing to work it out with you.
The best relationships are not the ones without problems but the ones where partners are deeply committed to each other and willing to make things work.
Also, frequently bailing on relationships never get you anywhere if you aren’t learning and improving from the previous ones. All it does is reduce your tolerance span and jeopardize your opportunities to have a fulfilling relationship.
Disaster 3: Wrong reactions
When you persist in a relationship built on the wrong foundation and perceptions, you tend to see more of what you don’t want over time.
Again, there’s another good bit of chance at this point to take a break and figure things out else you may jump right into the third disaster by reacting wrongly.
Wrong reactions include violent confrontations (insulting, fighting, etc.), denial, succumbing to gaslighting, determining to stay and make life hell for your partner, stealing from them, revenge sex and other toxic things that make no difference.
It hurts so badly when you’ve invested so much into a relationship yet you’re not getting even the minimum you deserve out of it. Such pain could drive anyone to rage and madness but don’t say “I can’t just leave; I’ve got to make them pay somehow”. You’ll only hurt yourself more.
I could talk about the best ways to react, but this isn’t the article for that. Here and now though, I’ll tell you to leave and work on your mental health. You’ll have to revisit your ideas of love if they seem to be the cause of your problems.
Denial happens when you’re in a relationship that’s not working but paint this fantastic El Dorado picture in your mind that everything is alright and working fine. This happens to people who get into a relationship for some material benefit, or sex or are diehard suckers for their partner. This is far more dangerous than confrontations.
Disaster 4: We go again.
Usually, many people end it at three. They can’t take it any further except the party in denial which can stretch for long periods in one bad relationship before diving into disaster 5 in a traumatic response.
Those who manage to end it earlier can sometimes skip the part where they do an introspection of what they believe love to be and how they got it wrong in their last relationship and fall right into another relationship just to repeat the same choices and end up the same way.
This is where the fourth disaster happens. Jumping into a new relationship before figuring out why the first ended.
The cycle keeps on going until you’ve got no energy left in you for another.
Disaster 5: Wrong conclusions
Exhaustion!
It is amazing how we sometimes conclude that something is unattainable because we’ve tried and failed over again with our narrow-minded ideas.
Have you ever searched and thought something was lost while it was sitting comfortably in your palms?
I once looked for a phone in the dark with that phone’s torchlight. Until a friend came to my aid, I had concluded the phone was lost forever. It’s a funny story but it explains how we could hold the answers and still give up on finding them.
We can make all the mistakes in our love life and still blame it on love itself when all that we truly need sits comfortably at the bottom of our heads waiting to be tapped.
I feel heartbroken when I hear people say love — the alluring intimate devotion — doesn’t exist; not by some psychological or social research but out of a broken and tired heart.
The fifth and final disaster happens when after suffering enough heartbreak, you conclude that true love can’t be found and even when it can, it’s never going to be for you. You finally shut the door.
Well, you’re right!
If your perceptions of love are wrong, that love will never be a reality.
Imminently, what you’d find is that you shut the door tight on something beautiful that was within reach if you could’ve refined your perceptions, got control of your feelings and taken things carefully.
On a final note,
The journey of romantic love and relationship can be beautiful and long-lasting. Amidst all the divorces in the world today there are still a lot of working, happy relationships.
It’s all about having the right knowledge and choosing the right partner; not perfect but right.
When you get it wrong in your concepts of love, the full cycle of love disaster is sure to follow. You can halt things at disaster two but make sure you are learning with every relationship you end.
Here are some important quotes to set you straight.
Love is not only something you feel, it is something you do -David Wilkerson
Accompanying any feeling should be helpful thoughts, decisions, and actions.
The best thing to hold onto in life is each other -Audrey Hepburn
True love is in partnership. The most important trait you should look for in a partner is the willingness to commit, to grow and to always work things out. Not failing to mention the ability to admit differences and work out a common ground.
Love is not a feeling of happiness. Love is a willingness to sacrifice -Michael Novak
Love is choosing someone and going all out for that person even when the feelings are gone and things are looking tough. However, this commitment should be mutual to get the best out of love. Though love doesn’t expect in return, bonds are made stronger when your partner 'loves' you too.
Best wishes.
