The Love Of Your Life: What Actually Makes Love Last A Lifetime? - Page 4

It’s the burning question that you ask yourself every time you’re a bridesmaid (yet again), or you go through another breakup, or a man tells you he’s not looking for anything serious but you secretly know he’s just not looking for you. And when you start to answer it, you probably start to analyze yourself, and your exes. You try to understand what is wrong with you, and what was wrong with them. But you’re missing the point, which is this: it’s not about who you are as an individual, or who he is as an individual. It’s about what happens when the two of you come together. A guy might seem great on paper, but for some reason, it didn’t work. And that’s because what’s more important than character traits, is dynamics. Like these:

Understanding your baggage

The only way you don’t have baggage is if you were born yesterday. No, even that’s long enough to give you baggage. Look, you’ve got it and you need to recognize it and understand it. You may have had a bad experience with an ex, or even with your parents, that’s given you some knee jerk reactions to things. Typically, when you have baggage, you respond to present day events as if they were past traumatic ones, simply because they look the same. But, they are not the same. And so it’s not fair to your partner to deal with your freak out when he didn’t do anything wrong. If happenings in life stir up strong emotions in you—stronger than they should be—analyze your past. That might be what you’re reacting to.

Understanding his baggage

You both have a responsibility to analyze yourselves, your pasts and recognize when your partner has actually messed up, or when your baggage is just creeping up. But sometimes, we still lose it. Sometimes our fears, insecurities and anxieties get the best of us and we lash out at our partner. Have the patience to understand when your partner is just acting up because of his baggage, rather than taking it personally. When your partner is having a full blown irrational reaction to you, sometimes you need to be the calm one and just let them get it all out. Nobody is perfect. And being with someone means accepting them, flaws and all.

Happy to be bored

When you’re with the wrong person, you always feel like you’re waiting for something. When you’re in the car on the way to dinner, you feel like you’re waiting to be at the restaurant, amongst nice ambience, showing off your Hot dress and sipping on wine so that the two of you can finally bond. When you’re grocery shopping together for a party you’re throwing, you feel like you’re waiting for the guests to arrive and the music to be on before you can finally have fun. Being happy feels like it takes effort. But, with the right person, no moment spent with them feels like you’re waiting for anything. You’re just happy to be with them and in the most basic and boring setting, you feel excited. Or at the very least, content and comfortable.

Getting mad

You’re not a crazy Itchbay. You’re just human. You think that that seemingly perfect couple you are friends with never fight? Get real. Everybody fights and that’s because no couple has ESP or mind reading powers. Any time you get two people with their own separate minds, feelings and insecurities, there will be the occasional fight. That’s okay. But if you fear speaking up because you don’t want to be “that crazy girlfriend” you’ll end up miserable because issues will pile up in your head. It’s okay to be irrational sometimes and to just have an unwarranted emotion. Men get that (the good ones do at least). Usually, the simplest statement of, “I’m feeling neglected right now” can fix everything. Even if the guy didn’t do anything wrong, he can say something to make you feel better if you just tell him what’s up. If you are with a man who will judge you or criticize you for getting emotional, you’re with the wrong guy.

Electric skin

You know the feeling—you touch the person and it’s on, even if you were just peeling carrots in your sweat pants before a TV dinner. Your bodies work together. That is the true meaning of chemistry. Chemistry happens when two different entities come together. Or, it simply doesn’t happen. It cannot be created though. It just is, or it isn’t. You might be with someone who you enjoy sex with but, it takes some work for you to be turned on. Again, wining and dining, dressing up and a whole lot of build up are required for you to feel “chemistry.” But with the right person, it’s just there because your body is next to his. And that’s what you want. Sounds good, right?

The same goal

Women are great at pretending they don’t want what they want. A guy says he doesn’t want marriage, we say, “Terrific! No problem! Me neither!” Oh, and to that voice in our head that says, “Yes you do…” we say, “Shut up! He’s perfect! Don’t ruin this!” But you know how that plays out: a breakup. You can’t change what you want and you can’t change what he wants so if you’re in a long distance relationship and you want to stay where you are, be sure he wants to move to you. If you want four kids, be sure he wants to be a parent. If you want to have a swingers relationship (hey, to each her own) make sure that’s a concept that excites him too. Those things that you tell yourself you don’t want in the beginning are usually the things that break you up.