I love a good rom-com as much as the next guy, especially some of the earlier ones where love seems so easy and simple as long as you can find the right person. You grow up thinking as long as you find the perfect partner everything will automatically fall into place. With love by your side, you will experience never-ending happiness and live the rest of your life with a smile on your face. Unfortunately, life is not a movie, and love is not as easy as it is made out to be. This article dives into how lasting love takes work to find, build, and maintain. But don’t stress yourself out too much because all of that work is absolutely worth it.
Deceived by Disney Movies
A phrase I’ve often heard both in media and in real life is “Love should be easy” or “if love is hard, you’re doing it wrong”. While there are some slivers of truth to both statements, the problem is they mislead and misguide, ultimately creating more problems than solutions. We’ve learned in recent years how unrealistic expectations (various beauty standards) can cause serious harm to people both physically and psychologically. It’s important we realize that similar unrealistic expectations of love are causing harm to those around us. From refusing to address our own issues because we assume our perfect partner will love us as we are to breaking up with a partner because of a silly disagreement, we are sabotaging our potential for love and growth. We can all agree you don’t get a 6-pack from eating ice cream for breakfast, yet we somehow still believe love comes without effort or sacrifice.
Searching for Love: It’s Not a Walk in the Park
In theory, finding love should be easier than ever. Between social media, dating apps, and the internet we have greater access to potential partners than ever before. Yet even with such great advancements in technology people still consistently struggle to find partners and successful relationships. While technology has made it easier than ever to locate potential partners, it has also weakened our ability to communicate and connect with them. By replacing phone calls with texting and meet-ups with swiping our ability to leverage emotional intelligence for effective communicating has dwindled. There are entire generations of young adults that are terrified at the idea of introducing themselves to a stranger because they never had to build the skills necessary to do so.
Not only do we lack the tools and courage necessary to find love, but we are also too stubborn to address the areas of ourselves that need improvement. We expect to be loved for our dadbods while simultaneously requiring our love interest to workout 5 days a week. We know we have emotional trauma from our childhood or past relationships but expect a love interest to happily accept our issues even though we aren’t willing to do the work to address them. We think our perfect match will love us as we are, but fail to see that no one will truly be able to love us until we can put the necessary work in to love ourselves. Obviously, these are sweeping generalizations that aren’t true for everyone, but sadly there are a large number of individuals that fall into the categories I just described.
If we want to find love, we need to have the gumption to face ourselves in the mirror, be honest about areas we need to address, and put the work in to make things better. No one is perfect and you don’t need to be to find love, but you do need to be willing to work to make yourself the best version possible. Not only will strengthening your emotional intelligence make it easier to build a connection with a possible love interest, but the self-love you showcase will make you significantly more attractive. The love of your life could be the person standing next to you in a check out line, but it is up to you to have the courage and the ability to strike up a conversation.
Sandcastles and Love: They Both Require Work to Build
Congratulations! You’ve found a potential love interest and have managed to create an initial attraction or relationship. You should be proud of yourself. But you should also realize the work doesn’t stop here. Casual dating has become more commonplace now than ever, which has caused many to create emotional walls to protect themselves from getting hurt. Far too often we find ourselves catching feelings for someone only to realize they were looking for casual intimacy rather than lasting love. It’s easy to understand why people would be hesitant to open themselves up after being hurt time and time again. Unfortunately, it will be impossible for you to find the love you seek without making yourself vulnerable.
Not only do you need to be willing to get vulnerable and deep, but you also need to show your willingness to work for your partner’s love. And I don’t just mean fancy dinners and gifts (although no one hates to be wined and dined). I’m talking about working to show you care about them and want to get to know them. Learning about each other’s pasts, present, and desired future. One of the key metrics to a successful relationship is having healthy communication. Everyone has different communication styles so you need to understand how your partner communicates and adapt to their style. This is a two-way street though so don’t be afraid to expect them to do the same for you. Show that you care about their friends and family and are willing to spend time getting to know them. If you don’t have strong relationships with your partner’s friends or family, it will introduce stress into the relationship that could be difficult to overcome. Don’t just be your partner’s love interest, be their champion. Understand what they want their future to look like and be willing to support their journey towards those goals however you can.
This is the stage where you lay the groundwork to have a strong and lasting connection. The foundation you build at the beginning of a relationship will determine whether you last a couple of months or a couple of decades. Support your partner to be the best person they can, but also love them for who they are. You don’t need to be obsessed with golf or reality dating shows, but if your partner is then maybe buy them a putter for Christmas or be willing to watch the new season of Love is Blind. You might have been lucky enough to find the right person for you, but if you don’t put the work in the love you quickly found could just as quickly fade away.
Love is a Marathon, not a Sprint
From my experience, most people understand that it takes work to find love, and often takes work to be able to create love. Where a lot of couples fall short (and divorces follow) is when people forget that love continues to require work even after it has been clearly established by time or a formal construct like marriage.
Life is hard and no matter what you do or who you are everyone will experience hardships out of their control. These hardships could be a lost job, a parent passing away, an unexpected illness, or any other unexpected difficult situation. Regardless of what the hardship is, it will put stress on your relationship. The success of your relationship and love hinges on your ability to support your partner through these difficult times. It can be easy to take your frustration and sadness out on one another as you have become each other’s safe space, but you need to be cognizant of this and avoid it where possible. Sometimes these moments of lashing out will be difficult to avoid so it is important to remind yourself that your loved one isn’t upset with you, you are simply the vehicle for their emotional distress because you are the only person they trust enough to open up to.
Sometimes it’s not traumatic events that create issues in a relationship, but simply time and comfort. Being comfortable with a loved one is beautiful and one of the benefits of love, but it can also be a pitfall. Many marriages struggle because partners start to see each other more as roommates, friends, or parents than lovers. The responsibility of managing a household or a family often causes us to put love on the shelf so we can focus on other areas that feel like more of a priority. It is important to remember that love requires intimacy and intimacy requires work. Simple acts of love such as date nights or words of affirmation can be enough to keep the spark alive. Understanding your partner’s love language and putting effort towards those areas is the key to maintaining the love you worked so hard to build.
Final Thoughts
If you are still reading hopefully I haven’t scared you away from searching for love. It might seem intimidating after all the work I described it requires, but the truth is that when it comes to love work does not feel like work. The effort you put into a relationship will not only be fulfilling and rewarding but will be fun as well. I might organize planning a date night or learning about your partner’s life goals as “work”, but you might find these activities to be among the most enjoyable you have access to. Any effort you put towards love will be well placed as there are few greater joys in life than finding a partner to share it with. So roll up your sleeves, dive in, and enjoy one of the greatest aspects of being alive.
