Things You Should Know Before You Get Into a Relationship

I do not intend to be a love guru and I will not pre­tend to be very good about rela­tion­ships, because I’m not. But I have learned many things from many dif­fer­ent peo­ple, and I have even advised some young peo­ple on rela­tion­ships. So here is my take on what you should know before you get into a rela­tion­ship. For those already in a rela­tion­ship, this might be a good check and re-evaluation of how your rela­tion­ship is going.

Com­plete your­self first. Some peo­ple can’t help but look at another per­son to com­plete them­selves. Tom Cruise’s char­ac­ter in Jerry Maguire says, “You com­plete me,” and because it came from Tom Cruise we are prob­a­bly think­ing that that is an ideal thing to say.

In real­ity though, a part­ner that says that should raise a red flag for us. To find YOUR com­plete­ness in another per­son is to invite a rela­tion­ship of need instead of want. Good and healthy rela­tion­ships are the ones between two com­pletes and not the ones between two halves. It means that you won’t be forc­ing your lover to fill some­thing you do not have or is needy of. Scott Peck would put it this way: love are two free­doms look­ing at the same direction.

A friend once asked me, “How do I know I’m ready to be in a rela­tion­ship once again?” And I answered her, “When you’re not look­ing for some­one to be with any­more.” When you’re really ok, and not des­per­ate to be with some­one, when you don’t feel the need to be with any­one, that’s when you’re ready to be in a rela­tion­ship. Because only then can you express your­self fully, and develop your tal­ents with­out feel­ing you’re step­ping on the other person’s dreams, and accept who you are fully with­out feel­ing inse­cure about your­self in the relationship.

If you try to find inti­macy with another per­son before achiev­ing a sense of iden­tity on your own, all your rela­tion­ships become merely an attempt to com­plete yourself.

Learn from your past rela­tion­ships. Many peo­ple go through rela­tion­ships that turn bad and end in break-up and then pro­ceed to com­mit the same mis­takes in their new rela­tion­ships. I think after a cer­tain point, we have to be able to see pat­terns in our relationships—patterns of unhealth­i­ness or wrong ways of act­ing or even wrong atti­tudes that keep com­ing up—and catch our­selves and really make a deci­sion not to com­mit the same mistakes.

Remem­ber, if expe­ri­ence has not taught us any­thing, then that’s an awfully sad waste of experience.

Do not think per­sons change; they usu­ally don’t. I know, it sounds quite cyn­i­cal but hear me out first. So many peo­ple (girls mostly, but the ide­al­is­tic guys also get into this trap) go into rela­tion­ships hop­ing that the other per­son will change just because they’re will­ing to shower them with love. They also go into rela­tion­ships think­ing that they have the power to change the other per­son for the better—like love is a magic potion that will make every­thing go away.

I tell you, love can be many things, but love is not like that. First of all, love is not love if it forces another per­son to change. Sec­ond of all, you shouldn’t make your part­ner your own per­sonal mes­sianic project. Bring him to rehab; send him to fin­ish­ing school; ask him to go to a psy­chi­a­trist or a coun­selor or a life coach; let him con­fess to a priest. A lot of peo­ple make their liv­ing by help­ing peo­ple like your part­ner. And sorry, they are bet­ter at it than you. Oh, and another thing. Even if the ones I talked about started help­ing your loved one and he doesn’t decide to change? NOTHING WILL HAPPEN.

So if you think you could change another per­son just because you love him/her, or because you gave him/her another chance, think again. Per­sons do not change unless and until they make a deci­sion to. In any case, DO NOT GO INTO A RELATIONSHIP WITH A POTENTIAL, GO INTO A RELATIONSHIP WITH THAT PERSON–as he/she really is.

Focus on char­ac­ter, and not just chem­istry. Chem­istry ignites the fire but good char­ac­ter keeps it burn­ing. It’s great to be attracted to another per­son, but make sure you also check out the person’s char­ac­ter. A really quick three-question check to ask your­self are these:

* Do I want to be more like this per­son?
* Do I want to have a child with this per­son?
* Would I like my child to turn out like him or her?

What are his/her annoy­ing habits? These are things you prob­a­bly see as cute in the begin­ning because you’re so in love and you want to be in a rela­tion­ship as soon as pos­si­ble. But these habits catch up with you sooner or later. And you won’t find them cute any­more. I’m not telling you NOT to get into a rela­tion­ship just because of his annoy­ing habits; I’m telling you not to get into the rela­tion­ship BLIND about these.

Know what your love lan­guage is and what his/hers are. This I found very help­ful; and you will prob­a­bly learn this all the more as you get along. Basi­cally, Gary Chapman’s the­ory on love lan­guage is about the impor­tance of being able to express love to your spouse/partner in a way that your spouse can under­stand. He calls this type of com­mu­ni­cat­ing using the five love languages:

The Five Lan­guages of Love

Words of Affir­ma­tion
This is when you say how nice your spouse looks, or how great the din­ner tasted. These words will also build your mate’s self image and confidence.

Qual­ity Time
Some spouses believe that being together, doing things together and focus­ing in on one another is the best way to show love. If this is your partner’s love lan­guage, turn off the TV now and then and give one another some undi­vided attention.

Gifts
It is uni­ver­sal in human cul­tures to give gifts. They don’t have to be expen­sive to send a pow­er­ful mes­sage of love. Spouses who for­get a birth­day or anniver­sary or who never give gifts to some­one who truly enjoys gift giv­ing will find them­selves with a spouse who feels neglected and unloved.

Acts of Ser­vice
Dis­cov­er­ing how you can best do some­thing for your spouse will require time and cre­ativ­ity. These acts of ser­vice like vac­u­um­ing, hang­ing a bird feeder, plant­ing a gar­den, etc., need to be done with joy in order to be per­ceived as a gift of love.

Phys­i­cal Touch
Some­times just stroking your spouse’s back, hold­ing hands, or a peck on the cheek will ful­fill this need.

The con­cept states that while each of these lan­guages is enjoyed to some degree by all peo­ple, a per­son will usu­ally speak one pri­mary lan­guage. Because we have a pri­mary love lan­guage, we expe­ri­ence and feel love best in one of the five listed above.

The prob­lem is that we often­times think that the best way to love oth­ers is through OUR pri­mary love lan­guage or the way we want to be loved. And so for exam­ple, we give words of affir­ma­tion to some­one who really needs to be touched, or we give gifts to some­one who really needs our qual­ity time. And so we try to love in the way we want to be loved; the prob­lem is that often­times, the way we want to be loved is NOT the way our part­ner feels loved.

Many rela­tion­ships could have been saved if the cou­ple knows each other’s love language.

In the end it is your choice whether you want to go into a rela­tion­ship, and only you can answer whether you are ready to go into a rela­tion­ship. But read the tips above and you might just save a lot of tears and sleep­less nights.

Good luck, fall in love and stay in love and it will decide every­thing!