We've all heard it before: “You’ll find someone to love when you’re not looking.” Some of us believe it, and the rest of us realize how ridiculous and illogical that statement is. How likely are you to find your car keys if you don’t bother looking for them? How about that matching sock? How likely are you to receive that promotion if you don't put in the conscious effort to be noticed?
Just because a person is a living being doesn’t mean that he or she will simply walk into your life. On top of that, if you’re not looking, who’s to say that you’ll notice this person when he or she does happen to walk into your life?
There is, of course, a difference between actively and passively looking for a life partner. Looking for someone actively via dating sites or going out to bars does -- I promise you -- have a much higher success rate than not looking at all does. Yet, actively looking gets tiring, and whether we like to admit it or not, much of who we meet in our lifetime depends on luck.
What’s important isn’t so much spending as much time as possible searching for someone to love, but rather, making sure that we are prepared to love once we find someone worth loving.
Find Your Best Friend
How does one prepare to fall in love? We must understand the type of person that will make us happiest. Not too long ago, one of my readers reached out and we started chatting. When I asked her what she looked for in a man -- yes, I sometimes flirt with my readers, one of the perks -- her answer was earnest and simple: “I’m looking for my best friend.”
If we imagine the person we would like to spend the rest of our lives with, the person we will spend nearly every day with and the person we will raise a family with and support for as long as we live, we should be looking for the person that we will have the most fun with -- a person that will get into trouble with us, explore with us, support our passions and make us better.
What we should all be looking for is not a husband or wife, but a partner in crime. Life is supposed to be fun. If it’s not, you are doing something wrong.
Your Partner Should Be Just That, A Partner
A new friend of mine told me about a time she went to a weeklong retreat, sort of a detox from her regular life, which was a few hours away from home up in the woods somewhere. She found herself on a lone bike ride on the nearby trails, racing up the hill, when a moment of clarity washed over her. She came to realize that she is a fast-paced, passionate, highly competitive and relentless person, and what she needs -- if anything -- is a person that she can race through life with.
She needs a person that can not only keep up with her, but also push her, test her limits, encourage her to improve and better herself. Life is difficult; it has its ups and downs. We experience successes and failures, good luck and bad. Life isn’t always pleasant, nor is it easy. If we are to find a partner, then it better be just that: a partner. Our partner shouldn't be someone who makes our lives more complicated or difficult, but someone that keeps us focused on our goals and dreams, who will be there to hold our hands when we feel like the ground is falling away from under our feet.
Find A Mutual Reality
Some people love to live life in the fast lane; some like to take things slower. Some are extremely competitive and eager to grab life by the balls, while others just want to take in the quiet beauty that moves along, whether or not we will it to. There is no single standard for right and wrong. The right person for you is the person that sees the world almost the same way that you do... almost.
Complete opposites may attract, but they don’t last. If you and your partner don’t share very similar beliefs on the most basic of levels, then your relationship will be filled with nothing but arguments and stress. In order to share your life, you have to share your world -- the world that exists only in your mind and hopefully in your lover’s.
However, if you and your partner are too similar, it's no good, either; boredom is a reality. It is possible to find someone who lives in your reality, but perceives certain things a bit differently, enough to broaden your horizons and to expose you to other parts of a reality that you can adapt as your own. Finding a person to love, in summation, relies on understanding yourself well enough to know what to look for in another. If you don’t know yourself, then you won’t know love when it comes your way. That’s something worth being afraid of.
