Perfect for Me

Many people have the following question: "When will I know if I met the perfect one for me?" Well, I'm going to attempt to answer that question!

I'm going to come up with something for you. A checklist of sorts. I'll put together some aspects of a relationship that will hint toward whether or not that relationship could be long lasting, so much to the point of bringing two people together for their lives. That being said, let's dive in.


Accepting the past.
We all have something that we are not proud of. How does your partner react to these things? A person who truly cares for you, and wants to spend plenty of time with you, will not fully accept flaws and issues that lie in your past. The same response lies with you. Do you feel comfortable with your partner's past? No, it isn't flawless, but do you trust your partner? Do you support him/her? These are good leading questions that could indicate how you feel about your partner's past.

A lifetime is a long time.
Many relationships are healthy and lively when two people see each other every once in a while, maybe a couple of times a week or so. How do you react when you're around your partner for a long time? Keep this in mind: If you get aggravated with your partner after spending only a few hours with him/her, imagine what it will be like to wake up next to that person for the rest of your life. If you're dreading this idea, chances are you aren't with the right person.

Know your partner.
It's difficult to know if two people are compatible if these two don't know each other well. Make sure you get to understand your partner. Let yourself view other sides of your partner's personality. Experience this person in many settings, including alone time, spending time with the family, partaking in activities in public, and when you two are celebrating. How your partner reacts to certain situations makes you aware of the person you may be spending your life with. Know your partner both emotionally and physically, to some extent, as you'll be around this person a lot!

No relationship is flawless.
 It takes two to tango, and one should expect to have issues in any relationship, no matter how well it may be going in the moment. What's more important is how you and your partner find a way to work through such problems. This is a good clue as to whether or not a relationship with a person could work. If your partner seems ready to jump ship at the smallest battle, be very wary. However, if your significant other decides to stay behind you during the most difficult arguments, it's a good sign. That's very telling as to how lasting that relationship can be. Analyze the bad times in the relationship. Are these bad times worth the good times? Do you still love your partner while that person may be arguing with or aggravating you? Spending your life with the person that is "perfect" for you doesn't mean you only look forward to the good times, but you must be ready for the bad times. You should be looking forward to those too, because you get to experience them with your partner.

These are four aspects of a relationship to think about when wondering if someone is perfect for you. However, don't aim to find the perfect person. Aim to create the perfect love. If this is your goal, the perfect person will turn up when the time is right.

Did this advice help you? If it did, please share! If you happen to have any situations or questions that need some insight, please contact me and let me know what it is that's on your mind. I'm here with answers and tips!

Happy Loving!

Letting Go of a Lost Love

It's finally starting to feel like Spring, which is symbolic to a new beginning. With that in mind, this topic goes out to the single people out there, ones who have recently experienced a difficult break-up.

I feel like we have all been in this position in life. We suffer a break-up and get caught in the past, wondering what went wrong and how one can fix it. It leads to depressing and lonely nights, putting a large damper on life as a whole. We all find ways to cope with it, but at times, those negative emotions just linger, waiting to drag us down. Here are some things to help you push past the pain.

Go out and find a hobby. It could be related to music, puzzles, video games, working out, anything that will occupy your mind. Once you put yourself into something you enjoy, you may find out something that is very interesting: While you're dedicated to your hobby, you aren't thinking about the pain of your loss. There is a high chance that your mind will go back to the pain you once felt, but the time away from those negative thoughts are healing.

Spend time with friends. There is a common misconception that one is lonely if he/she is not in a relationship, but this isn't true! Think of the friends and family around you. You may not have a romantic partner, but you have multiple emotional connections with others  who can help you through life. Being around others will help in two manners. You will realize that you aren't alone and true friends will find a way to comfort you and make you smile. This is also very cathartic while dealing with pain.

This next component is mental and may seem easier than it truly is, but let your ex-love go. It sounds harsh, but it is necessary. If the relationship is actually over for good, let the weight lift off of your shoulders. If you're still hurting after the first two suggestions, chances are you feel that you had done something wrong to drive the other person away. Do not put the fault on yourself. A relationship doesn't work because two people were not a compatible fit for life. What your ex may have despised is an aspect of you that someone else can love. Don't apologize for being you. This is poison to the mind and doesn't have an easy cure. You will be running circles in negativity. So I say again, let your love go. You're keeping yourself in the past if you don't do this. Focus on the future.

This brings us to the last point. Have hope. Sure, one relationship didn't work, but the next one may. What I found is love will find you when you least expect it. Keep an eye out for people you may be interested in, but keep positive and live your life. I'm confident that the right person is out there for you. One day, life will bring you together with another person and it will be an incredible moment. It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all, so learn from your ex and prepare for meeting the love of your life.

For those in a happy relationship, reinvigorate passion within it. Have a night just to the two of you and put that spark back into the relationship, assuming it was ever lost to begin with. Be thankful for each other and renew any love that may have been lost or taken for granted. Take this as a challenge, and good luck!

Friendship Far Far Away

"The guy/girl you love most moves away and he/she is the center of your life. They're the one you talk to when you're feeling down but you haven't talked to them since they moved, a long time ago. Now, you really need that person for everything. What do you do?"

A friend came to me with this question, wondering what she should do to solve problem. Here is my advice on the matter.

If that person is the center of your life, it must mean that you considered him/her a close friend, and he/she thought of you in the same way. Now that this person has been in another state for quite some time, it's fair to say that the bond that once held the two of you together has dissolved. However, it does not mean that it was forgotten. Your friend will remember you, and could share many of the same attachments.

If you're missing this person and wish to talk to him/her, then go for it! However, don't latch on to that person. Instead, say something along the lines of, "I miss you and thought we should catch up." This way, your friend doesn't feel pressured or forced into the expectations and boundaries of the past friendship. Let the two of you grow closer naturally, which could easily happen, considering how close the two of you were in the past. This is how to resolve the relationship between your friend.

The issue now lies in the idea that you need that person for everything. Find a way to branch away from that. Not only is your friend far away and not "easily accessible", but you need to find trust and confidence in yourself. As we get into romance and long term relationships, the mentality of "I'm on my own" goes away, as you forge a team with your partner. But otherwise, rely on yourself. Find that strength within yourself to take on life, and go to friends for added support and strength. Reliance on anyone will get you into trouble later on. It'll effect what you want to do with your life, and come between relationships with others. Start to ween yourself off of this dependence on this person. It doesn't mean you have to replace your friend, but become comfortable with yourself. It will solve plenty of issues, now and in the future.

I hope this helped!

I'm always looking to give advice. If you happen to have any issues with love and friendship, send me a message. It will be anonymous, and you'll get some unbiased advice straight from the blog! If you have any questions, comment with them. You'll get an answer soon!

It Is Said That...

I have trouble with this quote. It seems to say that if you love, you die. That, I absolutely do not agree with. I'm not entirely sure how to rewrite, however. Perhaps, "If you love truly, you are reborn daily?"

Love is an incredible emotion, feeling, and connection between two people. It has the power to put a smile on someone's face even at the most depressing moment. It makes people feel complete and whole. It gives others the meaning to live. This is why it bothers me that something that is seen as so negative, death, is paired with love.

In fact, I'm going to go in the complete opposite direction and say this. If one loves, that person will never die. Well, how could that be? Actions done with love influence many people in a positive way, even if it is with the ripple effect, of affecting one person who affects another, so on and so forth. If one person loves, that person is held in the hearts of many many people, even through death. In this case, that person never dies, constantly living daily in the hearts of the ones who love him/her.

Death is not to be found in love. We are born in love, in many different ways. Some find completion in love, others find purpose, and some find themselves within it.

If you were to change this quote, how would you change it? How were you born in love? Leave your comments and thoughts!

Happy Loving.

Love Yourself

They say you have to love yourself before you can love someone else. I've thought long and hard on how valid this statement is. Should someone give up love if that person doesn't love him/herself? Should this be a life motto?

I do agree that you must love yourself. Though it doesn't mean that this love comes before you find a way to love someone else.  If you were to ask everyone who loves themselves how they managed to find this appreciation of the self, each person will have a different story. It may have been an achievement that got someone there, it could have been a conversation this person had with another. There is no science as to how a person can fall in love with themselves, have confidence, and feel happy in his/her own skin.

Here is my theory: If you fall in love with someone, your partner could be just what you need to love yourself. It could be something the other person said, or just fulfillment of being happy with another person, but it could easily lead to this love of self as any other scenario.

Some friends of mine are not quick to accept the idea that they are great people. They have excuses, complaints about themselves, and disappointment for themselves. If I had to give them advice to bolster their confidence, I would simply say, "Meet yourself." A person may not have love of the self, though if this person were to meet him/herself on the street, love could blossom between the two. Do you doubt it?

I use that motto above, "Meet yourself," as a way to illustrate how we never know how we will meet ourselves. Some of us never will, though others have the gift and ability to view themselves as how others see them, not as the critical people we often view ourselves as. It could be our lovers who allow us to meet ourselves. Through support, trust, communication, and words of love, our partners can make us see the positive effects we have of other people's lives. Therefore, the deep love we have for another could be the catalyst we need to reach love for ourselves.

If you hear the thought that you must love yourself before you can love anyone else, don't take those words to heart. If you happen to think lowly of yourself, focus on your relationships with other people. Find love for another, and this in turn will find your self confidence and appreciation. You are completely capable of loving someone else, even if you do not love yourself yet.
If you have found the key to loving yourself, go out in search of a person to love. You may be the key to another person loving his/herself.

With our culture the way it is, it could take a lifetime before we love ourselves. Don't hurt your own happiness by waiting for something that may take years to occur. Find a way to love yourself, and find a way to love another person, but either will happen in their own times. Nothing is set in a timeline.

Tom Robbins Says...

"We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love."

 I blame the media for this one. We are constantly bombarded with another's ideas of what love should be. We see perfection in books, in the movies, even in ads. What we need to keep in mind is that in these situations, we are only seeing half of the story. A movie could go through the lifetime of a couple, but that doesn't mean that we experience each and every day that this couple goes through. I guarantee there were hard days in that lifetime.

One will never find the "perfect" lover. After all, we are all human and we are all flawed in one way or another. Perhaps we don't look at ourselves the same way others do, but it doesn't change the fact that nobody is perfect. This doesn't mean, however, that there isn't someone in this world that is perfect for you. This is the perfect love that Robbins is talking about. It is important to look for and create the perfect love for you, not search for the flawless lover, driven by an image of perfection in your head. If you hold such lofty expectations in any relationship, it will never work out in your favor.

Nobody is perfect, yet the perfect love can be created

This perfect love will not be a person walking down the street. It will be someone that you dedicate yourself to, that you accept, for flaws and all. This is where creating the perfect love comes in. You find the person you want to create it with, then work through the tough times and enjoy the good times. Be there for each other, side by side and support one another through it all. Know that in times of need, the other person is there for you. Understand that the bad days are a part of even the best relationships. People may see it as a negative thing to go through some tough times as a couple. Don't let that hold you back. Every relationship will eventually have some problem or another. It is most important to communicate and get through these conflicts together. Only in this way could the perfect love be created.

Let Me Know!

Hello, Blogger folk! Matthew Johnson here. I like to consider myself a Romantologist. This does not mean that I study Romans! No, it means that I study love. I reflect on many situations about this crazy aspect of life, I try and make sense of some the confusing qualities of love, and I also like to give advice and tips to establish and create a healthy relationship that is meant to last!
I'm actually coming over here from another blog. I did not feel a part of the community over there and am considering moving my blog to Blogger. Would such a topic, the topic of love, interest you? If it would, comment as to what your thoughts are on this. I'm curious as to what you have to say!
Among aspects of love that I have reflected on in the past, I thought on showing appreciation, how dates are important in any relationship no matter how long it has been going on, and how to get over a past lover. There are many more ideas I have on other advice and tips! I also take other known love quotes and reflect on them. Each quote has something to be learned within it! With a passion for blogging on this topic, I hope I find a home here. Having a responsive audience to blog to will result in benefits for both you and me. Once this gets up and running, I will ask you for questions of love, and open a contact page where you can rant to me about love, ask for specific advice on situations, and find out a little bit more on something so wonderful and painful, sometimes at the same time.
Thank you for joining me on this journey! I look forward to hearing from you and can't wait until we get to know each other a bit more.

Let's explore love together