Stop chasing love (and start chasing your joy)

When you spend all your time chasing love, you often lose sight of loving yourself.

by: E.B. Johnson

We are a society that’s completely obsessed with love. No matter where you look, you’re confronted with images of happy couples and the pressure to pair off. It can be overwhelming and for many of us it results in a compulsive chase that leaves us alienated from our true selves and the things that matter in this.

Finding deep and meaningful happiness requires us to dig deep and first find that happiness within ourselves. While romantic relationships can certainly offer us love and support, those things cannot exist unless we find them first within ourselves. We have to stop chasing love within the external world and start tapping into it within ourselves. Take courage and stand on your own. After all, no one can see you and love you quite like you can love yourself.

Love isn’t a check mark on your to-do list.

The world places a huge emphasis on pairing off and finding romantic love. From a young age, they bombard us with images of knights and princesses, happy couples with picket fences and 2.5 kids. Everywhere you look, you’ll find the pressure to secure a very superficial ideal of love. For this reason, many become obsessed with this idea and start approaching their coupling more like something to be checked-off a to-do list than anything else.

Romantic love isn’t a benchmark. Our relationships are not a check-box on a to-do list. Real and lasting partnerships require far more than love. They require commitment, compromise and a work ethic that doesn’t stop at disappointment. The more we view love as something to be “conquered” the harder it becomes to find.

Only when we stop chasing everyone else’s ideas of love, can we find it within ourselves. We alone have the power to love us as deeply and as unflinchingly as we crave. So why do we spend all our time seeking that love in others? We have to discover a way to stand strong and see the beauty within ourselves. We have to love ourselves — fully and without question — before we can fully realize how to love others without condition. Stop chasing love and start chasing your own happiness.

Why we place such a high value on romantic love.

It’s no mistake we place such a high value on romantic love. When we feel the pressure of friends, family and society bearing down on us, it can make us force things that don’t work and revert to old examples. There’s a lot that goes into our desperate chase for love and romance, and we must understand these root causes to best them.

Chemical addictions

It’s no secret that romantic love can provide us with a lot of feels-good hormonal hits that make the experience more akin to taking drugs than anything else. When you get those little moments of attention and affection from a partner (whether or not they’re a good fit) — you still get the dopamine hits and the oxytocin shots to the brain that make it hard for you to see all the bad that might swirl in the background. They don’t call it “love drunk” for no reason.

Peer pressure

As mentioned, society and the “peer pressure” exerted by friends and family can go a long way in forcing us into some romantic corners. Whether everyone in your family is paired off (since high school), or the world at large just thinks you need to “settle down” — there is always an unbearable amount of pressure on us to find a partner and chain ourselves to them. While this is ideal for some, it’s not ideal for everyone, and it can lead to getting lost in the chase.

Low self-esteem

Self-esteem is a cornerstone of happiness, and it’s one way by which we prevent ourselves from investing in the wrong partners and partnerships. The more we see our worth and the more we value ourselves, the less likely we are to settle for people and relationships that don’t suit us. When our self-esteem is suffering, however, it becomes easier to associate your worth with the outward opinions of others. This is especially true of romantic relationships, which can provide an even greater amount of superficial validation (for a time).

Early examples

The earliest examples that are set for us in childhood are important, and they go a long way to inform how we build our ideals on love later on in life. If you had a parent that bounced from one relationship to the next — constantly looking for the next best thing — then you can find yourself in danger or repeating those patterns for yourself later on in life.

Validation of self-worth

One of the biggest and most common reasons we bounce from relationship to relationship is our need for external validation. Having a relationship can almost be seen like having worth in the eyes of society. When someone loves you (outside of yourself) you feel seen and celebrated in ways that hard to deny. The problem, however, is that these outward displays of validation are fleeting. When we put the entire weight of our self-worth on other people, we find ourselves continually disappointed when they leave.

What happens when we get lost in the chase.

Chasing the affection and attention of others is a serious pattern, and it’s one that can come with some serious consequences. The longer we place our value in the hands of another person, the more we can find ourselves becoming bitter and distanced from the things that once mattered most to us.

Love fatigue

Like it or not, chasing love can destroy those dreams for us. Love fatigue is an actual thing, and it can occur when we find ourselves bounding from failed relationship to failed relationship. We begin to define love differently and see it differently than we (probably) should. Some become bitter or cold towards ideals of honest and equitable love, and can slide down a very toxic spiral of patterns that make it hard to ever reconnect with meaning and contentment.

Emotional wreckage

There is a major amount of emotional wreckage that comes from seeking outward validation through romance. Your relationships become chaotic and fraught, and you’ll find yourself breaking your heart time-and-time again. Likewise, your friendships and even your family ties can suffer when you’re so focused on love that you forget to honor their value in your life. The more alienated you become, the more your emotional stability can plummet.

Loss of self

It’s incredibly easy to lose touch with who you are when you’re constantly chasing someone else. There’s no room to stay in touch with interests, experiences, or friendships when you’re spending all your time looking for someone to validate you romantically. It takes a tremendous amount of energy and a tremendous denial of self to be this non-discretionary in love. If you’re feeling like you don’t know who you are anymore, it might be because you’ve lost sight of that person while chasing someone else.

Erosion of confidence

Because this type of desperate pursuit lands us in so many toxic relationships, it takes a major toll on our confidence. Thinking too that our value or our personal worth is wrapped up in another person, eats away at any self-esteem we had left. When we’re desperate for love, we’re actually desperate for confidence. And that is a gift that we create and give to ourselves.

Toxic relationships

Chasing love is a bit like firing into the dark. It’s a numbers game, and eventually you’ll hit something that’s “close enough” to settle for. The problem here, however, is that true love requires more discretion. If you’re willing to accept any romantic partner that will consent, it’s easier to find yourself dealing with toxic people who want to take advantage of you. We have to set some boundaries for ourselves, and within that some standards that can safeguard our happiness.

Absolute breakdown

If you think that the chase for love is just a casual pastime that most people outgrow — think again. There are people who detonate their lives in the search for love without ever digging deeper into their own subconscious needs and hangups. They spend thousands of dollars, bankrupt themselves and fracture their families beyond repair… all because they’re searching for something that they already had within themselves. Love isn’t something that is supplied from the outside world. Rather, we each supply the world (and those we love) with our own excess gifts of acceptance and compassion.

How to stop chasing love and start chasing your own joy.

We don’t have to lose ourselves in the search for romance. We can find freedom and find ways to fall in love with ourselves, but that requires us first to take a step back and take focused action for our needs and our happiness.

1. Reconnect with your passions

One of the most basic ways to let go of your need for romantic validation is to get back in touch with your passions. Passions are passions for a reason. You can think of them like “hints” — guiding us toward those skills, persons and experiences which can provide us with meaning and contentment. When we reconnect with our passions, we reconnect with our skills, our interests and, therefore, our confidence. Stop chasing love and start chasing your passions again and you’ll be surprised by what you find.

If you’ve put your passions to the wayside in order to chase some preconceived notion of love…stop in your tracks. Immediately pull back and question your motives. Why have you put things you love to the wayside? If you look for passion and purpose in others, do you not expect that they will look for the same things in you?

We should come into our relationships as fully realized people, and that includes having an identity and interests of our own. We find these through passion, and we find ourselves and our paths to the future through those same passions as well. Don’t make romantic love your only focus in this life. Instead, come to see it as an added benefit (like getting “free” bread at a restaurant after buying a meal). Once you dig in and engage with life and your interests, they will reward you with love and companionship. Avoid putting the cart before the horse.

2. See your intrinsic value

Whether we like to admit it or not, many of us chase love because we see no worth in ourselves. Our self-esteem is so eroded that we look to others to tell us that we have value or that we are worth loving. In this route, we can never find happiness. When our value is only acknowledged in the eyes of others, we are left hollow and with no connection to who we truly are. You’ll stop chasing love when you begin to accept your intrinsic value.

Break away from the need for external validation. Focus on rebuilding your confidence from the ground up. In that final moment, you alone will be there to answer for yourself and the things you did or didn’t do. Why sacrifice the pride we could feel at the finish line for someone else’s opinion?

Embrace your right to be on this planet. Embrace your right to revel in the experience and find your place and your people within it. You deserve to have those things which bring you happiness and contentment. You don’t need someone beside you to deserve those things. You deserve them because you exist and you want them. So, put in the action and find the courage to stand on your own feet — free of the influence and opinions of others.

3. Celebrate your strengths

One of the best ways to get comfortable with your own journey to happiness is to spend time celebrating your strengths and victories. As humans, we have a bad habit of focusing on the negative and that includes the negative experiences in our lives. This can undermine our confidence, though, which can drive us right into the search for love. When we celebrate our strengths and wins (no matter how small) we empower ourselves to shift our perspective in new and transformative ways.

If you’re feeling the crunch in the mad dash for love, take a deep breath and then take a step back. Instead of looking around for someone who can offer you happiness or a better life, look within. Consider all the challenges you’ve already overcome on your own.

When you something right, praise yourself. When you do well at something, reward yourself. Celebrate those things about you which are powerful, masterful and good. High-five yourself in moments of victory and stop shying away from the fact that you are actually a great person with a lot of skills and talent of your own. The more comfortable you get in celebrating who you are, the more you will come to see yourself in a new and more positive light.

4. Fall in love with yourself

Before you can truly access lasting love with someone else, you have to learn how to love yourself. This doesn’t mean accepting yourself, and it doesn’t mean simply seeing the good and the bad. It means seeing all the above and making the conscious decision to revel in your power and your majesty, anyway. It’s looking at the full scope of your beauty and your ugliness and extending compassion and understanding despite your urge to look away.

Fall in love with yourself. Spend time alone and spend time celebrating the fullness of who you are. No one will ever be able to love you as deeply as you can love yourself, because no one will ever be able to see the full scope of what you’ve already survived.

Align yourself in your mind’s mirror. Strip back the layers and look at yourself for everything you are, everything you were — and everything you have left to become. Don’t flinch from anything. Instead, embrace all of it. The more comfortable you become with this practice, the more comfortable you will become with yourself. Be playful. Explore the opportunity of loving the fullness of who you are in this moment. It’s a beautiful thing that can unlock a lot of doors.

5. Break beyond the barrier

There are so many barriers that are placed on us in this world, and they range across everything from our gender to our personalities. People judge us and we judge ourselves, and this creates walls that can seem insurmountable when it comes to our dreams. Part of recognizing the fullness of true internal love is breaking beyond these barriers and finding the strength to pursue what is good and right for you.

Shed all those hang-ups and all that guilt that leaves you clinging to relationships that leave you miserable and empty. You don’t need to be married to anyone. You don’t need to have a partner. You don’t need to have a family.

The only person who can determine your life is you. Only you have the knowledge and the power to affect the change you’re looking for in your future. Stop dumbing yourself down and walling yourself up all in the name of ideals that have nothing to do with who you truly are. When you break beyond the barrier and start taking action for yourself, you will what you truly want from your life. Until then, you’re lost in someone else’s smokescreen and far, far removed from honest love.

Putting it all together…

We are a society obsessed with love and romantic relationships, and sometimes that can come at the detriment of our own personal happiness and wellbeing. When we get obsessed with chasing love, we forget to chase our own joy. And that is where we miss out on important opportunities for growth and transformation that could help build better and more fulfilling futures. In order to find lasting happiness, we have to let go of this desperate chase for love once and for all and start to look inward instead.

Reconnect with your passions and find the joy that is all around you — independent of anyone else. We don’t need other people to find things in this world that excite and inspire us. Get back in touch with your intrinsic value and understand that right now, in this moment, you are good enough precisely as you are. Celebrate your strengths and find a way to fall in love with yourself again. Only when we love ourselves deeply and unashamedly, can we extend that love to others and find it in them for ourselves. Let go of the fear and embrace the uncertainty. This life was meant to be lived authentically and independently. Break beyond the barrier and see the open doors all around you. Your future can be whatever you want it to be, but you have to stop chasing the happiness of other people.