The worst relationships you’ve ever been in

Want to get your happily ever after? Stop going back to these toxic relationships.

by: E.B. Johnson

For a lot of people, intimate relationships inhabit a core piece of life experiences and happiness. We love to be in love, but not every story turns out like the romance we hoped for. Sometimes, the relationships we build come tumbling down around us. It’s important to take note of our patterns and all the things we got wrong, so we can build better relationships for ourselves in the future. The more bad relationships you avoid, the more good relationships you can bring into your life.

What do relationships mean to you?

Our intimate partners can form a cornerstone of our lives, but when our relationships with them become complicated or toxic, it can seriously undermine our happiness. Romantic relationships are only worthwhile when they bring value and joy into our lives. When they tear us apart or bring us down, they only further destroy the hope we’re trying to build for our future.

If we want to have that special someone in our lives, we have to learn how to build better relationships for ourselves and for our partners. Falling into the same bad relationships over-and-over again will only pull us further away from the experiences and the people that bring us fulfillment.

You need to figure out what intimate partnerships really mean to you and spend some time rethinking how you spend your time and energy with others. You need to stop investing in people who don’t have your best interests at heart and align yourself with those who see the best in you and want the best for you. Once you stop settling for less than you need, a whole world filled with love will open itself up to you.

The worst relationships you’ve ever been in.

Building better relationships requires that we learn how to spot the bad ones. We have to learn how to analyze our patterns and all the behaviors and beliefs we get wrong when it comes to other people. By knowing what a bad relationship looks like, we can spend our time and energy focusing on the type of partners that bring us true joy and support.

Endless drama

Have you ever found yourself stuck in a relationship with a total drama star? To this partner, they are always on show. If you get something wrong, expect major public blow ups and an array of sparks which keeps things frayed and emotionally on edge. In this relationship, attention and passion are the hook that keep the partners coming back for more…even to their own detriment.

Constant infidelity

Being in a relationship with a cheater is never fun, and it seriously erodes our self-confidence and sense of trust. When we trust someone, that trust is complete. When it’s betrayed, it becomes hard to ever bestow that trust on someone again. Constant infidelity in a monogamous relationship leaves the victimized partner on unstable ground and dealing with complex emotions like grief and resentment.

Suffering abuse

Abuse — in any form — is never acceptable. There are many types of abuse, and both subtle and overt forms that are hard to recognize or even confirm. From emotional manipulation and terror to all out physical battles for life, abusive relationships are one of the most catastrophic things we can experience. It changes who we are and it changes the way we see ourselves and others.

Awkward disconnection

There doesn’t have to be an insidious reason behind a bad relationship. Sometimes, we just don’t fit together as well as we hoped we would, and things get awkward and weird. This generally happens when your basic needs and wants aren’t compatible with your partners, or you decide to go different directions with what you want in life. The problems really occur when you can’t find the courage to stand up for yourself and call it like it is.

Intimacy only

From time-to-time, a strictly physical relationship can be fun. It can be just the thing we need to get in touch with our bodies, or figure out what we do or don’t want in the bedroom. When our relationships become strictly physical, though, in an emotional space — the lines get blurred. It gets even worse when you discover you’re being used for your physical body by a dishonest person who isn’t being clear about their intentions.

Taking advantage

Have you ever been with someone you expected you to pay all the bills? Someone who was using you for material gain or emotional support — without offering anything in return? Hooking our wagons to someone who takes advantage of us is dangerous. When they leave, we find ourselves heartbreak and left with nothing. It’s important we learn that we should have to make constant sacrifices in order to be loved for who we are.

Too many members

A relationship between two people is a nuanced thing, and it’s made no simpler by the interference of in-laws or close friends and loved ones. When family is overly involved or gets in the middle of things, it can cause serious division and even more toxic misunderstandings. Our in-laws and our own family members should respect us and our partners enough to allow us to handle our own business in private.

How to stop going back to bad relationships.

You don’t have to settle for abusive, toxic, one-sided relationships. You can build a partnership which allows you to thrive independently as you are, but you first have to figure out what you want, rebuild your self-respect, and commit (mindfully) to never going backwards when it comes to your needs and to your happiness.

1. Figure out what you really want

It is impossible to build the relationship of your dreams if you don’t even know what your ultimate dream is. We have to know ourselves from the inside out in order to be good partners and build stronger relationships. Before you waste time and energy chasing after the people you know are wrong for you, you need to take a step back and figure out what you really want from your personal life and your romantic life.

Build a picture of your ideal dream life and then imagine the relationship that you see within that life. What feelings does that relationship provide you with? What tangible items or factors? Once you’ve envisioned the perfect relationship, get clear about the person that you’re building that life with.

There’s a good chance that you keep bouncing back to the same old comfortable things because you’ve never taken the time to really consider what you want and what you’ll have to put in to get it. Set everything that everyone ever told you to the side and center on yourself for a moment. What do you want from love? A family? A partner? A helpmeet? There’s no right or wrong answer, we simply must have the courage to question ourselves.

2. Have some self-respect

Self-respect will get you everywhere when it comes to building healthier and more connected relationships. Our self-respect is our sense of self-honor, and that comes our self-esteem and the worth that we place on our skills and our presence. When we respect ourselves, we don’t allow others to take advantage of us, and we certainly don’t allow ourselves to settle for second best.

Begin by re-building your self-esteem, piece-by-piece. Start with your physical body (as it’s the most obvious, and the easiest to get started with). Every morning when you look in the mirror, celebrate at least 3 things you love about it. You can write this down in a journal too.

Once you’ve started to connect with your physical body, it’s time to celebrate who you are from the inside out. Celebrate your skills and all the things you do well. Look back and pat yourself on the back for all the hardships you’ve managed to overcome. You are strong, lovable, and capable — just as you are right now. Have enough decency to respect yourself and stop giving yourself away to people who don’t deserve you.

3. Take a look at the past

Although we generally like to bury the past deep and lock it up tight inside, it’s not a treasure chest that can be stowed and forgotten. Our past holds the key to our present. And while we can’t dwell there, we certainly have to start there when it comes to unwinding our relationship knots. Taking a look at the past is absolutely necessary to reshape our intimate relationships in the present moment and beyond.

Stop where you’re at and look back at the relationships you shared with others in the past. Start with your parents. What did they teach you about trust? Did they make it safe for you to express your emotions, or say “no” when you didn’t want to do something? Move ahead slowly and question each relationship. What was a lesson and a fear that it taught you — and why?

By working through our past relationship history (at every level) we can recognize our patterns consciously and mindfully. Journaling is a great way to do this slowly, layer-by-layer, but it can also be helpful to enlist the help of a mental health professional. These are trained experts who can guide you safely through the well of emotions that come along with digging up the past and finding the answers we need to transform.

4. Invest your time in better people

Whether we like to admit it to ourselves or not, we tend to become the type of person we surround ourselves with. You’re going to keep running back to bad partners (or the same types of partners) when that’s the only type of person you allow into your life. For you to truly thrive romantically and socially, you need to invest your time and energy into a higher quality of person.

Fall out with the crowd you’re in and fall in with people who want to see you thrive simply because you deserve to. We are dragged down when we insist on surrounding ourselves with toxic people, or people who want us to stay as small, lost, and miserable as they are.

You have a finite amount of time and energy to spend on the people in your life. Spend it wisely and spend it on the people who return the same time and energy to you when you need it. Healthy relationships are a two-way street. Stop going one way into heartbreak and disappointment, when there are people out there who are ready to open their arms to you fully and without judgement.

5. Never settle for less than you need

One of the worst habits we fall into is settling for a partner who provides us with less than we need mentally, physically, emotionally, etc. We all have different needs, and that’s okay. Needs direct us toward our happiness and our fulfillment, and it’s our responsibility to make sure they are being met in whatever station we may have them.

A partner who does not have what you need — no matter what department that may be in — is a bad fit. We owe it to ourselves to only spend our time, energy, and effort on those who see the best in us, and who want the best for us; people who are aligned to our journey and who hold the same values.

You have to actively start setting boundaries that protect from those who don’t have your needs in alignment with their own. It’s okay to say no to a potential love interest. There are plenty of fish in the sea, and there will be someone better that comes along when you learn to let the wrong person go. We only have so much space in our lives. Don’t clog it with the people who are a bad fit.

Putting it all together…

There are some core relationships we should always seek to avoid when it comes to building a happy love for the future. From abusive partners, to bad fits and superficial cheaters — getting past the bad relationships takes analyzing our patterns and getting past our old habits. Want to find someone you can build something long term with? Build understanding and stop going back to bad relationships.

Spend some time zeroing in on what you really want from your life and the respective relationships that you decide to build within it. Not everyone needs or wants the same things from a relationship. Make sure you know what you want so that you can invest your time in people who want the same things. We make our relationships last by having a mutual sense of the future. Have enough self-respect to only pursue those things which suit you. Analyze your past and look for the patterns that are leading you back to the same old heartbreaks and the same old memories. Stop settling for less than you need and pursue those loves which align with your deeper authenticity. We can have the romance of our dreams, but it comes down to changing the way we see both ourselves and love first.