You Never Really Wanted to Be With Them
But you forced yourself. Now, here we are. Ready to get it right?
by: E.B. Johnson
Let’s be honest. It’s just us here. You never wanted to be with them. You settled for them, sure. You put up with them. Maybe you went through the motions and married them and started the family. But you never really wanted to be with them — and that’s always been apparent. When are you going to admit it to yourself? When will you face the truth? The sooner you allow yourself to acknowledge what you’ve been running from, you can take steps to put it right and find your happiness again.
Signs you never really wanted to be with them.
Coming to terms with the truth? There were always signs there. You just didn’t want to see them. Or maybe you didn’t know how. Either way, you’re here, and you’re wondering how to get out. First, you must look at the truth for what it is. Acknowledge where you took a wrong turn, and you can take steps to actively avoid those mistakes in the future.
You were in a really bad place
Were you in a really terrible place when you met your partner? Maybe you were leaving a toxic relationship. Or maybe you were dealing with death, losing your job, or some other calamity that left you lost, confused, and searching for peace. That might be the time your current partner walked in the door. Did they offer you a safe place to stand while the world settled? While that counts for a lot, it’s not always enough to make a commitment work. We don’t really want saviors, after all. We want partners.
You resent everything about them
When resentment takes up permanent residence in your life, you must question where it comes from. For a lot of couples, endless disappointments and mis-communicated expectations guarantee frustration and upset. It’s bigger than that for other couples, though. In their world, the resentment stems from a deep inner self-knowing. This person will never give me what I want. As they continue to disappoint you, you end up proven right.
You cringe when it’s intimate
Would you describe your sex life as vibrant and exciting? Do you enjoy being physically vulnerable and intimate with your partner? Do you share things in the bedroom and use this intimacy to reconnect when life gets hard? No? What about cringing? Do you flinch when your partner reaches for you? Does the thought of opening up to them like this make your stomach turn? Maybe it was never meant to be — and your body knows that too.
You fantasize about something else
Do you spend a lot of your time fantasizing about anything, and anyone, other than your relationship and your partner? Have these fantasies been around since day 1? While fantasies can be a natural and helpful part of a relationship, always fantasizing about someone else isn’t healthy. If you are always looking for better options, then a part of you is probably confident that you’re not where you want to be (or with who you want to be with).
You don’t laugh at their jokes
Humor is one of those qualities that universally revered and desired in romantic relationships. Study-after-study, couples explain their desire to find a partner who makes them laugh. So what about your relationship? Be honest. Does your partner make you laugh? Are their jokes right up your alley? Does watching them be silly bring you pleasure? Humor is another powerful bonding agent, especially when life gets challenging. Without that humor, we can end up stressed and too focused on things that don’t matter.
You can’t picture a future together
Have you ever pictured your future with your partner? We’re talking about a real future, here. Have you imagined what it would be like to hold their hand at the end? To retire? To watch your children grow up? If you can’t imagine a future together, then how are you going to plan that future? The couple that never makes future plans is a couple that’s not picturing the long-term; they’re not picturing commitment in any proper way.
You fight with each other constantly
Endless conflicts and arguments? Face it. You don’t want to be with your partner and these fights are a part of the problem. The two of you can hardly be in a room without exploding. Everything you say turns into a personal attack, and the demeaning and belittling comments are at an all-time high. When you’re not fighting, there’s silence. Even that can be weaponized these days. Failure to come back to the middle can always be a sign you invested in the wrong person.
You’re on-again, and off-again
Is your relationship always in some state of on-again, off-again? Have your friends and family stopped asking whether you’re breaking up or making up? This is one of the biggest and most common relationship red flags we have to pay attention to. A relationship that isn’t stable enough to maintain a basic commitment is not a relationship that’s built on two people who are passionately in love with one another. Genuine love makes it work. Couples who settle bounce back and forth until they find something better.
How to build the relationships you actually want.
Instead of settling for partners who don’t have what you need or want, you’ve got to realize your needs. Then you can take steps to foster them and nurture them in your partnerships. That requires a commitment from you first, however. You must boost your self-esteem and create relationships you don’t have to settle or water yourself down for. Is that a commitment you can make? Great. Fall in love with yourself as the final grand gesture of your ability to connect.
1. Be honest with yourself first
There’s no improving the quality of your relationships until you can acknowledge the role you’re playing in your own disappointment. Sure, the toxic and abusive partners have their own blame to handle. Boiling it down, though, you are the one who keeps settling for partners and spouses that aren’t a good fit. To make better choices, you need to recognize your patterns. At that point, you can acknowledge the change that has to take place in your romantic life.
Be honest with yourself foremost. Why did you give in? Why did you say “yes” to someone that you didn’t really want to commit to? You need to mark these reasons and turn them into lessons in future relationships. What is it in you that makes you settle for partners who don’t deserve you?
Unless you look at things for what they really are, you’ll keep bumbling into the same mistakes over-and-over again. You’ve got to take off the rose-tinted glasses and be brutally honest with yourself about yourself. You deserve to have a love that is fulfilling and worthwhile. But that love won’t come if you keep playing small and selling yourself short in relationships you don’t want to be in.
2. Communicate your needs candidly
How often do you communicate your needs to your partner? When you communicate with them, how candid are you? Do you say what you mean in no uncertain terms? Or are you vague and evasive? Reality check time: that doesn’t work. Your partner can’t magically address your needs without knowing what they are. And when you hold on to those beliefs, you end up in all the wrong relationships.
Whenever you’re approaching your new relationships, you need to put your needs right out on the table. There’s no point in wasting time with people who don’t have what it takes to interest you or connect with you. Both of you should want the same things, and have complementary needs. Tell your partner exactly what you want and need in terms of sex, family, career, travel. Anything that’s really important to you should always be at the forefront of any new relationship.
3. Increase your self-esteem
A lot of our relationship problems come down to self-esteem. And settling for partners we don’t really want is no different. We don’t love ourselves. So we allow anyone to come into our life and take up space. Everyone is better than me, so I have to settle for what I get. That’s a common theme that permeates relationship issues over-and-over again. How do we combat that? By increasing our self-esteem and knowing we inherently deserve more.
Increase your self-esteem and use it as the armor to deflect your need to settle. You don’t have to please others. You don’t have to meet their expectations or make them happy. The only happiness you’re beholden to is your own. The only standards you have to meet is your own.
Believe in yourself. Believe in your right to get what you want in love, but also to survive the building of the right partnership. That may require walking away from what you have now. So be it. You’re strong enough to do that. More than that, you’re deserving of a genuine connection with someone who has what it takes. Give yourself that permission. Fall in love with your body, your heart, your mind, your skills. See what a catch you are and use this to prevent selling in future.
4. Stop settling for less than you want
With this new self-esteem to hand, you’ve got to make a new commitment to yourself. Beyond self-sabotage, you must promise that you will stop settling for relationships that don’t really make the cut. You must move beyond the desire to please others more that yourself. And with that, you must let go of the relationships that aren’t enough to make you feel anchored and connected in love.
It is better for you to spend a lifetime in singlehood than to spend one moment with someone who you resent. It’s literally better to be alone than to waste someone else’s time with your fear of being alone. You will always be alone in some respect, because you’re the only person experiencing your life through your eyes. Hold out for the authentic hero, and know that love is right around the corner. The trick is getting yourself on the right street first, and that happens with action, skill, and self-acknowledgement.
5. Fall in love being on your own
So many of us run into the settlement trap simply because we’re desperate not to be alone. We’ve been raised in a society that tells us we have more worth as a couple than alone. They tie our value to romance, children, families, weddings, and diamonds. And all of that creates this immense pressure to settle as quickly as possible. We’re told to make it fit and make it work. But that doesn’t work. We can do none of that until we learn to love being on our own and with ourselves.
Fall in love with being on your own so you don’t feel pressured to fall into the arms of someone else. Celebrate your time as a singleton. Don’t associate it with failure or loneliness. Associate it with self-exploration, fun, and the freedom to live entirely on your own terms without compromise.
If you enjoy your time on your own, then you won’t be threatened or tempted by the advances of someone who is a poor fit. Who would want to fall into the arms of another person when they are perfectly happy standing on your own? Fostering a natural sense of independence is key in building better partnerships; relationships you don’t have to settle and play down for. Never commit for the sake of committing. Create space for yourself in this world that you can easily revel in.
Putting it all together…
It’s time for you to tell the truth. You never wanted to be with them. You never wanted to settle down and commit, but it happened. Afraid of being alone, you gave in to the temptation to settle. You gave up on your dreams and gave up space to theirs. And now you’re stuck in a pattern of resentment. How can you get free of these patterns? How can you ensure that the next love doesn’t end up as disastrously as this one?
First, be honest with yourself about your patterns. What is the motivating force behind your need to settle for things you don’t want in your relationships? When you uncover that reason, you can be more upfront about identifying and communicating your genuine needs. Lean into a greater sense of self-esteem to help. Believe in yourself and you won’t have to settle so often for the things you don’t want. Before you jump headfirst into a commitment, commit to yourself. Be okay being on your own and embrace a life lived on your own terms. This will put you on a path to true love, and a partner who both honors and celebrates everything that you are (and have yet to become).
