When You Want A Relationship For The Wrong Reasons

Many people desire romantic relationships. I'm not going to say everybody because that's simply untrue, but it has been pitched to us as a sort of end-goal kind of a fairytale scenario: love, in the form of a romantic partner in particular, is supposed to give us meaning and purpose and joy and a family. So it's no wonder that so many people fein for it, and it's also no wonder that so many people chase it under the totally subconscious assumption that finding love will more or less eliminate the rest of their problems entirely.

Relationships are not just great, they are more or less the fabric that make up the quality of our lives. Everything is a relationship, if you think about it: how we relate to ourselves, our friends, our partners, our bosses, our jobs ... it's all about the interaction between "me" and "them," whomever "them" happens to be at the moment. So needless to say, that whole "love yourself first" business is important, because if you can't relate to yourself in a healthy way, there's no chance you'll be able to do so with someone else.

This is where the work of discerning comes in, especially when you're feeling heartbroken or lonely: is it time for you to bite the bullet and get back out there, or do you just want a relationship because you don't want to have to face your own problems? Unfortunately, the latter tends to be true of people very often, and it's not a great way to enter a partnership. You end up choosing someone based on what fear you think they can quell, not what kind of relationship you could develop.

So to help you determine whether or not you want a relationship for the right reasons, here are a few of the signs that you absolutely want it for the wrong ones:

You Want It Really, Really, Really Badly

Almost to the point that you can barely carry on with your normal life because your sadness and desire consumes your every thought. If this is the case, it's probably not that you really want a relationship, but that you're scared of the alternative.

You Don't Know What You'd Do With Your Life If You Had To Be Single For A Year

Even if not preferable, people who enter relationships on healthy terms are usually able to identify how they'd spend a year on their own if they had to. In other words, it's something they could manage, not something they're running from.

You're Willing To Compromise On Some Major Issue

Whether or not you're ready to admit this to yourself yet is besides the point: if you're compromising on some really, really big issue — like, for example, they won't commit to you but you're going to keep seeing them because you "connect," or they don't want kids in the foreseeable future but you think they'll "change their minds" — it's probably because you're more desperate for love than actually choosing the right person.

The Thought Of It Consumes You

As in, you can't do really anything without sitting and thinking about your future, maybe, one day partner.

You're Waiting For Your Life To Begin

You're postponing your happiness until you find that person, and not really doing any of the necessary work to achieve any kind of meaning or fulfillment because you assume it will be done for you.

You Feel Happy When You Think About What Other People See When You're Together, Not When You're Actually Together

It's just another way to say: you love the idea of the relationship, not the actual relationship.

You're Actually, Sincerely Stressed Out About "Whether Or Not It Will Work Out"

Life hack: if you're freaking out too much about whether or not it's "meant to be," it's not. This is the one part of relationships that isn't hard to navigate: if someone wants to be with you they will be, getting lost in the "maybes" and excuses and justifications is just a messier way to say "no."

Life hack, part two: If you absolutely can't let go of whether or not it will work out, despite knowing that you're freaking out because it isn't working out, you absolutely want the relationship for the wrong reasons.

You're Deeply Unhappy With Almost Every Other Part Of Your Life

In other words, you need to do some serious work on other aspects of your life, but are conveniently putting it off in favor of just hoping someone comes along to induce all a hormonal high and make all well again.

You Rely On The Excuse That You're A "Relationship Person" So You "Just Can't Be Happy Without Someone"

Sure, if you're someone who thrives in relationships, you're not going to be at your ultimate ideal without one, but if you're at the point where you basically can't function without one, that's an entirely different story.

You Feel Like You're Running Against The Clock

Sure, it's important to keep in mind that your reproductive system does have an actual expiration date (yikes) and that finding a partner can get harder as time goes on — but if you're only picking someone because it's "that time of your life" and everyone else is doing it and you're afraid you'll be the only one left single, you're probably not going to choose the right person.

You Haven't Let Go Of Your Exes, Whether You Realize It Or Not

You check their social media profiles once too often, keep comparing them to new people you're meeting, didn't give yourself any time between relationships to heal, and so on. You're trying to fill a hole in your life that only you are responsible for.

You're Caught Up On Insignificant Details

You're not into your new partner because they didn't look the way you thought, or they're not as far in their career as you hoped the person you'd be with would be... basically, you're sabotaging your chances at love for super shallow reasons, likely because what you want is the idea of a relationship, not an actual relationship itself.

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