There are many wrong reasons to fall in love and stay with an ex who is wrong for you. But when you are hopelessly in love, you don’t really care whether someone is right or wrong for you. You’re so in love with the idea of being in love that it’s only when the relationship fails to fulfill you, turns into a nightmare or thrusts you into emotional pain like no other that you realize that you probably fell in love for all the “wrong” reasons.
Here are 7 wrong reasons to fall in love and stay with someone who is wrong for you
No 1. Wrong reason to fall in love – Loneliness and/or desperation
We’ve all been here at one time or the other. You miss the closeness of being with someone who will hold you and make you feel special. So when you meet someone, anyone really; even an ex who treated you badly, you think “this is better than nothing”. What starts as a lonely act of reaching out to another human being ends up in a complicated and hurtful relationship.
There is never a happy ending to a relationship in which you sell yourself off like second-hand commodity.
No 2. Wrong reason to fall in love – Distraction from the problems in your life
Some people get into a relationship to avoid dealing with what is going on in their lives. They think that a relationship will make it all go away; or even better bring passion, purpose and excitement into their lives. When the relationship fails to do this, which is usually the case, they end up in the same place they were before – just themselves and their problems. Then when they are single again, they resolve to better their lives; they set goals, buy a self help book and even attend a couple of personal development workshops but this only lasts a few weeks, before they start looking for someone and something to distract them from their problems. It’s a dance that never ends.
No 3. Wrong reason to fall in love – Pressure to get married and/or have kids
We live in a world where people have an age by which we should be married. So you end up having a relationship just because everyone says you should. One day you wake up to the fact that you are not in love with your partner. Whether the pressure comes from your family, your friends or from your own urgency, making a decision to be with someone because of the pressure you feel is giving away your power and happiness. Is it really worthy it?
No 4. Wrong reason to fall in love – Replaying childhood roles
Some of us use relationships to avoid growing up. We look for someone who will take care of us or someone who needs us to be mom or dad. This has nothing to do with one partner being younger or older, but about finding partners who are either too domineering or emotionally immature and who we can depend on or who depend on us.
If you are a loving and caring person but find yourself stifled by your partner’s neediness or your partners leave you and immediately marry someone else, then may be you need to look at the kind of choices you make and how they mirror your childhood.
No 5. Wrong reason to fall in love – Starving for sex
We each have our own “I got to get me some or else I’ll go crazy” limit. When you are so horny because you haven’t had sex for a long time, you can talk yourself into having a relationship with just about anyone, and can come up with so many “good” reasons why having sex with someone you are not even in love with is okay.
There is a high price we pay for being horny and indiscriminate – and the highs price is not just limited to below the waist.
As a conscious dater, take note of your “sex-hunger” limit and be more careful as that “I have to get laid” timeline approaches to avoid jumping into the sack with the wrong people.
No 6. Wrong reason to fall in love – Mistaking sympathy for love
This one was mine and I could easily have earned a PhD in “Love Rescue Missions”. It starts out with good intention to help or “make it better” for someone who has been badly hurt either emotionally, physically or financially, and it ends with you feeling guilty for abandoning them too. You find yourself trapped in a relationship with someone who loves and needs you more than you do them.
A relationship based on sympathy and guilt, or on the extreme… pity, is emotionally and even unhealthy and will only end up hurting you.
No 7. Wrong reason to fall in love – Lack of wholeness and sense of completeness
If you’ve never had a relationship in which you feel whole and completely fulfilled, it’s time you realized that no man or woman however much they love you will be able to make you whole or complete. Your need for wholeness and completeness is really your need to find your authentic self and live your authentic life.
No one is going to make you happy and fulfilled until you are happy with yourself. What you need is not a relationship but time to discover and love yourself before you can expect someone else to love you.
RELATED: Are You And Your Ex Too Incompatible To Make It Work?
