It’s Good to be Picky
Whether or not you’re concerned with getting the “ring by spring,” or finishing college with your MRS degree, chances are you’ll have your fair share of relationships during the years you spend on campus. College gives you the opportunity to experiment with all kinds of relationships, from the flings that last as long as the fraternity mountain weekend, to the boyfriend that broke up with you after months of dating and left you heartbroken and crying over ice cream and a bottle of Barefoot.
Collegiate relationships can be confusing and stressful and wonderful and exciting all at the same time. For most of us, college is the first time we’re around a humongous group of individuals, coming from all corners of the world, carrying different experiences and ideologies that make each of us unique. You have endless possibilities for all types of relationships to develop – and there are so many people to choose from, it can be overwhelming at times.
Building meaningful relationships of all kinds can be difficult, but romantic relationships are a whole new level of complicated. If you’re looking for a long-term relationship in college, your expectations for that relationship are going to be vastly different than the expectations you had for the perfect formal date freshman year. As a young adult interested in a meaningful, lasting relationship, the qualities you look for in a partner differ from the qualities you used to look for in flings and hookups.
You’re not psycho for thinking about the probability of a long-term relationship with the person you’ve only hung out with a few times. If you’re interested in being in a relationship, you’re probably interested in getting married someday (or at least living together and starting a family with your partner like Scott and Kourtney). By the third date, you should know whether or not you like this person. If you do like them, you’ve probably already imagined yourself in a relationship with this person. And when that happens, you’ve already thought about your wedding vows and how you’re going to include that one inside joke you guys had together from your first date. Trust me, you’re not crazy for thinking ahead to the future at this point in the relationship – in fact, I think it’s a necessity.
If you’re not feeling this person after a few dates, don’t stress yourself out over ending it. You aren’t interested, and that’s justification enough to say you just don’t want to hang out anymore. At this point in our lives, we’re looking for life partners, and it’s okay to be picky about with whom you choose to spend your free time. We’re maturing out of the hookup phase and into the relationship phase. You’re no longer looking for someone to spend the night with after formal; now you’re looking for someone who you want to sleep next to every night for the rest of your life.
If you’re not physically attracted to someone, but “they’re really nice,” don’t waste their time or yours. Move on. Be picky. Sure, people become more attractive to you as you get to know them, but if the physical chemistry isn’t there from the beginning, you can’t force it to happen. If you seem to really like them, but you’re interested in traveling the world after graduation, and they’re a total homebody, don’t change your dreams for them. Move on. If they say they never want kids, but you want a huge family, don’t entertain a relationship that will lead to countless fights in the future. Move on. If you’re really religious and they’re atheist, chances are you will never be able to reconcile those enormous moral differences – stop wasting each others’ time, and move on.
Building relationships does take time and effort. But it’s perfectly acceptable to be picky about what kinds of qualities you’re looking for in a partner, even at the very beginning of that relationship. If you’re confident in who you are and what you want, don’t let anyone try to convince you to give someone a chance if you’re simply not feeling it. That being said, however, you have to know who you are and what qualities you’re looking for in a partner before you enter a serious relationship. But if you are confident that you know what you want and expect out of a relationship, please, be picky and don’t settle. Don’t waste your time with someone you know you don’t see yourself with in the long run.