We live in a society full of convenience and speed. A world of fast food, on-demand movies, and cell phones. This has forced several aspects of our lives to exist in a similar fashion, including our love lives.
We unconsciously spend so much of our free time idealizing and romanticizing various people in our lives in order for them to fit our ideals, blindly ignoring what is reality. This is a product of the rush we feel to simply get things done: to find someone, to fall in love, to create a relationship. This leads us to settle and to put ourselves in poorly assessed situations.
For me personally, I had an awful history of men treating me poorly. There was almost this trained cycle of jerks in my life, that when the first guy to come along that did not treat me like garbage, I threw away every other thing I wanted in a partner. I was just so relieved to find someone who was nice to me that I could not stand the thought of letting go of him.
I wanted a partner who was intelligent, driven, like-minded, adventurous, and passionate. I gave up almost all of that because I met someone who was nice to me. Of course, the relationship that these parameters produced was not bad, but it lacked a lot of substance that both he and I desired. In all honesty, I would have benefited more from spending the time and resources that I put into the relationship on myself, my friends and family, and my spirituality. Instead, I settled.
As a 20-year-old woman, I have limitless goals for myself. Sometimes they are so daunting, it frightens me. Nonetheless, I promised myself to never sacrifice who I am and my aspirations for the sake of others. I know what I deserve, and I will not settle anymore– not in my career goals, nor my friendships, nor my relationships. It is so imperative that we resist the urge to rush into things because so often do good things take time to cultivate.