All the taken ladies (all the taken ladies), All the taken ladies – now put your hands up!
While Beyonce preaches that, “If you like it then you shoulda put a ring on it,” I’m here to contradict the Bootylicous Queen. No offense to the recent Destiny’s mother; but her advice is slightly misleading, and can leave college girls feeling blue* (pun intended).
Think about it: a relationship does not need to be labeled with a ring or a title in order for it to be meaningful. In fact, the best relationships are the ones where people feel secure and happy enough with one another that they do not need to categorize “what they are” right away.
On the contrary, romantic partners who feel less secure in their relationships are typically the ones who stress the most about their title. They may feel pressure from society (AKA their peers) to identify their relationship status, which often leads to a vicious cycle of obsessing, overanalyzing, and more obsessing.
This stage in the game is commonly characterized by an inability to focus on anything other than the following questions:
A) Are we exclusive?!
B) Is he my boyfriend?!
C) Are we just hooking up?!
D) Are we dating?!
E) Does he want this to be consistent?!
F) Do you think he really likes me?!
And of course there’s the infamous….
(G) WHAT ARE WE?!?!?!?!?!
Sound familiar? If these questions have become a part of your daily dialogue, or you find them flashing through your mind like a reoccurring slide show; it’s time for you to hit the pause button, take a deep breath, and relax.
This type of internal (and external) obsessing over your relationship status will only lead to one of three things:
1. A heart attack
2. Your friends banning you from saying your boyfriend’s (?) name
3. Your boyfriend (?) breaking it off because he hears through the grapevine that you’re a crazy, obsessive, stalker (thanks to the Jersey Shore’s Pauly D for coining that term)
Which brings me to my next point. If you truly can’t live another day without satisfying your burning desire to label your relationship; you are better off having this discussion with your guy than risk him hearing about your obsessing from another source. In fact, to him, he will see this as one of the greatest turnoffs (next to you gaining 100 lbs or seeing you march around in saggy-granny panties and your retainers).
However, if you don’t feel confident or ready to bring up having “the talk” with him directly; this is a red flag that you’re NOT comfortable enough with one another to take the next step in making your relationship “official.”
So, instead of wasting your time over-analyzing, obsessing, and dreaming about the day that you can call him your boyfriend; I suggest that you live in the moment and enjoy whatever it is that you have.
If you like him, you enjoy spending time with him, and you sense the he likes and RESPECTS* you too, then everything else will fall into place. *Gaining his respect is key. There’s a definite difference between waiting to define “what you are” because it’s too soon, and waiting forever because he doesn’t respect you enough to be exclusive and he’s still seeing 20 other girls. (It’s up to you to differentiate…but you’ll know when you’ve gained a guy’s respect).
So there you have it! We live in a society that loves to label everything. Ex: Are we democrats? Are we republicans? Are we Jewish? Are we Christian? Are we gay? Are we straight? But the truth of the matter is: this constant desire to differentiate between two groups is the root of conflict in our world. If we can stop categorizing people under specific labels, we’d have more freedom to enjoy whoever it is that we are, and we won’t feel as limited as we grow into who we want to be.
This same concept applies to relationships. If you stop pressuring yourselves to define your relationship status, you’ll find yourselves to be less stressed, less obsessive, and better able enjoy your time with your man!