My friends and I have been talking a lot about relationships recently (shocker), which has ultimately led us to talk about men (shocker…again). However, there is one common theme that I have noticed a lot about college relationships: nobody knows what they want. So many people go into very intimate situations without a clue about what they want. Granted, I have absolutely been guilty of this. We, as humans, crave affection, so when we are lonely, we often search for validation within romantic settings. Regardless, I feel like such a broken record because I am constantly telling others to stop searching for relationships if you do not know what you want.
The reason I say this is because when you have no standards, you have nothing to hold your partner to. If you do not have a set idea of how you want to be treated, then odds are you’ll be more likely to end up in bad relationships. I feel like so often women are expected to get into relationships and fix the man they are with. We can all recall some movie or show that has the “bad boy” trope where the girl is supposed to fix this broken man. Well, I am kind of done with that. This is not me saying you should avoid everyone with problems because that is virtually impossible. However, you should not be expected to “cure” them. When you are in a relationship, both people are supposed to grow together rather than fix each other.
We, as women, need to stop accepting the “bad boy” trope. We need to hold men accountable for when they treat us badly. We need to stop ignoring red flags just because the man has a hard life. We all have hard lives. We all have problems. But that does not mean we should take it out on others or use it as an excuse to be a mean person.
Most importantly, we need to raise our standards. We need to know exactly what kind of man we want and how we want to be treated. Ladies do not settle for less because I can guarantee you deserve a happy, healthy relationship.