Things I didn’t know about love in my 20s that I know now
Many people tend to embark on their first serious and committed relationships in their 20s, which is when they often find themselves struggling and floundering when it comes to love and romance. Romantic relationships can become the source of people’s highest highs and lowest lows.
Now that I am older, I can’t help wishing that I could have done some things differently in regard to my past romantic relationships.
I do know that those experiences were necessary for my growth, and that I would not be where I am now, had I not made those mistakes in the first place. If my future self had been able to swoop back in time and give me some advice, would I have been ready to listen? The truth is that I’m not sure-maybe I would have been and maybe I wouldn’t.
Nevertheless, when I play this scenario in my head, here are a few of the things I would have told my younger self:
1. Your relationship to your own self determines everything else in your life
This is something we hear being said quite often nowadays, but it is a truth that remains relative until you actually begin experiencing it in your life. Our own sense of self-worth and our ability to value and love ourselves determines the quality of all other relationships in our lives. While it has become somewhat of a cliché, it is really true that we can only receive and give love to the extent that we are able to love and value ourselves.
Our relationships with others can mirror our own feelings towards ourselves; for example, if you find yourself in a relationship with someone who doesn’t really value you, is there a chance that somewhere deep down you don’t really value yourself? These are, of course, deep questions that would be best explored in a safe, therapeutic container, but it may be worth to gently start investigating this in your own life.
Yet, even if you are in a healthy relationship, it can only thrive to the extent that you are taking care of yourself. While a partner’s love can be healing and life changing, the reality is that someone else can never give us what we need to be receiving first from our own selves. Each individual person’s inner demons are theirs to take care of, and it can be damaging to the relationship if this is not done.
Know yourself deeply. Invest in your own inner peace and emotional equilibrium. That is the best foundation for love to flourish.
2. Kindness goes a long way
It sounds almost silly, but kindness is important when we direct it both towards ourselves and others. While it is hard, it can be so much more rewarding to act with kindness and not react with anger or blame when in challenging situations. Sometimes we feel overextended, tired and fed up with all the stuff we have to put up with in the rest of our lives, that it becomes easy to take that out on our partners.
We can forget that our partners are also human, with their own vulnerabilities and struggles, looking to us for comfort and understanding. Even when we have been wronged in some small way, it can be such an inner struggle not to lash out, and, instead, to remind ourselves to give the other the benefit of the doubt and the chance to make it right.
It is, of course, paramount that we have a partner who is kind back to us. We also need someone who is willing to give us the benefit of the doubt and treat us with gentleness and respect.
Being kind to ourselves is also vital. Take note of the things you say and do to your own self. In truth, it is so much easier to be kind to others, when we are first directing it inwards.
Kindness really does go a long way.
3. Relationships should be easy, but also hard in the right ways
Relationships are always going to require effort and work. It takes commitment and endurance to work through the struggles that will inevitably come up when two people decide to share their complicated and multi-layered lives with one another.
Each person brings his/her our own unique patterning from childhood to the relationship, which will at times be in conflict with the patterning of another person. This makes conflict every so often unavoidable.
When conflict, however, is faced with openness, honesty and a willingness to communicate, it can bring enormous growth in the relationship. It grants us the opportunity to see ourselves in a newfound light, which allows us to mature and evolve in profound ways.
Nonetheless, a relationship should not, in my opinion, feel like work all the time. There need to be periods of peace and quiet, and it is important that there is an ease and flow between two people. I’m not talking about the idealized romances we tend to see depicted in film, but a certain harmony that exists between two individuals who like each other and simply get along.
4. Your intuition is your guide
Our own intuition has such an important role to play in our lives. It tells us when to move forward and when to stay away from something or someone. The problem is that we often just don’t want to listen to what that inner voice has to say.
In romantic relationships, your own inner voice will guide you towards and away from someone if you listen. I often think back to the times that I didn’t pay attention to that voice inside telling me that certain people were not right for me. Perhaps I wasn’t ready to take that into account when I was young, yet when I started to pay attention to its nudges, it made a huge difference in my life.
Even when you are in a healthy relationship, your intuition can guide you to know when to be quiet and when to speak up, when something is wrong and what you or your partner are in need of in that particular moment. It can be as simple as feeling like you are in desperate need of some time alone, and that there will be an unnecessary fight with your partner if you do not heed that inner voice.
5. We all have different inner parts
According to Internal Family Systems, each person has different inner parts.
In her book, Happy Days, spiritual teacher, Gabrielle Bernstein, attempts to explain IFS to her readers: “IFS…is an approach to psychotherapy that works under the premise that we have multiple “parts” of who we are that show up at different times… Perhaps you notice a critical part of yourself show up when you make a mistake at work, or an outraged, aggressive part of yourself freak out whenever you’re frustrated with your spouse”[i] (chapter 7).
This is a complex, multi-layered topic in itself and I will not be getting into this in great detail here; yet, it is worth bringing some awareness to this matter, as we may find ourselves reacting to our partners from ‘parts’ that are not always conducive to a specific moment.
For instance, you may be coming from a critical part, while your partner may be reacting from his/her own separate parts, such as a defensive or shut down one. Having some awareness of this can be useful. By sensing, for example, that your partner is coming from his/her vulnerable and hurt part, it might become clear to you that that precise moment is not the best one to discuss a challenging topic that will further arouse pain, and instead wait to address it when he/she is feeling more balanced.
Although these are issues that would most certainly best be looked at with a qualified therapist, it can be helpful to start being mindful of where each person is coming from.
Richard C. Schwartz’s book No Bad Parts: Healing Trauma and Restoring Wholeness with the Internal Family Systems Model is also a great resource if you want to better understand your own internal system that is comprised of various parts.
6. Becoming comfortable with the Life/Death/Life cycle
In her seminal book, Women Who Run with the Wolves[ii], Clarissa Pinkola Estés discusses the Life/Death/Life cycle present in all relationships. She writes:
Wolves are good at relationships. Anyone who has observed wolves see how deeply they bond. Mates are most often for life. Even though they clash, even though there is some dissension, their bonds carry them over and through harsh winters…the integrity of their relationships is derived from their synchronization with the ancient pattern of all nature-what I call the Life/Death/Life cycle. The Life/Death/Life cycle is a cycle of animation, development, decline and death that is always followed by re-animation” (page 127).
She also explains that it is necessary to
develop a relationship with the Life/Death/Life nature. When we have that, we are no longer bumbling along fishing for fantasies, but are made wise about the necessary deaths and startling births that create true relationship…we learn that passion is not something to go ‘get’ but rather something generated in cycles and given out….a shared living together through all…endings and beginnings, is what creates an unparalleled devotional love (page 132).
In other words, our relationships with our partners go through cycles; within a single relationship, we will experience numerous endings and new beginnings over time.
In essence, there is no relationship that just keeps on peaking, reaching high after high. As two humans sharing a life, it is inevitable that a couple will go through different phases; there might be periods of breakdown and dissolution, but then there can be a phase of healing and coming together again. Things reach another pinnacle, only to deteriorate again, before climbing up the mountain to the next peak, and so forth.
In a world where everything has become disposable, it is hard for us to put in the work that a committed relationship requires, and to ride through the cycles with patience and fortitude; yet, this is what we must do if we wish to share our lives with someone for an extended period or for a lifetime.
This is, of course, not to say that one should stay in a relationship that is unhealthy, unfulfilling or abusive. It is though also true that even solid relationships have their ups and downs, and that we must be able to bear that if we desire to be in a committed, long-term partnership.
7. Space and closeness are equally important
Having quality time with your significant other is paramount, but so is having time apart.
Love and relationships need breathing space, and each person must be allowed to explore their individuality, their projects and passions. That doesn’t mean that you have to be in different places or separated from one another for extended periods; it might entail giving each other psychological space to focus on whatever it is you are working on, or simply time to be alone for an hour or two.
When there is clinginess in a relationship, the other person’s individuality may be suffocated. In essence, you fell in love with someone for who they were, and that person must be given permission to continue to exist. Getting some distance and providing space allows each partner to appreciate the other’s beauty and specialness, as sometimes it is easy to take the person for granted.
At the same time, the ability to come together and enjoy quality time together is paramount. If we don’t enjoy or like being around our partner, what is the point?
∞∞∞∞
Like so much else in life, there is no magic recipe when it comes to relationships. However, if this is important to you, investing in the health of your romantic relationship is a worthy endeavor. Relationships are not easy, but they can bring self-growth and awareness, and also a lot of joy.
According to the spiritual teacher and writer Jeff Foster, “The healthiest relationships are not necessarily the ones that look ‘happiest’ to the naked eye…The healthiest relationships are the honest ones…Where relationship is seen as the ultimate yoga-an ongoing and deepening adventure and rediscovery of each other…”[iii](page 185).
[i] Bernstein, Gabrielle. Happy Days: The Guided Path from Trauma to Profound Freedom and Inner Peace, ebook, Hay House Inc., 2022.
[ii] Estés, Clarissa Pinkola. Women Who Run with the Wolves: Contacting the Power of the Wild Woman, Rider, 1998.
[iii] Foster, Jeff. Falling in Love with Where You Are: A Year of Prose & Poetry on Radically Opening Up to the Pain & Joy of Life, Non-Duality Press, 2013.
