There Is No Such Thing As a "Perfect" Relationship
But somewhere in the middle there is you and your ideal.
One thing I love about my job as a coach is the ability to branch out. Half the time, I’m helping the adult children of narcissistic find themselves again. The other half of the time, I get to help people on a path to achieving their personal goals reconfigure what their ideal relationship looks like (both with others and the world).
The ones who come to me with their relationships in shambles are usually guilty of a couple of sins themselves. Namely, they haven’t set the *right* boundaries, and they have unrealistic views of what they want their relationships to be. Until the fog recedes, you can’t build that mountaintop castle.
Changing their relationships usually starts by changing how they see those relationships, how they value them. When you get to the bottom of what really matters, you see a different way to coexist with the people in your life who matter.
Maybe that’s where you’re at too.
Have you struggled with your marriage? With your partner? Do you find it hard to maintain friendships? Are you always burning bridges and cutting ties? If you answer yes to any of the above, then it could be time for you to reconfigure too. What do relationships mean to you? Are you looking for perfect when you should be setting your sights on ideal?
What the best relationships look like.
I blame movies and music, and the fairy tales and urban myths of childhood, for the mess that we find ourselves in now. That’s where so many of our earliest misconceptions take root. Instead of being shown what a good relationship looks like, we were fed fantasy. Love at first sight makes life easy. Love can conquer all.
It’s a comforting dream to slip into, but it is a dream nonetheless.
Relationships aren’t perfect. Born of the human condition, they are susceptible to all the same pitfalls that any normal human institution can. Perceptions can be warped, and realities manipulated. Our pain and our struggles become reflections within these relationships. “The blood will out.” Everything we try to hide comes up to the surface.
Avoiding these realities has never been the point of “happily ever after.” Indeed, finding that happy ending is still possible. It’s all in the perceptions that we have and how far we are willing to go to change them.
Do we want perfect? Or do we truly want someone who is willing to see and love our imperfections? Just as we will see and love theirs?
Good relationships are like flowers. On the outside, they look ideal at first. The people inside look cozy. They look real. Like something plucked out of a place you’re supposed to be, instead of where they’ve been. Look closer, though, and you’ll see it. Imperfections. But those imperfections don’t make the flower any less beautiful. Quite the opposite. The flower is beautiful because of how it bends and blooms beautifully around its imperfections.
This is how good relationships are. They don’t exist without imperfection. They exist, maintain, and continue on, despite those imperfections. The people in these relationships show up and they don’t shy away from the work - whether that work is on them or the world they build with their partner.
There are no perfect relationships because there are no perfect people.
We all have sides of ourselves that we aren’t proud of. Shades of light and dark that we try to hide from the world. Everyone living gets things wrong. Makes mistakes. Does things they later come to regret or feel guilt and shame over.
That is the human condition. To be frail. To be vulnerable. To be full of foibles. It is also to be loved, despite those things, by someone who has embraced similar frailties in themselves.
Instead of looking for the perfect relationship, we should seek only that which is ideal for us, in a partner and a lifestyle with that partner.
What matters? What makes the most sense? What makes you feel at home? At the same time, what are you willing to tolerate? Where do your comfort levels lie?
Answer these questions and you will be closer to the truth of who and what you are, who and what you need in a relationship.
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