You Know You’re Ready for Real Love When…
There’s a shift that happens in a woman when she realizes she is ready for love. Real love. The deep and lasting kind. It doesn’t come at a certain age. It happens when in her heart, she feels a deep longing for permanence. In my relationship coaching business, I’ve heard the words directly from single women.
I just want to meet my person.
The gap of time between when a woman first feels this to when her desire is fulfilled can be decades long or months. This very occurrence is the cause of many quiet tears shed and silent prayers uttered. There’s really no formula.
For me, I don’t think I started feeling this way until my current relationship blossomed. I spent my 30th and 31st birthdays with him. I’m 31 now.
Wanting love is a whole different thing than being ready for it.
Actually getting married is a whole different thing than being ready for it.
Having never been married myself, I can’t say I’m the authority. But I have spent my conscious years analyzing relationships (since I was 7 years old). I’ve always been fascinated, curious, and driven by it. I experienced my parent’s marriage first hand. I’ve read countless books on dating, relationships, and marriage. I invest significant time reflecting on the kind of partnership I want. I’ve consciously and subconsciously deconstructed the relationships and marriages I’ve observed all these years. And I currently process all my thoughts and feelings on this with a therapist.
*It’s not to say real love only/always leads to marriage. My coaching is designed for the woman who desires a thriving and monogamous marriage.*
From all my observations, you know you’re ready for real love when:
You feel the longing deep within your being
You genuinely desire to share your life with someone. This feeling may even consume you. You go through periods of optimistically working towards it (creating dating profiles) and times of setting it aside in an effort to be happy now. Nevertheless, it is a deep desire in your heart and no matter how you compartmentalize it, it’s there.
You no longer actively (or desperately) date
I know, this one is counterintuitive but it’s true. You have accepted yourself and love your life as a single person that you start to really feel complete. You may be focusing on your business or work, nurturing friendships, and making memories with your family. You’re pretty much going with the flow of your life and you’re content.
You no longer settle
The biggest test to see if you’re ready for love is if you are still settling in some way. Settling in an obvious way is dating someone who is emotionally unavailable, who isn’t treating you well, who has major life issues that negatively affect you, etc. But in a more subtle way, it’s continuing to be with someone you already know you don’t see a future with. Your heart knows.
You no longer expect someone to save you nor do you want to fix someone
You are your own human. You own your sh*t and you won’t put up with someone else’s. Sounds a bit harsh, but what I mean is you’re at a point where you can communicate your feelings and expectations in a way they receive. You’re willing to have difficult conversations in an effort to build the strength and foundation of your relationship. It’s being able to call in and invite the highest in that person because you are willing to speak your truth.
It’s not about the shallow stuff anymore
You realize that a “physical type” is fluff and not what lasting love is made of. Attraction, connection, and chemistry, YES, 100% critical to a successful relationship. But the physical traits, hair color, or hair at all, start to become less important. As my brother would say, the external is just your avatar in this game of life.
You are willing to put in the effort
It takes vulnerability, willingness, heck even eagerness to foster a blissful partnership. For it to work, both parties will share an intention of protecting, nurturing, and growing the relationship. If this isn’t a shared intention, this is when betrayals, big or small can happen. It also takes staying power, courage, and overcoming fears to be able to boldly open your heart and keep it open even when you naturally get triggered.
You believe it is possible for you and can happen unexpectedly
The biggest way to know if you’re ready for real love is that you are actually excited about it! You don’t know how or when it will happen, but you absolutely trust that it will. This feeling of hope, certainty, and confidence guides your choices. You are able to stay with this feeling consistently and rarely do you shrink back in doubt, pessimism, anger, or anxiety. You have faith in your future.
This list certainly can keep going but I’ll leave you with this.
You are worthy.
You are deserving.
Blissful love is possible for you.
If reading this really spoke to you and you realize, yeah, I truly am ready for love, then this might be for you. I created a free webinar all about the Five Blocks Keeping you from the Relationship of Your Dreams. It provides clarity on the beliefs that could be keeping you stuck in the area of love and relationships. Register for free here.
