Let’s think about what we look for in a partner…

Ask yourself what is on that checklist you hold so dearly to your heart; what are the personality characteristics, physical attributes and behavioural traits that you yearn for in the other? Maybe you want them to be more successful, more driven, more attractive or more social than you…maybe (for those in a relationship), they are… To look at this from another angle, your idealised partner is a projection of you; they are a romanticised, fantasised reflection and many of us settle to live vicariously through these relationships. “If my partner is successful, then in turn, so am I.”

What we don’t realise is that by acquiring or aspiring to these idealised partners, we fail to accept the self-constructed ‘inadequate’ parts of ourselves. “If I cannot be skinny then I will make sure my girlfriend is…”

What is attraction and more importantly, what attracts us to one type of person over the next? For me, attraction is perception, governed in part by your socially constructed worldview and in part by how you perceive yourself. If you’ve struggled with weight, you will look for someone who is at your idealised weight; if you’ve struggled with education, you will look for an intellectual and so forth.

What you actually achieve if/when you find such a person is that you feed your psychopathology; you bypass addressing your insecurities and hide in a false sanctuary within the other person. You attempt to love yourself for who you are not, rather than for who you actually are. The end result is that you secretly begin to despise yourself, and in turn, despise your partner for possessing your desired traits. More so, you become fused to them; for if that person was to leave, you’re left once more un-whole and subordinate.

What’s the solution? Look for a partner who is an accurate reflection of yourself; someone on a similar emotional, spiritual, physical and intellectual level to you. Look for a partner who is a daily reminder of what it is that you want to accept about yourself, of the challenges you’d like to overcome and the goals you’d like to achieve. Aspire for your duality to grow in unison for as each of you begins to accept every part of yourself, you accept every part of the other too…