The couple as a mirror
The couple is a mirror that reflects many things about ourselves. When you admire a quality in someone, it turns out that it is also in you. In the same way that those defects of yours that bother you so much in the background are reminding you of your own weaknesses.

Definitely, there is no “Prince Charming” or the “perfect princess” of the stories. We are all unique and complex human beings, with our weak points and strengths. With deficiencies, difficulties, virtues, dreams … And once you become aware of reality, and you stop dreaming of perfect romantic love, paradoxically you will start to be happier with yourself and your partner.

That is the moment when you abandon the mirage that “the couple gives happiness”. You can finally put an end to toxic relationships. You even stop being the toxic one! You say goodbye to the fatal attractions, the roller coaster, the “bad luck” of always finding the same type of man. Because you understand that the dependence of another person does not fill the inner emptiness.

When you come to understand that love as a couple is not the solution to all problems, you can always start to stop looking outside of yourself for the affection, understanding, acceptance and validation you need. Because you start to find them inside you.

All this is a process that can be painful, but it is the kind of pain that looks like a grain that you bust. The pus comes out and the wound takes time to heal, until it finally closes. Therefore, if you are hooked on dependency relationships it is good that you learn to spend some time just to get rid of that addiction. Little by little you will be liberated, because you will begin to be responsible for your happiness and to see in the couple someone who helps you to wake up, to connect with yourself, to grow as a person and to teach you to truly love yourself and him or her as they are.

Let’s see how to make this exciting journey from dependence to love in freedom.

02. From disappointment to awakening
After each sentimental failure, the emotions are intense. There is a great sadness because an illusion is broken … But that pain will not last forever if you live it. Do not suppress tears. Empty yourself, talk, get rid of anger and frustration. And then, when you reach a certain serenity, ask yourself if that was love or … illusion, convenience, comfort.

The path to full love is to overcome the need for the other to complete, comfort, compensate or correspond to an ideal image to satisfy our desires and needs.

It is you, in the first place, who has to become the man or woman of your life. It’s time to really get to know yourself and be aware of how you act and why. For example, ask yourself things like, do you give too much in love to people who do not belong to you? Do you think you’re not enough? Do you repeat the pattern of emotional dependence that you observed among your parents? Do you choose couples that abandon you or disappoint you?

The answers are inside you, but making them come out is not easy. However, there are many ways to connect with yourself. You can do yoga, go to therapy, read good self-help books, talk to a friend who tells you the truth, write about your feelings, connect with nature … You’ll see that little by little you start to make peace with yourself and understand your feelings and even your contradictions. Just give yourself time and space.

03. To the encounter of happiness
If you feel needy or you are unhappy because you do not have a partner, try to find other sources of happiness, well-being and motivation that depend on yourself. If that seems too much because you have always had a partner and you have not really learned to be alone, then lean on other people at the beginning, but do not get hooked on an illusion or pretend that nobody saves you from unhappiness or is always available to you.

For example, cultivate a hobby, make new friends, dedicate a weekly time to do something good for other people with a volunteer group, practice a sport … Look for the company of friends, family and co-workers or study that make you feel good.

Little by little you will see that your self-esteem is strengthened, that you get excited with new activities and people and that you are creating a small world where you feel happy, relaxed, wanting to do good things and not, for example, spending hours spying on Facebook to your ex-partner

But if you try to do it with all your strength you are still stuck in a toxic relationship or you meet up every so often with your ex without both of you can avoid that fatal attraction, the important thing is that you become aware of the situation in which you are and try to cut definitively. It hurts, yes, but in the long run you will be happy with the decision made. It’s like getting out of a cage!

In any case, remember the most important thing: that your happiness does not depend on a couple, nor on the opinion that other people have about you. It is about taking small steps to learn to be alone, to enjoy the little things of life without a partner. You may need several attempts and feel that you fail, but it is not so. Each step takes you a little further on your path to freedom. Love your own process and forgive yourself when you feel weak.

4. Goodbye, expectations
Every day, at all times, we create expectations. We write down lots of things to do, organize the calendar or the agenda, set dates on the calendar when we do not even know if we are going to be alive tomorrow. We take it for granted. We forget that we can not control the things that happen or the life that flows outside our desires. And the same thing we do with the couple. But that “lived happily ever after” only exists in the stories.

Of course, when your wishes are not fulfilled you can suffer a lot and get angry. You believed that your partner was perfect, or at least perfect for you. But you were unfaithful and you were deeply disappointed. Or idealized that when you showed your weaknesses you blamed everything that worked.

Actually, having a certain level of expectations is inevitable (unless one is a Zen master), but if they are excessive they become a heavy backpack. When you “build a movie” about what is going to happen with your partner, you generate an illusion. Whether you have just met someone and you imagine yourself married to that person until the end of your days, or that you blindly believe that your partner and you will always be as happy as at the beginning of your story.

Remember that love is a way, which requires presence, patience, courage to accept the shadow of oneself and that of the other person, courage to change, express oneself, move away and come back closer. That will make them feel alive and rediscover each step.

05. From romantic love to real love
You may ask … “If I do not get my hopes too, and put my happiness on someone else, or create me .. expectations . Why am I going to look for a partner? “But it’s not about you becoming a hermit, or about someone who thinks he’s superior to others or self-sufficient.

Simply forget the idea that you must be in a couple to be happy. It is a deeply rooted idea, but it is not true.

Imagine that you find a person who is beautiful, intelligent, sensitive, understanding and all the qualities that you think are desirable. And besides, he adores you and wants to be by your side. But if you do not feel worthy of being loved, if you do not know what you want in life, if there is nothing in your day to day that you are passionate about and frequently get angry or depressed, that person will not be able to infect your happiness. Maybe at first you think so, and that being by your side and nothing bad can happen to you. But after a while, maybe you give it up because you think it’s too good for you. Or you become even more angry because you do not manage to be as wonderful as he or she, or because you have discovered that you also have shortcomings. And you will go back into a spiral of unhappiness.

Por el contrario, imagínate ahora que has llegado a ser razonablemente feliz sin pareja. Tienes amigos con los que te lo pasas en grande, y algunos de ellos son íntimos con los que compartes confidencias y que te hacen sentir conectado y apoyado. Tu trabajo te gusta, has renovadola decoración de tu apartamento, todas las semanas te vas a bailar y cada mañana cuando te levantas sonríes de alivio y orgullo por tener una vida propia y haber dejado atrás los amores dependientes.

Then, on any given day, you meet someone you like. You also like her. They start to leave, and now every morning you smile, in addition, of illusion. You have butterflies in your stomach! And that is fantastic. Of course you can get excited, make plans, get excited with a new love. Is there anything more beautiful than that light on the face? But now that you know yourself well and have managed to leave behind some beliefs and patterns that hurt you and limited you, you will face that relationship in another way.

You will know that it can last or not, but that if it ends you will not sink into a pit of anguish. You will know that if something bothers you or makes you feel bad, you can talk to your partner and make changes between the two. And you will know that if the relationship does not work, you do not have to stay by their side because you have a life and a place to return to, and that is in the center of your heart.