Not all people willingly settle for mediocre anything in their lives. Relationships are not an exception. Being in a perfect relationship with a perfect partner is a dream and even a life goal of many.

Searching for a dream while taking the present moment for granted might be a mistake. Searching for a perfect relationship while taking the people around you for granted is an even bigger mistake.

I wanted to invest my time and energy into the one relationship that seemed perfect to me. But I never encountered that potential perfect relationship. However, I met great people and made friends with them while hesitating to take it to the next level.

If there was a slight chance to “test” that potential partner I was doing it knowing that it is not very ethical and right. Naturally, they could not pass the test and I was categorizing them in the back of my mind and never even looking back at them.

Later, when I talked to other people about relationships and saw how the people from my circle are able to sustain healthy and long term relationships, I wondered “What are they doing differently than me? Maybe there is something I have been missing on all this time?”

I realized there were three major beliefs I have been holding onto since I don’t even remember when. I still find myself believing in the “ideal relationship” but I don’t forget to remind myself of how unfair it can be towards others. Here were the beliefs holding me back.

Partners should understand their expectations without talking

Let’s get this clear — no one is someone’s other half no matter how romantic it might sound. No one is half an apple waiting to be completed by the other half, even though all those fairytales have told us that.

We are unique individuals who are willing to choose one or more than one person out of billions to walk on the journey of life together. So there is nothing more natural than not being 100% compatible.

“The purpose of a relationship is not to have another who might complete you, but to have another with whom you might share your completeness.”– Neale Donald Walsch

There is something special about not being perfect for each other. It creates space for more discoveries in each other’s personalities.

Next time you see your partner behaving in a way that you are not used to, instead of feeling attacked and confused, think about what else you can learn about them. It might be a good opportunity to get to know them more.

But if you don’t really sit and talk about different things in life, your attitudes toward life, relationships, marriage life, having kids, surprise parties, and gifts, universe and stars — but then you can’t expect your partner to know you telepathically or through reading your mind.

Yeah, that would be so cool but our brains have not developed that much yet.

Save your time, energy, respect, and even love and start sharing each other’s expectations.

Perfect love might not have expectations but a perfect relationship should have.

“When you don’t talk, there’s a lot of stuff that ends up not getting said.”– Catherine Gilbert Murdock, Dairy Queen

The mindset of being right and sticking to your guns all the time

We all have egos and few are lucky to get rid of their ego completely throughout their lives.

Most of us hug our egos so tightly that we close our eyes intentionally and stay blind until the other person is done with hurting. While we want to be right and accuse the other of being wrong, we eliminate any chance of theirs to be right; we lose something from the relationship that can’t really be recovered later.

Imagine the other person does the same. It is like the same sides of a magnet. What happens to them? They repel each other.

“Real giving is when we give to our spouses what’s important to them, whether we understand it, like it, agree with it, or not.”– Michele Weiner-Davis

Of course, you don’t have to get away from yourself and change for your partner or change your standards, principles of life — but a little compromising might be necessary for the relationship to function steadily and go upward towards transcendence.

We are unique. It is not fair to demand our partner be just like us, or imply it when we don’t say it out loud.

Partners have some magic and fix all the problems of the other

Our magic is our love and it can’t just snap its fingers to delete all that is wrong in our significant other’s life.

In my personal life, I believed in this so much. Not going to lie, sometimes, I still wish it was true.

I learned the hard way that we all have problems and they don’t disappear just because we change our relationship status.

We become two different individuals who may combine our happiness, jobs, income, and issues. There is where the art of relationships lies.

Relationships don’t have to be rainbow and butterflies. I personally visualize it as two spheres combined together in which we walk through life together. Growing stronger, faster, and moving further in life.

“What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other?”– George Eliot

Instead of waiting for a perfect relationship that will solve your problems, focus on your own life, while solving those problems on your own and improving yourself along with it.

In other words, become the perfect partner you have been searching all along and you will get rid of the lack mentality. Not only will you come across someone who does the same, but it will already feel like the most perfect relationship it can ever be.

Sometimes the desire to find someone else who might help and save us stem from the subtle need of becoming that person to ourselves.

“You can’t just give up on someone because the situation is not ideal. Great relationships are not great because they have no problems. They are great because both people care enough about the other person to find a way to make it work.”– Unknown