Four Ways to Really Know You’re in Love

Love is a controversial concept. We all want to be in love. But we find it somehow hard to tell when we are really in love. We often have this strong belief that is something we should just feel.

The truth, however, is quite different: love isn’t something you should just feel. It’s way beyond the fluttery and butterfly feelings in one’s stomach. And that’s probably why many people end up in wrong and messy relationships.

If you search Google on “ how to know you’re in love,” you will mostly see shit advice like “You’ll just feel it. Those fluttery and butterfly feelings in your stomach.

The problem, however, is that this kind of advice wrongly influences our emotions and thoughts and makes us believe that love is those butterfly feelings in our stomach.

However, love is way beyond all kinds of feelings not just butterfly feelings which are like candles that go off when the wax finishes.

It’s a decision, a choice, it’s an act of the will, it’s intentional, and no, it doesn’t just happen. It’s when you decide to put in hard, loving, endeavors of commitment to walk through life at a particular period with someone.

In essence, you can know when you’re in love and have made the decision and choice to walk through life at a particular period with someone if you notice one, few, or all of the following signs:

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#1. Life doesn’t necessarily feel happy with them.

Genuinely, happiness doesn’t come from other people. It comes from within you and the effort you put in to make yourself happy.

We all know that relationships are connected to some of our strongest emotions. When they are positive we feel happy and fulfilled.

But that doesn’t mean your partner should be the only source of happiness you’ve got, because it’s a big problem. It’s even worst if you’re generally unhappy with your life and your partner serves as an oasis for you.

Instead of looking for happiness from people or relationships or even your partner, you need to build happiness within yourself.

Happiness is something we ought to do on purpose. Amid struggles or difficulties, we must choose to be happy. Happiness does not come from the acquisition of money, or things, or even from relationships because happiness begins from within each of us.

Being happy within yourselves simply means doing things you love, forgiving yourself of all your errors, and reducing thinking less negatively about your problems.

The truth is when you’re happy with your life and your partner adds to it, you stand a better chance of enjoying a truly happy and fulfilling relationship with yourself and your partner.

Hence, if your relationship is where you and your partner maintain some level of independence in almost all aspects of your lives including your sources of happiness outside the relationship, it often means you’re truly in love and not infatuated or something of such nature.

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#2. Seeing them happy makes you happy.

One of the biggest misconceptions about happiness is that it can’t be sold anywhere.

Because no one goes to the mall and comes back home with a bag of happiness.

But you can make smart choices on how to make yourself happy, which in return can positively influence your level of happiness. If seeing your partner happy makes you happy it often means you’ve made the active decision to genuinely love him or her.

Because most people who’re deeply in love with their partner become happy whenever they see their partners happy, they tend to have more energy and feel motivated, inspired, and even less stressed.

For instance, seeing their partners happy especially as a result of their current achievement makes them happy and motivates them to chase their own personal goals and dreams instead of being jealous and finding it hard to genuinely be happy and celebrate their success due to deep-rooted insecurity and abnormal competitiveness.

When we only tend to celebrate the success of the people we love when we think we’re still doing better than them, we don’t truly or genuinely love them.

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#3. You don’t feel constantly anxious about getting hurt.

Always excepting your relationship to be constantly sweet sucks because if everything went bad for a while, it might hurt your self-esteem and demotivate you.

While this may sound rational, the reality is that such kinds of mindsets might be holding you back from enjoying the present, positive moment.

As we all know that shit happens and that relationship is not always sweet, peaceful, love, and harmonious. So you can’t have a satisfying relationship if you constantly expect good things to be happening.

But that doesn’t mean you should constantly live in anxiety of getting hurt because anxiety kills the magic or connection between two people who belong together.

That’s why if you don’t feel consistently anxious about being hurt, it often means that you’ve made the active decision to love that person irrespective of the fact that they might hurt you someday.

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#4. You’re considering your own needs and wants as well.

Quite often, we confuse genuine love with a lack of self-respect. We consistently place the needs of our partner over ours thinking it’s love.

The truth, however, is that genuine love has little to do with sacrificing your needs for your partner.

Sure, there are times when your partner’s needs might be greater than yours, and focusing more on their needs will just be right.

But constantly focusing on your partner’s needs over yours is nothing but clearly a lack of self-respect required for a mature relationship. In fact, it accounts for one-sided and imbalanced relationships.

Because just like you believe that the relationship shouldn’t be just about you, it also shouldn’t be just about your partner, and prioritizing your partner’s needs and happiness over yours, simply makes the relationship about them. It’s all about striking a balance and creating a friendly environment where the needs of both of you are met.

That’s why you can say that you’re comfortable and in love with someone when you start considering your own needs and wants as well instead of trying too hard to meet their needs at the expense of yours.

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Final thoughts.

While most people think that love is those fluttery and butterfly feelings in one’s stomach, the reality is that It’s a decision, a choice, and an act of the will.

To really know when you are In Love with someone, you need to make sure that you aren’t infatuated, preoccupied, or obsessed with the person.

That’s why you need to:

Make sure they aren’t the only source of happiness you’ve got but an addition to your already happy and satisfying life.
Make sure you aren’t overly insecure or competitive enough to find it hard to celebrate their happiness.
Make sure that you aren’t consistently living in anxiety and fear of being hurt by them. And lastly,
Make sure that you aren’t consistently prioritizing their needs and wants over yours.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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