Tarnished Halo

So it’s been a few weeks since I posted, school and lack of inspiration will do that to you, but I am very excited to be able to post again, so without further ado.

Has anyone ever said something along the lies of “I really like him/her, but I can’t date him/her because I might get hurt”? Have you said this yourself? I know I have and I know a lot of other people with this mentality as well. We really need to take a step back sometimes and think about what a relationship is, how they work and what our expectations are.

You’re right, you might get hurt in your next relationship, in fact, you probably will. Getting hurt has nothing to do with monogamous or polyamorous relationships, kinky or vanilla relationships. It’s simply the nature of all relationships. Blunt though this may be: there are only two possible options when it comes to relationships. Either it lasts forever or it ends. When a relationship ends, it hurts. Even relationships that end on amicable terms, hurt.

The determining factor of whether to start a relationship or not, shouldn’t be based on the possibility of getting hurt. It should be based on how you feel when you’re with the person. You know when a person makes you happy. Why should you give up that happy feeling because of a possible, albeit probable, future?

You’re right, unless you’ve found the person that you intend to marry (and even then a lot of the time) the relationship is going to end. And you’ll probably get hurt but it’s not about getting hurt, it’s about how we deal with that hurt, how the relationship helped us grow while we were in it.

I personally have learned something from every relationship that I’ve had (whether we called it that or not). I’ve learned about myself, about the world, and about life. The hurt that came with the end of all of these relationships helped me to grow and become a stronger, better person. Without pain in life, it’s hard to feel the joyous times.

However, I am not advocating starting a relationship with just anyone. If you are not in a position in your life that you can handle the possibility of pain or sadness, starting a relationship is not a good choice for you, but if you have found a person that you’re willing to make a commitment to and the only thing holding you back is the possibility of getting hurt, it’s time to take that step. If you end up getting hurt, look at it as a learning experience, thinking about everything good that came out of the relationship, and how things could be different next time.

Don’t let fear of getting hurt prevent you from entering a relationship that you feel has the potential to be loving, fun, meaningful and whatever other things you hope to get out of it. The hurt makes us stronger.

This entry was posted on March 22, 2012 at 11:22 am and is filed under Dating with tags dating, getting hurt, relationships. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.