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Seeing some of the many threads on here from 20 somethings and younger about relationships got me thinking about everything I've learned over the years. While I'm happy where I am now finally, part of me wishes it happened sooner than this. But I am thankful for everything that I have because sometimes the hardships are what make us who we are today.
However, if I had a time machine and could go back in time, I would probably tell myself the following:
1. Be patient. There are no real timelines other than the ones you set for yourselves. Don't progress based on what your friends or society thinks. (i.e. sex on the third date, etc.)
2. Follow your instincts. If you think something wrong in a relationship, there's a good reason. Never ignore that feeling in your gut even if you love the person.
3. Love yourself first and foremost. While it's possible to lose yourself in a relationship, you really shouldn't. Only because when you lose yourself is when you open yourself up to be taken advantage of. You need to accept yourself, faults and all before you can accept someone else's faults. This includes being secure in yourself enough to have your own friends and interests outside of the relationship.
4. Remember what is important and what isn't. So many times we make mountains out of molehills. So many people make big things out of problems or issues that are actually minor in the long run.
5. Communication, communication, communication. This above all else is the backbone of any relationship. If you don't have this, you don't have anything.
6. Know when to walk from a bad situation no matter how much it hurts. If you need more info on this, see point 3. Never stay in a relationship longer than necessary just because.
7. Don't expect a person to change, they have to want to do it themselves. Either you accept them for who they are, or you don't. Everyone changes over time on their own for their own reasons, but to think that marriage or kids will change a person or a situation is foolish. If you have problems, marriage and kids will not solve them.
8. Remember it's the little things that count. While large grandiose gestures are always nice, it's the little things that so many people miss that make the biggest difference. Sometimes it's just the way a person looks at you, or the fact they will make it a point to kiss you even though a fan is staring them down, letting everyone know they're with you. How they handle a situation or treat other people. The little things will tell you more about a person than you could ever realize.
9. Making lists of what your ideal person is will never work. Stop making a list in your head. Most of the time the person you end up with or are attracted to ends up being nothing like you imagined, and you realize all those things you thought you wanted in a person don't mean as much.
10. Know that when you find the right person, you hold on and never let them go.
For me, the dating has always been the painful part. So...
1) Hit on women early in the process of getting to know them. Express interest early.
2) Numbers, numbers, numbers. Be optimistic but expect rejection.
3) Never grow an emotional attachment to a woman who you have not kissed yet. No exceptions.
4) Crushes are dumb. Extinguish them early or let them die.
5) Attitude and chutzpah when you are on a date.
In terms of relationships, I've never really had anything TOO horrible. I'm still friends with the very few women who have dated me. So that would be my advice to myself at 20.
But the 20 year old me wouldn't listen. He'd keep chasing girls, daydreaming of playing them songs, bringing them flowers on first dates, sweeping them off their feet, and getting all those sappy, romantic ideas of true love in his head.
Life lessons take time, most of those things, people don't seem to get til 30's and beyond... heck, there are people that never get them..... wallow in bitterness,angst,despair and lead sad lives.
I'm in my low 40's and just the last few yrs I've really gotten some deeper perspective on things of this nature that the OP posted.
I have a long way to go still, but self awareness, it is wonderful thing.....
Let's see, 15 years ago I was 12 and considering I didn't go on my first date until I was almost 19 I'd probably tell my 12 year old self to just keep truckin
If I could go back 10 years, I'd tell myself to ignore men, focus more on airplanes and build more tesla coils and other cool sciencey stuff. I wasted far too much time pining over boys/men that I could never have and that energy would have been better placed elsewhere.
Let's see, 15 years ago I was 12 and considering I didn't go on my first date until I was almost 19 I'd probably tell my 12 year old self to just keep truckin
If I could go back 10 years, I'd tell myself to ignore men, focus more on airplanes and build more tesla coils and other cool sciencey stuff. I wasted far too much time pining over boys/men that I could never have and that energy would have been better placed elsewhere.
The highlighted phrase - in spades!
That, and don't believe that you will "make him happy." If he isn't happy already, you are not going to 'make' it happen.
Still in my twenties, but, advice I would have given my younger self and anyone similar in those age brackets:
1) If you like a girl, ask her out. If she says no or you fail at applying the aforementioned advice, don't turn down otherwise excellent interested girls while you are in emo-mode/mooning over someone you don't/can't have. Even if you care a lot, act like you don't: it's more attractive to women.
2) Don't spend too much time trying to pick up women. Instead invest that energy in self-improvement. When you are good-looking and successful, women will (sometimes literally) throw themselves at you. When you aren't, the amount of effort and time needed to pull anything decent is far better spent investing in yourself for the long term. Free-weights and high-protein/low-calorie diets are your friend.
3) When in a relationship, do not make major personal sacrifices for the sake of the other person and/or the relationship: you will just end up single AND suffering the consequences of those decisions. People are not interested in what you have done in the past, only in what you can offer going forward, and this holds true for dating as much as for anything else.
Advice I wish I could give myself years ago about relationships. . . . .
Stay away from and avoid spoiled, rich and narcissistic daddy's girls. Psychologically and emotionally they are pre-programmed at an early age to think that they are princesses as well as perfect. And as a result they the very basic and human capacity for empathy and compassion. As well as lacking any form of emotional maturity, ability to deal with reality and even love. Convinced while they were younger that they are perfect and then believing it, leaves them with the blueprint for being human trainwrecks as they get older. And they never get better. Their complex and multi-faceted range of disorders only gets worse and the consequences are incalcutable in terms of the effects it has on whatever naive or unsuspecting man decides to fall in love with one of them.
But then again. I nothing more than the end result of all of my life experiences - good or bad, and they have made me what I am today. So now I walk the Earth wiser, scarred from battle and with the insight and perspective that will hopefully prevent any other journeys straight into hell and back while sacrifing my life goals, dreams and aspirations to the shell of a human being devoid of a heart. Now, with a soul as strong as steel, forged in the eternal fire of hades, I have returned to reality ready to take on any challenge and level of adversity with the wisdom and knowledge I have acquired - and committed to never letting it happen again.
It kind of sucks though for all of the hot women that came into my life afterwards that exhibited the same emotional and psychological issues (and sometimes sexual) as the walking nightmares that came before them since my radar has been fully on since that point and I never let them in the gates. They all missed out on the adventure known as life with the Skydive Outlaw. Oh, well. . . . . . .
Know the qualities that don't work for you...and don't ignore or "overlook" problems for the "perfect" person. I dated a guy who had a huge anger management problem. He was always hot about something. He was impatient, rude, had a terrible temper. I overlooked those problems because of my own low self esteem issues. I would have been better off alone.
Always be true to yourself. If you are unhappy about anything, don't just "put up with it". Say something.
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