8 Types Of Relationships That Won’t Work

Most of us  are reluctant to believe these at first, but over time, most of us eventually learn it the hard way. Sometimes, it might be too late to back out when we finally realize it.

If you’ve chosen the wrong life partner or a partner who is fundamentally incompatible with you, it does not mean that you won’t get together, share sweet moments or won’t get married. In fact, there are plenty of fundamentally incompatible couples who got married and even have kids.

However, when they finally realize it, it might be too late to turn back. They are either stuck in a very unhappy marriage or eventually end up getting a divorce, causing heartbreak for themselves and sometimes their children.

So, if you are still looking for a life partner, you might want to make sure that your relationship does not fall into any of the following types of relationships.

1.  YOU CARE MORE ABOUT YOUR PARTNER THAN THEY DO ABOUT YOU

In a healthy relationship, both parties should take turns playing the role of the “pursuer” and the one “being pursued” by caring for each other and doing sweet things for each other.

If you are the only person doing all the caring and “pursuing” all the time, that means you are in a one-sided relationship. If this goes on for a long time, you run the risk of burning out eventually.

Furthermore, everyone deserves to be with someone who appreciates & loves them as much as they do.

2.  YOU ARE IN LOVE WITH YOUR PARTNER’S POTENTIAL

Are you together with someone mainly because they have the potential to become someone you’ve always dreamt of being with?

Maybe he has the potential to be a successful businessman in the future, or she could be the next top model and you’ve always dreamt of marrying a successful businessman or a famous model.

Are you still with someone because they’ve promised to change or become someone that they are not now?

Maybe he has promised that he will stop gambling when you get married, be more caring & considerate, or promised to be more responsible & honest when you get married or have kids.

Well, while it is good to believe and have faith in our partners that they could achieve their dreams or change for the better, it is dangerous to be with someone if the main reason you’re with them is because of their potential to become the person you want to be with sometime in the future.

Can You Accept Them For Who They Are Right Now?

You have to be really honest with yourself and ask yourself whether you love them as they are right now.

10 years down the road, if they are still struggling to build their first successful business venture, never became the famous model they wanted to be, or are still gambling and smoking, would you still love them for who they are?

If your answer is yes, then you’re good to go.

But if your answer is no, then you might want to seriously consider whether you are really in love with the person or the potential of the person to grow or change into someone you hope they could become.

Why You’re Likely To Get Disappointed If You’re In Love With Someone’s Potential?

In life, nothing is certain; things happen, and plans fail or change.

If your love for someone depends on whether they are able to achieve their goals, then you will be in for a rough ride filled with disappointment, which would in turn hinder them from achieving their goals.

Also, old habits die hard. Almost 90% of our personality, habits and character are more or less set once we turn 19, unless we go through some sort of life – changing experience. So, if the person you are with has a habit or character trait that you can’t live with, you must be prepared to accept it because the chances of them not being able to change is quite high even though they promised to.

Suggestion:

Find Someone Whom You Can Love As They Are Right Now

True love is about being able to love & accept someone for who they really are, both the good and the bad. So it’s best to find someone whom you can fully love & accept just the way they are right now.

Learn to love & value someone’s character & traits rather than an image or potential. If you have to, love someone because they are passionate, hardworking & talented, instead of their potential to be successful because they have these traits. Learn to appreciate what they have and who they are right now, not who they could become.

If They Promise To Change, Make Sure They Do That Successfully Before Marriage

If someone has a habit or trait that you can’t live with but vows to compromise and change that because they want to be with you, you could give them a chance but make sure that they carry it out successfully before you get married. Otherwise, there is a high chance that you will be stuck in a very unhappy marriage or it might end in divorce. Either that, or you would have to learn to live with it and accept it.

3.  YOU ARE ON A “RESCUE MISSION”

Do you feel that you have the power to change your partner for the better?

Do you feel that if you leave your partner right now they will not be able to survive on their own or they will go down a bad path and you’d feel guilty for leaving them to their own demise?

If you do, there is a high chance that you are not really in love, but actually on a “Rescue Mission”.  In a healthy relationship, partners support and encourage each other, but not to the extent where one is constantly trying to “rescue” the other.

Mistaking Sympathy For Love

If you are on a “Rescue Mission”, you might be mistaking your sympathy for someone as love.  It is a good thing to help someone or a friend you care about, but you do not have to make the person your lover or soul mate in order to help them, we could help them just as well as a friend, or refer them to a professional who can help.

If you mistake your sympathy for someone as love, your sympathy might turn into apathy when you realize that you can’t really “rescue” someone from themselves or that it takes a huge amount of effort and sacrifice from you. A person who needs you to constantly “rescue” them or help them is not your lover, they are your “project”.

4.  AN IDOL & FAN RELATIONSHIP

In a healthy relationship, both should have a healthy amount of admiration & respect for each other.

However, if the admiration of one of them is so lop-sided that it almost puts them on a pedestal, then it can severely affect the dynamics of the relationship. In such cases, the relationship is more of a idol & fan girl/boy relationship rather than a romantic relationship.

A Superior & Inferior Attitude

Such relationships often occur when someone gets together with their role model or someone they look up to tremendously such as a student and a teacher or an employee and their boss.

However, that does not mean that people who look up to each other can’t be together, the issue here is whether there is an attitude that one is superior than the other.

A boss and an employee or a student and a teacher can live happily together if they are able to communicate and treat each other as equals in their relationship, where the person who is being admired more can come down from their pedestal and treat their partners as equals in the relationship.

If not, the relationship will turn into more of a fan & idol relationship rather than a normal healthy romantic relationship. This can severely affect the self-esteem of the supposedly “inferior” partner and it can also slowly evolve into the first type of relationship that won’t work where one cares much more about the other.

5. YOU’RE INFATUATED WITH YOUR PARTNER FOR EXTERNAL REASONS

Imagine your partner.

Now, imagine if they no longer had all their material wealth, no longer had all their good looks or dazzling skills such as smooth dance moves, impeccable guitar skills or their mesmerizing voice.

With just their character, personality and who they really are deep inside, would you still want to be with them?

If your answer is no, then there might be a chance that you are infatuated with your partner for primarily external reasons.

It is perfectly alright to be infatuated with your partner for external reasons, and it is definitely a good thing if your partner is attractive, good looking and skillful.

However, if you are only attracted to them because of external reasons alone, then you run the risk of:

• Losing interest & be tempted to stray when their beauty fades or wealth dwindles 

            (Tempted to have affairs)

• Ignoring other serious problems or incompatibilities in the relationship because you  are infatuated

Hence, although a person’s external qualities make up part of the person and it is alright for us to be attracted to them because of that, we should bear in mind that a person’s inner & more permanent qualities such as values, character, attitude & personality are more important.

A person with the right values, character & attitude can easily weather through tough times & regain their external wealth or acquire new skills. Life is a long and challenging journey full of surprises, and what you really want is a person who has the inner strength to go through all the ups and downs with you while encouraging you & making you smile.

You would want someone whom you would still love & appreciate when you are both 90 years old and have wrinkles all over your faces, someone whose mere presence and company would make you happy. It doesn’t matter what the both of you look like, can still do, or have, as long as you are together, you are happy.

Suggestion:

In short, don’t be blinded by infatuation, get to know someone better and choose your life partner wisely, taking into account their non-external qualities that are more important before making a decision. If they also happen to have attractive external qualities, that’s a bonus, but they should not be your main criteria.

6. A RELATIONSHIP OF CONVENIENCE

There are times where 2 individuals happen to be stuck in the same place or same activity for a period of time and it would seem like the time is right, the feel is right and everything is right for love to happen, and it happens.

It could be 2 co-workers on a working trip, 2 strangers taking a 3 month holiday at the same resort or 2 students working on the same project.

Now, don’t be mistaken, we are not saying that strong & lasting relationships can’t start this way. In fact, many have, and it is a really romantic way to start a relationship.

However, if you rely solely on the good experience you had during that short magical time you had together to fuel your entire relationship, then you run the risk of blinding yourself from realizing whether the both of you are right for each other.

Hence, it is great if you meet someone that way, but make sure that you find out whether the both of you are compatible when you’re not in such isolated and romantic situations as well when you’re back to your normal everyday life. If you are, congratulations, but if you’re not; don’t hang on to the illusion that you are because of that magical first encounter. You might be missing out on the right one for you who’s still out there.

7.  YOU ARE IN A RELATIONSHIP TO PROVE A POINT

There are some people who choose to be with someone just to prove a point.

Sometimes, they do so because they are tired or simply just don’t agree on their parent’s idea of who they should or should not date. They would date someone who is exactly who their parents told them not to in order to prove their parents wrong. Even though it is obvious to them that they are suffering in the relationship, they would still press on because they want to prove a point.

Sometimes, they do so because friends or family members say they can’t be with someone or can never be in certain relationships, and they make sure they do it to prove them wrong.

This is not how true love and true relationships are supposed to be. If we do this, we are merely using our partners to prove a point, and it would make life miserable for everyone. It is not worth gambling our happiness just to prove a silly point.

Be with someone because you genuinely love them and are right for each other, do not force yourself to be with someone or continue being with someone just to prove a point.  It won’t be fair to yourself and your partner.

8.   YOUR PARTNER IS UNAVAILABLE

All of us deserve to be with someone who is able to love us whole-heartedly as we love them, because otherwise, we will merely be surviving on someone else’s “leftover love”.

We all know that.

But sometimes, we can get blinded by our emotions or circumstances and lead ourselves to believe that it is okay to be with someone who is not available.

It is also important to note that although someone says that they are available or will make themselves available to you, they might not really be available.

If someone:

• Is with someone else
• Promises to leave someone to be with you
• Hasn’t recovered from their previous relationship
• Has broken up with their previous partner but still has feelings for them or might get back together with them
• Is with someone else but tells you that you are the only one they love/they love you more than the other

They are all not available. Don’t kid yourself.

Find someone who is truly single & available and ready to start a new relationship with you and you alone.

“If you chose the right partner, life can be like heaven on earth; but if you’ve chosen the wrong partner, it can be a living hell…”