Welcome back to The Self Love Fix!

First of all, happy New Year. I hope you had a wonderful holiday season!

Fair warning—it’s a new year, same me situation here at TSLF. I’m still not holding anything back. I’m still asking the hard questions. I’m still going to say the things you need to hear, and they won’t always be what you want to hear, but they will always be real and necessary.

Let’s start 2023 on a real note. Today, I’m here to tell you this: it’s okay to want a relationship.

Don’t Want a Relationship…or Can’t Have a Relationship?

I’ve talked about this before, but I’m feeling the need to share it again. I have come across so many people in my time as a coach, particularly women, who have “given up” on relationships and dating. After trying for some time to get exactly that, they suddenly come to the conclusion that maybe they don’t actually want a relationship.

Why does this happen? Because they start to convince themselves of things that may or may not be true: why it’s actually a burden to be in a relationship, why it’s not for them anyway, why they don’t actually want a relationship at all.

Here’s the deal: if you are someone who is genuinely comfortable in your singleness, if you truly don’t want a relationship, you’re not going to get offended by this message. If that’s simply something you don’t choose, and you’re very clear on that, that is absolutely okay. I’m not saying you have to want a relationship. Some people, in their heart of hearts, do not want that life for themselves, and that is completely fine.

On the other hand, people who do want a relationship deep down but don’t feel it’s possible are going to get offended by this message. So if that’s you right now, I want you to sit in that for a moment, and think about this:

There is a difference between not desiring a relationship in this phase of your life—or not desiring a relationship at all—and convincing yourself that you don’t want a relationship just because your attempts to find one aren’t working out for you.

Do you see the difference? With the first one, there’s nothing external that is influencing your decision to not want a relationship. It’s a conclusion you’ve come to internally, and you’re at peace with that. But there are so many people I’ve come across, both as a coach and in my personal life, that have convinced themselves—convinced being the keyword—that they don’t want a relationship, even when they truly, deeply do.

Here’s why I think that’s damaging: because you’re suppressing your desires in favor of temporary relief from the pain of not currently having what you want.

I am a huge advocate of being in tune with your feminine energy, and a big part of feminine energy is about trusting and surrendering to your desires. So if you have taken your desire for a relationship and insisted to yourself that it’s no longer there, you’ve not only cut yourself off from desire, but you’ve let yourself know exactly what’s going on within your ego. You’ve let external influences decide what you get to have.

Let that sit: you actually have let external influences decide that you can’t want a relationship. You have let something other than you decide that you aren’t able to have the thing that, deep down, you truly want.

Why do people do this? Oftentimes it happens because having that desire, pursuing that desire, and still failing to attain it makes them feel inferior. Other times it happens because walking around and seeing all these people who have what you want so badly…it just becomes too much to bear.

I’ve been there. I know how terrible it feels. Maybe you’ve been waiting far longer than them. Maybe it seems like they achieved it effortlessly, while you’ve been trying for years and can’t seem to attain it. Whatever the case, it leaves you thinking, “What the fuck? Why them and not me? What is so wrong about me that I can’t have this?”

Eventually, it becomes so difficult to want a relationship while witnessing other people who already have one that in the end, you just give up. Because giving up offers you some power in this situation, right? It makes you feel a little bit superior. It makes you feel like you’re in control again. Because once that “rejection,” of sorts, is your own choice, you no longer have to feel so crummy about missing out on having a relationship.

I’m just going to say it flat-out: ridding yourself of the desire altogether is ultimately unsupportive to you, regardless if it makes you feel better in the moment.

It is so much more supportive to you to come to an agreement with yourself: you can agree that whatever you’re currently doing is not supportive to what you want, or that you’re not yet experiencing the relationship that you desire to experience, but it’s fine. You’re still willing to do what’s required of you. You’re willing to examine where you might be getting in your own way, and you’re willing to surrender to the process.

So many people don’t allow the process to take place because they refuse to surrender to it. Why? Because it requires a sacrifice of control. You’d have to trust the universe, or you’d have to trust God, or you’d have to let go of the need to have your hands in every single thing. And a lot of people have difficulty with that because they don’t ultimately trust that things can work in their favor. So momentarily, it might feel really, really good to say to yourself, “No, you know what? I actually don’t want a relationship.”

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Kick Your Ego Out

All of that to say, I suggest you stop and closely examine why you’ve decided you don’t want a relationship. Are you someone that actually does not want to date? Are you someone who just wants to have fun and be casual? Or do you just feel so defeated by the process that you’ve decided it’s easier to rid yourself of the desire?

That’s not supportive to you, full stop. Let’s not be toddlers in this process. The dating process gets to be fun, but only if you let it be. When you let dating be fun and kick your ego out of the process, you won’t even concerned with how long it takes. If dating can become a vehicle for connection rather than a vehicle for boosting up your ego, it’s going to feel so much better, even when it doesn’t always work out. If you’re using it as a tool to fuel your ego, it is going to be a losing game for you internally. It’s going to feel frustrating every single time.

Be willing to sit with the feeling of actually deeply desiring a partner. I’m telling you, so much can shift after the acceptance of that desire, because then you’re not fighting it anymore.

You get to want a relationship. You get to want what you want, regardless of what it is. It just means that sometimes, you have to do what’s required of you—even if it means sacrificing your ego.

Be sure to connect with me more on Instagram @theselflovefix. I’d love to hear what you thought of this post and what your major takeaways were.

Head over to my website to learn more about how we can work together to shift your energy & transform your life.

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