How Happy Is Your Home? 5 Tips To Finding Your Perfect Partner

There are over 6 billion people of people on the planet and it doesn't matter how old you are, the cards are always shuffling and there is someone out there for each of us no matter what our age.

But how do we choose someone who is potentially a good fit and what qualities do we look for? There is such a high rate of divorce, unhappy marriages and infidelity that it seems many of us we are not choosing someone for the qualities that can make a relationship last a life time.

In fact, many of us find ourselves marrying for the wrong reasons, perhaps we are scared to be alone, so settle for someone who is nearly, but not quite right for us. Or perhaps their money makes us feel safe or that they are so attractive that they will look great on our arm. But none of these qualities will sustain us for a lifetime.

I remember going to a talk by Ravi Shankar about ten years ago and he said when there is a big flame when you meet someone there is almost no place to go with it, but when the flame is smaller, it has somewhere to grow. For some reason that analogy always stuck in my mind and my interpretation is that the flame isn't less, because it's smaller, in fact, it's usually stronger and sturdier.

Here are 5 Tips to discover if a partner is 'right' for you.

TIP 1: Think about what qualities and values are important to you. Is it important that they are warm, trustworthy, sweet natured and emotionally stable, or that they are loving, passionate, deep feeling, generous and spirited? Obviously you are going to think you want all of those and you might be lucky enough to get that or have got that, but I am asking you to look at your top 5, that you just can't do without. I once had a boyfriend who was not very passionate about anything at all and during that experience realized that passion was really up there as a necessity for me in a partner. I didn't care what they were passionate about, they could have been passionate about selling cars, so long as the quality was obviously there, rather than hidden.

TIP 2: Learn what worked and what didn't. It's not so easy to own up to where you went wrong in the last relationship, But if your goal is to have a relationship that works, that means you have to look at yourself, as painful as it is, and take responsibility for the mistakes that you made in each of your past dalliances and do it different next time. Otherwise you will keep falling for the same type of person and it will keep not working.

TIP 3: Choose someone who is open to growing and developing as a person, rather than someone who is resistant to change. A really healthy relationship is based on a mutual desire to ensure each other has the space to become older and wiser and, as a result, you will have the honor of watching them transform in this lifetime, as they will have the honor of watching you. Signs of someone being open are that they can easily say sorry, they listen to what you have to say when in a heated discussion, they are not stuck on being 'right' all the time and of course there are many more.

TIP 4: Don't fall in love with potential; it will never work. What you see is what you get. You can not make anyone change in the way YOU want them to, if they want to grow, they will do it in their own time, in the direction that is right for them, not the direction that is right for you. I actually know people who have been sticking it out with their partner for years and are still holding up the flame for them to grow, rather than the partner holding up their own flame for them to grow.

TIP 5: Keep your senses open. There is something about meeting your life partner that feels different from all the other relationships. The feeling is hard to describe, but there is a sense of a kind of stability, something really comfortable and easy that might not have been with anyone before. It's not usually like something out of a romance novel, it's a knowing only often in hindsight that it's different.

If we look at the actual linguistics of 'falling' in love, it actually isn't a very positive analogy. Many people who 'fall' end up being separated, divorced or in therapy. Forget meeting someone and falling in love, how about meeting someone and 'growing' in love.

That's it for this week and if you have any questions or want to make contact I would love to hear from you, so e-mail me at [e-mail].

Comments

[Aurelius740]

A leopard can't change its spots.....would be a lot easier for younger guys these days to meet a clean, well mannered girl if all of them weren't crawling around bars trying to get laid

[chandra-shekar]

I was married to my wife for 34 years (we knew each other for 37) before losing her to cancer three and a half years ago.
She was German and I am Indian, and in spite of the differences, we had a vision of what could work.
I had not dated at all when I met her, but your Tip 5 was the one that I believe worked for us. There was this immensely strong feeling that 40 years from then we could see each other sitting at a breakfast table together and still agreeing that it was a wonderful togetherness.
We had our ups and downs, but we were soulmates. We worked our way through tough issues. We shared similar values.
The decision to leave my job and become her caregiver when she was diagnosed was made in a heartbeat.
I love David Deida's books, especially "The Way of the Superior Man". I think every man and woman should read it. For the man, it shows the path; for the woman, it makes her recognize the 'superior man'.

[ballerinagirl]

What a great article this is! I wish I had had this a long time ago. It would have [hopefully] saved four people [at least] a lot of grief and disappointment! Thank you!

[lornejl]

The premise is wrong...........
Perfect ;
1 a: being entirely without fault or defect : flawless

[Sophie Keller]

Thank you for this, just to let you know I actually did send in the article with 'perfect' in quote marks as I do not believe in the word 'perfect' either. However it was not posted in that way. But we are on the same page. Thanks

[lornejl]

All relationships are roller coasters, If you don't want to ride the ups and downs, stay single.

[gascelebrations]

The coolest thing about this is that people innocently Googling "Ravi Shankar" will end up here.

[AmandaBC]

People don't fall in love because they've decided the object of their passion meets a bunch of prerequisites. Your recipe to pick a lover seems like one to select the particular dog breed that best suits your lifestyle. Couples running into big trouble early in their relationship very often chose their partners based on abstract ideals. It's not true that your "perfect mate" --if such an animal even exists...-- thinks and acts like you, that's just a cozy way to feed your narcissism, yet often a recipe for complete disaster. Opposites attract and often love feeds on diversity. Human emotions aren't easy to rationalize and trying to steer them in one particular direction never produces the result you're hoping for. This is what I've gathered from my life, your mileage may vary...

P.S. Picking a "trophy" partner (for money/prestige or looks) and believing the rest of the world will envy you is the very worst thing you can do. Actually any kind of relationship where one partner strongly depends on the other (money-wise or psychological dependency) will end up making both incredibly miserable in a very short time.

[Jericho]

I have an idea, start from the fact that nobody will ever be "perfect" for you and try judging yourself before you judge others to be inadequate.

[Pemo]

Good start 2 long journey to find perfect partner http://tinyurl.com/5h4d5a at Huffington Post!

[dora rice]

From someone who's been married to one partner for decades. The basic ingredients of a relationship are honesty and trust. If those two components aren't present, nothing else works. Period.

[texastrixie]

The best tip in seeking a lasting relationship is not to expect perfection - in your mate or in yourself. And if you should find this paragon of virtue - this perfect person, well, then if there is anything imperfect in the relationship, it has to be coming from you.

[provgrays]

This post is well intentioned, but picking a mate is not like buying the perfect car or any other product. You can't tick off a list of great qualities and check a person's label to see if all of your qualifications are satisfied.

It's luck.

Even the most disciplined person will not necessarily find the right one if they date every night of the week. Finding a compatible mate is a mathematical certainty in theory. The nearly impossible task is being in the same room with that perfect mate and having occasion to speak with them.

We like to think we're in control. We simply aren't.

[vagabond78666]

These common sense tips will not help you find a partner,they are a check list to keep you from being with the wrong person.
False heading in my opinion.

[artemisvictrix]

Number 4 is a great tip: "Don't fall in love with potential."
For the last eight months I was experiencing this in my life. A sense that things were "almost" perfect. But something was missing.. until I realized that I was living in an illusion. Then, I had to stop listening to my ego and paying more attention to what my intuition was saying.

[mediamarv]

Why only five?

Feelin' lazy??