When I was just twenty-four years old, I attended my first big personal growth seminar about relationships. There were over four-hundred women in attendance and the person running the show was a fifty-year-old man. There were so many assumptions about men and relationships that I made up that were simply not true.
Over the past twenty years of dating many types of men of all ages, shapes, and colors, I have witnessed the truth of these ideas. Sometimes I resisted these facts, ignored them, and, of course, believed I could change them if I met the right guy. I want to share the lies I believed with you.
Here are ten lies I believed about men and relationships that kept me single for way too long:
1. Lie: If a man loved me, he would make me a priority in his life
Truth: A woman’s top priority in life is her relationships. A man’s top priority is preserving his ego. Instead of wanting to be first in all of his life, if you are simply first in his relationships category, he cares about you.
2. Lie: Men like to talk about relationships
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Truth: Most men were not socially conditioned to discuss feelings. What comes easy for you is not as easy for them.
Don’t take it personally. Even a man who was raised by a single mom and is very sensitive will never be as comfortable as you in these discussions.
3. Lie: If a man breaks up with me, I must be flawed and I have to fix myself to be perfect enough to be attractive to men
Truth: There are so many reasons why men/women leave. Many times it is more about their baggage and fears than anything to do with you.
People fit together like puzzle pieces based on their subconscious programming. If you are not a match, neither is good nor bad, just not the right fit. There is nothing to fix about you except your false self-perceptions.
4. Lie: When I find a man to love me, then my personal growth work is complete
Truth: Your growth is never complete. Life is about growing and expanding, you are never done until you are dead.
5. Lie: When a man tells me how much he likes me, even though he doesn’t show it, I should believe him
Truth: Research from Coastal Carolina University states that men communicate with action. Pay more attention to what he does or does not do rather than what he says.
6. Lie: If I have those butterflies when I think about him, it must be love
TRUTH: Butterflies are fear/excitement rolled into one feeling. This can occur when your mate is unavailable creating the danger and excitement of the uncertainty.
This feeling also comes up when you meet someone who is a true connection. You can’t use butterflies as a gauge for finding “the one.” When we fall in love, our bodies react with a mixture of chemicals, that can induce that giddy feeling in our stomach, research from Harvard claims.
7. Lie: If I love him, then I should put up with bad behavior because he is my soul mate
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Truth: This is co-dependency at its best. You don’t love him; you love the idea of him.
This is a fantasy love if he is mistreating you. Just because you think you love someone, doesn’t mean they are right for you.
8. Lie: Men don’t want to commit, so I need to please him physically so he will stay with me
Truth: If intimacy was all it took to make a man commit, the hookers would all be married by now.
9. Lie: Men love to hear gossip
Truth: He doesn’t care about your friend’s problem with your other friend who said something your friend took as an insult. Nor does he want your breakdown of the conversation and how you feel about it. He may be interested in whether the Yankees won or not today.
10. Lie: The only way to catch a man is to play games and pretend I do not want to commit
Truth: You can try the catch him and keep him game which will work for a while. The problem is that you have to keep up the game throughout your entire relationship and that could be exhausting. When would he ever get to know the real you?
The biggest lie I told myself is that my life would have no meaning if I didn’t get married and have children. I hear this lie told to me every day by my readers, customers, and clients.
I feel their pain. I lived that lie for almost twenty years. Now that I am in a committed relationship (still not married or have children), I look back at my single life and realize all the happiness and fun I missed because I was so focused on finding “him.”
I was putting my enjoyment on hold until my knight in shining armor arrived. My life had meaning when I was single and I am still the same “me” as a part of a couple.
Examine the lies you tell yourself about love and life. Most importantly, the lies you make up about yourself and your limitations because you are single.
Stop telling yourself the lies that it is never going to happen and that you’ll be alone forever. Ignore that cranky voice in your head that says you are not good enough or need to be fixed. You are perfect right now. Love will happen for you and that is the truth.
Debi Maldonado is the CEO of CreativeMind, a personal development company. She has been featured by ABC News, FOX News, NBC News, Cosmopolitan, Huffington Post, Publisher’s Weekly, and more.
