When it comes to marriage and choosing the right person to spend our lives with, we can’t help but wonder how we can be sure that we are making the right decision. The truth is, no one is perfect, and we all have our flaws, so finding someone who can tolerate us and whose flaws we can tolerate can seem to be a big deal.
According to Alain de Botton, a founder of The School of Life, there seems to be a lot of anger that we hold on to, anger and rage that we secretly have, and it has us sulking about the way our love lives have gone. However, he says that if we are able to turn that anger into sadness, then we can make progress. Why? Because if we can turn rage into grief, we have given up hope entirely.
In his words, “scratch the surface of any regularly angry person, and you will find a wild optimist.” Rage is primarily driven by hope. And when it comes to love and relationships, it is extremely hard to give up hope because there are many, many industries that are all designed to inflate our expectations of love and what a loving relationship or marriage should be.
One of the reasons you will marry the wrong person is because you are strange and difficult to live with. We all are. In fact, there are many things that are wrong with us, things that only our closest friends and family know about (and very probably our ex-lovers), but they would not dare tell us.
It’s like most of us are addicts but not in terms of a substance we are taking, but an addict in terms of a behavior or pattern you are taking in order to not be alone with yourself and with your thoughts, and more importantly, not to feel your deeper emotions and get in touch with yourself and who you are as a person deep inside. So, you remain addicted to doing anything that keeps you away from yourself. And since you don’t know yourself, you can successfully relate to another person, let alone love them.
Love requires you to do things you don’t want to do. Not everyone is comfortable expressing their vulnerabilities. You probably don’t want to show your partner you are vulnerable and scared.
According to psychologists, people use two patterns of behavior whenever they are in danger of becoming vulnerable. One group of people gets anxiously attached.
This means that instead of saying, “I need you, I depend on you, I love you”, they say, “Where have you been? You’re 15 minutes late.” But then, they start getting critical and strict when actually they want to ask the scary question, “Do you still love me? Am I still important to you?” But, they don’t dare ask those questions out of fear.
The other type of people is avoidant, which means that when they need someone, they act cold and aloof like they don’t need them at all. They don’t reveal the need and love they have for another person. Instead, they start rejecting them. And this pattern gets toxic because other people start wondering whether they are important to them, which results in a lack of trust.
It’s as if we don’t dare to be humble and vulnerable and reveal how much we need another person, so in a way, we reject love. This is because we don’t know how to love.
According to Alain, love is not an instinct but a skill that needs to be learned. To love is to have the capacity and willingness to interpret someone’s not very appealing behavior in order to find more benevolent reasons why that not-so-good behavior may be unfolding. Or in other words, to love someone is to apply charity and generosity of interpretation for someone else’s actions towards us. And in doing that, we will cut some slack for ourselves because we are not perfect either.
Another reason why we will probably end up marrying the wrong person is because many of our early experiences of love are bound up with various kinds of suffering. As a result, there is a shift when we start dating and choosing love partners. We think that we want to find someone who will make us happy, but we are not. Actually, we are looking for someone who will feel familiar with us.
And there does a problem arise because familiarity and happiness are oftentimes two different things. Familiarity can be bound up with a particular kind of suffering and torture. This explains why when people encourage us to go out on a date with an amazing person, we end up “not feeling it” even though we agree that they are smart, charming, and amazing. We tell our friends that we didn’t feel the spark, that they were boring etc.
In fact, we are really trying to say that we have spotted that this wonderful and quite accomplished person won’t make us suffer in ways we are accustomed to suffering for us to feel that love is real. And so, we reject them.
We are not on a journey to be happy, we are on a quest to suffer in ways that feel familiar, and this is the main reason why we will end up marrying the wrong person.
So…
How To Avoid Marrying The Wrong Person?
Finding love is not easy. However, when you do find love, the question is whether you two will be compatible in the long run. So, here are some tips that will help you determine if you are with the person you should marry.
First, when you think about marrying the person you are in a relationship with, you should really look into their virtues and flaws. You should look at who they are as a person and don’t expect them to change. You must like them as they are in the present, without hoping that one day they will change the annoying habits they have. In other words, avoid marrying potential.
Furthermore, you should be open with your future spouse. The biggest mistake that couples make is not being honest and open about their wants and needs in a relationship. They need to be honest about what they could and could not tolerate in the partnership. Openness and sincere communication can be the key to everlasting marriage. You and your partner should be able to discuss your feelings about having kids, financial planning, future plans, etc. before you decide to get married.
Finally, both partners should be aware of and take care of the emotional needs of their partner. That’s how they build their trust and keep the love and passion between them alive. Before you marry someone, you need to ask yourself, “Do I admire and respect my partner? Can I trust them? Am I able to rely on them? Do I believe them and trust their judgment? Do I feel safe around them? Can I be vulnerable with them? Am I at peace with them?”
And lastly, you are responsible for your happiness. You need to be happy and fulfilled by yourself before being happily married. Marriage by itself is not vital to happiness. If you are miserable alone, you will be miserable in your marriage as well.
How Do You Know You Married The Wrong Person?
Of course, every individual is different and has their own breaking points; however, some signs can be useful to you if you are confused and wondering whether you married the wrong woman or man.
1. You are arguing more frequently.
Bickering is the slow killer of relationships. So, when it starts happening in a marriage, it is a sign that the marriage is in serious trouble. But then, you start feeling that you married someone who has no idea who you are as a person. Someone who has become your enemy.
2. You no longer talk about your day.
When you no longer need to talk about your day and share the little things that happened to you, then probably the connection you have with them is lost. Not sharing things is a red flag, and it usually means that your partner is not your best friend, and the marriage will slowly deteriorate as a result.
3. You often think about what your life would have been if you married someone else.
When you catch yourself fantasizing about other people, it is a sign you are married to the wrong person. When you think about your ex-girlfriend or ex-boyfriend and what would your life have been like if you had married them instead, then you need to really look into your spouse and ask yourself if you are happy with them and your life together.
4. You find excuses to not spend time together.
Another sign that you are not happy with your spouse is that you often look for other things to do instead of spending time with them. The intimacy between you is probably lost, and therefore, you start avoiding them because you are not ready to face the reality that you probably have married the wrong person for you.
5. Your fights often escalate into screaming at each other.
If you are someone who never raises their voice, and then you find yourself screaming and shouting at your partner, then probably something doesn’t feel right between you and your marriage. Fights can often be constructive and good when both partners are open to discussion and compromise but yelling, shouting, and calling names are never good.
6. You are impatient around them.
Almost everything your partner does bothers you. You are frequently impatient and nervous around them. It is as if you don’t recognize the person that is your spouse, and they have many flaws you think you overlooked that are now getting on your nerves.
7. You behave more like roommates and business partners.
You start feeling that you and your spouse have nothing in common except bills. Your marriage has now turned into a business transaction, and you no longer have a romantic interest in one another.
If you found yourself in these situations, then you are now probably questioning your decision and wondering…
Is It Normal To Regret Marrying Your Spouse?
Feelings of regret are typical in a marriage, especially when you have had certain expectations and they have not been met by your spouse. So, it is a human thing for feelings of regret, shame, and guilt to overwhelm you.
Perhaps you realized that you and your spouse don’t have anything in common. Maybe the quirks you loved about your person when you met them are now the red flags that annoy you and make you angry that you even married them in the first place.
Whatever your reasons, it is perfectly normal to regret marrying your spouse. And it is never too late to start anew and choose a happier life for yourself.
What To Do When You Are Unhappy In Your Marriage?
If you are feeling unhappy in your marriage or if you are wondering what’s the right thing to do – whether you should divorce your husband and have a fresh start, or accept your decision and learn how to live with it for the sake of your children (if you have them) – then, I would advise you to talk to your closest friends and family about your feelings. Sometimes, a new perspective on things can do wonders and remove your doubts.
Or talk to a professional counselor so that you can be sure that they are objectively viewing the situation. Then, they can help you by leading you to make the right decision to solve your problems.
Good luck!
Mary Wright is a professional writer with more than 10 years of incessant practice. Her topics of interest gravitate around the fields of the human mind and the interpersonal relationships of people.If you have a general question or comment please fill out the form and we will get back to you as soon as possible https://curiousmindmagazine.com/contact-us/ .
