Why do we all agree that a 16-year-old isn’t ready to date seriously and start searching for their future spouses? (Well, all of us except the 16-year-olds themselves, that is.) For the exact same reason many “grown ups” aren’t either: they are unprepared and lack the maturity required for a committed relationship.
We keep talking about the importance of being prepared to meet your potential partner. We also know that simply being older and living longer doesn’t automatically equal adequate growth and preparation. So what exactly does being ready entail?
Just like in the book “The Missing Piece Meets the Big-O” by Shel Silverstein (follow the link and read it!), I’ve come to understand that the best relationships aren’t about two incompletes making each other whole, but instead, two wholes enjoying each other’s company. Nobody is ever completely whole, but as long as we are striving to be we can come pretty darned close.
Here is what I think it means to be ready, sufficiently mature, or whole (I don’t claim this list to be comprehensive in anyway, please let me know if there’s something you disagree with or you think I’ve missed something):
Know Yourself
- You have a good (accurate, realistic and positive) understanding of who you are, your defining personality traits, as well as how you may be perceived by others.
- You know your strengths and how to use them. You find fulfillment in exercising those skills and talents.
- You acknowledge your weaknesses with humility, and honestly believe that you can overcome them. You have faith in the atonement and apply it in your life. You are a perpetual project of self-improvement.
- You recognize your own thoughts and feelings, acknowledge them and take responsibility for them.
- You know what you want out of life and have an idea of how to get it.
- You love yourself and know just what you have to offer your future spouse that would enhance his life.
Be Happy
- You take responsibility for your own happiness. You know what it takes for you to be a happy person, and you are actively working on attaining what is best for your well-being. You do not expect circumstances or other people to make you happy.
- You have a high sense of self-worth. You know that you are valuable and why. You are secure in that knowledge and it is not easily influenced by others.
- You do not let your past affect you. You recognize and work on resolving issues that affect your happiness and your relationship with others. You do not carry baggage around, nor expect to find someone who will carry your baggage for you.
- You have a positive outlook on life. You make decisions based on faith and hope, not out of fear or desperation.
- You enjoy your life and love being you!
Be An Adult
- You have the ability to take care of yourself and your own needs, emotional, physical, spiritual, financial and social.
- You have the room and the ability in your life to take care of another person.
- You are able to make good decisions carefully and not impulsively on your own with conviction.
- You trust in your decision-making skills and don’t question them in hindsight or constantly look back in regret.
- You have the courage and ability to “stick it out” through the tough times and resolve issues instead of jumping ship/burning bridges/running away every time problems arise.
- You are able to exercise good self-discipline and self-control.
- You have experienced life long enough to have a mature sense of time and have seen through personal choices and commitments that have spanned a long period of time.
- You are willing to stretch yourself and learn to exist outside of your “comfort-zone”.
- You are committed to living righteously and making good choices, even if those choices may be more difficult than the alternative.
Have Positive Relationships
- Love is a part of your life through healthy and positive relationships with friends, family, and with God.
- You are actively loving and serving those around you.
- You take ownership of your thoughts and feelings and are both able and unafraid of communicating them clearly.
- You are able to relate to and understand the thoughts and feelings of others, as well as see things from their perspective.
- You know how to say you’re sorry first as well as how to freely forgive.
- You know how to interact positively with those of the opposite sex
- You allow your life to be greatly enhanced by those around you.
- You are not afraid of emotional intimacy.
- You have an environment where you know you are loved unconditionally despite your flaws and where you love freely, despite their flaws.
- You understand how and why loving another (not just being loved by another person) will greatly enhance your life.
How do you fare in comparison to this list?
Don’t let this list daunt you. You don’t have to be perfect to be in a relationship, but you do need to be working toward it. Don’t confuse maturity and wholeness with flawlessness.
However, like taking a class that you don’t have the prerequisites for, without the proper preparation, you will face a steep learning curve in relationships and will have to struggle hard not to “flunk out”. Whether you learn them now, or you whether you learn them later, these things must be learned.
Regardless of whether or not this preparation and growth will lead to a relationship, constantly working on achieving this wholeness will greatly enhance your life in general. On the other hand, if there are things on the list that you neglect or struggle with, you will invariably find that they will be the source of much unhappiness in your life and subsequently, your relationships.
After all is said and done, married life is still life. If you’re not happy with your life, you’re not going to be happy with your marriage.
Think about where you are in your personal development. Look at the list carefully, and take note of the things you struggle with. You may find examples of why certain relationships had not worked out for you in the past, or you may discover why you are so happy with the relationship you have right now.
Do you have anything to add to the list?
Camille
As Fei is well aware, I have the opposite problem of the people this site is directed at: I am 16 years old, usually aware that I am not developed enough to have successful romantic relationships, and yet find myself consistently ending up in them – each turning out to be dysfunctional in a way none of the others were. It’s exhausting. I’ve finally made the decision to stay away, even when I’m pursued or pressured… Hopefully this resolution will prove sturdier than the other times I tried it. >.> I have more logical and emotional reasoning for the decision this time, so I’m hoping.
Even so, thank you, Fei, for this list. It’s fantastic.
Hopefully it will help drill into my head that I am not ready – and help me figure it out when I actually am.
Maybe people won’t take me seriously because of my age, but I’d like to add one to the list. It was alluded to in a few of your points, but I want to underline it a little.
-You know and feel that you do not need a relationship to be complete, happy, or important. You feel that you are the same person, with or without a boy/girlfriend.
There’s the baseline… Expand on that how you will.
I see this a LOT, both in my age group and the older ones. It seems to me that if you think you NEED a relationship… what you really need is some good productive single time to find yourself.
Fei
Camille, thanks for commenting. I had my younger self in mind when writing this – and you resemble that a lot (while being much wiser at the same time) so it’s no surprise that you’d find it helpful and relevant to you.
I’m still unsure how this list works for everyone else though. I think for some, independence and happiness is not the problem, it is learning to be in tune with their emotions or something that only relationships demand. I’m not sure. But when I figure it out, I’ll be sure to write about it!
I really like your addition to the list. I did try to cover that sentiment in more indirect ways: taking ownership of your own happiness (not dependent on others or circumstance), learning to value yourself (instead of looking to be valued by someone else).
However, I am hesitant to say that needing a relationship is a bad thing. It is my opinion that humans – some more than others – have an innate need to love and be loved, first by their parents, but later by their mate. I don’t think anyone can be complete without that kind of love in their life. I think singles are allowed to feel lonely and incomplete without them. At the same time, desperation for romantic love, is symptomatic of a different kind of problem and isn’t a good base for a healthy relationship. That void is best filled through different means.
Jeremy
I agree Fei. I might feel lonely and incomplete but lonely only to come home to an empty house with no one to share my life with and incomplete only cause I don’t have a wife and kids to be responsible for. I am not incomplete or lonely because I don’t have romance or the pleasure that comes from someone that is always reassuring me.
Camille
I feel that there is a fine line between needing a relationship, and needing a relationship in order to know who you are. We’ve all seen them… the people who *become* their romantic partners. Of course a boy/girlfriend’s tendencies are going to rub off on you, but if you’re changing your interests, friends, pasttimes, major, and even your core personality to align with that of a love interest, then that is need taken too far. Am I making sense? I agree that it’s okay (and natural) to feel a need for romantic involvement, but you need to have a strong sense of who you are and what you need. You need to *be* someone if you are to be someone else’s.
“I don’t think anyone can be complete without that kind of love in their life.” -I disagree with this statement; I agree that humans naturally feel a need for love and acceptance, though I’m not convinced it has to be romantic. What about the people who go their whole lives unmarried, whether by or without fault of their own? They *have* to find a way to be complete, or else their entire lives are doomed to be inadequate, no? But perhaps my limited personal experience with mature relationships keeps me from really understanding.
Persephone
This list seems to be more catered to women. If I was a guy, would this list be very different?
Crighton
If guys had a list, it would be shorter and more straight forward. Girls tend to overcomplicate basically everything — especially internpersonal relations. This article is a prime example of that.
But playing devil’s advocate, I think ultimately though you really have to be “in” a relationship to work on a lot of these items. Saying you have one “checked” off isn’t necessarily true: it may its not an issue when single, but our best attributes tend to come unraveled when in direct contact with another person.
The most fearless, independent women in the world become clingy, naggy witches whose self value is 100% dependent on what their man is currently feeling towards them.
Penelope
While I do LOVE this list because I agree that we are more likely to find a great match and have a good marriage with these characteristics, I know lots of people who get married and don’t have many of them. I don’t agree with the reasoning that we aren’t married because we lack a certain something, that we have a character flaw.
Persephone- What part of the list seems to be catered to women? I honestly don’t see it.
Fei
@Penelope: Singles are still single for a myriad of reasons. Sometimes, it’s within their control, and sometimes, it’s really not. There’s no real point talking about the things we can’t control, though, since there’s nothing we can do about that, and blaming outside circumstances may give us consolation but really doesn’t get us anywhere.
This post wasn’t meant to poke at singles telling them what they are doing wrong. I already did that in my 20 reasons post
This particular post is meant to help individuals, within or without relationships to learn to be as whole and as happy as they can be as an individual. I certainly can’t conclude that being whole leads to having a relationship – because, you’re right, there are so many married people who don’t meet this list, and many who do that are still single. But there, we’ve made the mistake of equating marriage to be the happily ever after. Just because these people are married, doesn’t always mean that they are happy.
Kristine
Great Post. I couldn’t agree more. Random question, but how old were you when you got married?
Fei
Kristine, your question is actually a pretty relevant one.
The answer: I married young. Old enough to not be a BYU Mormon-insta marriage (I had been out of the college scene and singles wards and working in the “real world” for 5 years by then), but too young to be writing things for mid-singles
I was 26 and my was husband 28.
Actually, since we’ve only been married half a year, we’re still that age. Did I just give away my age?!
I hope that doesn’t undermine my credibility any!
Kristine
hahaha nope, you didn’t give me your age, I must have missed that part of the reply.
It would be interesting if you did a post on your background!
Camille
I’m sure Fei would LOVE to do a post on her backgroun.
Fei
Heh. I’ve intentionally avoided writing a post on my background because:
1) I haven’t felt that my story is relevant to most mid-singles (and this site was originally primarily targeted toward that demographic).
2) I already talk a lot about myself in all sorts of other places, and this site isn’t supposed to be about me – I have my own blog for that. I haven’t publicized that blog here not because of privacy, but because I run this site with the sole intention of helping myself and others improve their relationships, not as a way to bring any attention to myself.
At the same time, I know that a voice without a face isn’t heard as clearly, and I do wish this place had more of a personal touch to it instead of being so preachy all the time (I am a real person with relationship problems too!) so I have been working on writing my story, but, it’s a lot harder than you think. There are so many aspects of my life of relationships I want to write about, more than “this is the magical way I met my husband” because that story is entertaining, but useless. It’ll be streamlined one day, but in the meantime, enjoy the stories I’ve solicited from other people