Right now I’m single because I know what I want and I refuse to settle. Finally. And proudly. I’ve always been (and stayed) in my relationships (both serious and casual) because I really didn’t have anything else better to do or anyone else more worthy of dating. I settled. I compromised because I honestly used to think that settling was the best option—that you most likely had to end up settling somehow in some way to have a lasting relationship. But once I freed myself of my last relationship, I also freed myself of this terrible and claustrophobic way of thinking about my future.
I now feel that no one should ever settle for someone that they are not head-over-heals for. Chemistry is everything when finding—and keeping—a companion.
But it’s so hard, and that’s what makes it difficult to really analyze the inclination to settle for a man and a specific kind of relationship, even when that relationship may not be ideal, perfection for the remainder of one’s lifetime… Meeting eligible people gets ever harder once you are older, and I’m not even that “old” yet! In high school it was like hormones on a sugar high. Going into college, I remember being so overwhelmed with the idea of an unlimited dating potential. Now, since graduating, things are starting to change, and I feel almost in an in-between phase of dating, age-wise. I’ve started to set my standards a little higher (seriously factoring in the possibility of marriage and whatnot), and just as I do that, the eligible men (numbers) start to plummet. And all things relationship get more confusing. What I DO know, is the longer you wait around for Mr. Right, the longer your chances of being (and, oh no! staying) single…which could also be the best thing ever—or the worst.
So, when do you know that you are just not settling (waiting around for the perfect guy that probably will never come, anyway) or just being unrealistic and picky? It’s a very fine line that many women I know have been trying to balance on. Some fall off and settle but some wait around for the absolute real thing, “true love”. And to me, that possibility of being completely content with a relationship and having it happily last for a lifetime is worth being just a little big pickier.
