You would probably agree that part of dating is feeling good, looking good and physical fitness. I would argue that mental fitness should be at the top of that list. As a therapist, I see people every day who are unhappy in the relationships they are in… or can’t understand why they keep meeting the same UN-healthy man or woman… or can’t seem to meet anyone at all.
Mental Fitness in Dating for a Relationship
It is not just about knowing what you want but knowing where you’re coming from. The two can contradict one another.
Mentally Fit for Love: Know Where You’re Coming From
I had a client who came to me to “figure out” why she would break up with one dead end to find another. Maggie was attracted to the “bad boy” but when she started dating that cute but unpredictable man, she was unhappy and the relationship would inevitably come to an end.
She would swear she was done with “those type of men” but the pattern kept repeating itself.
This only reinforced Maggie’s feelings of failure and that she would never have steady relationship. Now each new encounter became more unhappy and depressing for her.
I asked Maggie to describe the man she was looking for. She said to me that he had to be attractive to her but more importantly she wanted someone she could rely on. Someone to be a peer in the relationship. All she had found in the past were dependent men who she took care of. That was fine as long as there was reciprocation.
Determined to change her pattern, Maggie eventually found David. He was nice, had a good job, treated her well…and bored her out of her mind! Wasn’t this what she wanted? Isn’t this what she described? She broke up with him coming just short of saying, “it was too easy”!
The Right State of Mind for Finding Love
Well the conscious mind is much more rational than the subconscious. Maggie’s conscious mind knew it was “logical” to find someone who was more of a peer than a dependent child but that thought hadn’t crossed the bridge over to the subconscious mind; the place where all our habits and programming are stored.
That’s the place where remember how to ride a bike as well as file away all the dynamics of the relationships we learned as a child and adolescent so we can model them as we get older. The problem is that when we didn’t have a more ideal model we tend to repeat history. So we have dilemma here.
Get Fit for Love: Changing Your Mind to Set the Course for a Healthy Relationship
In therapy, we worked out Maggie’s “habit” or subconscious way of seeking out relationships that modeled the past, gained insight, poked holes in that theory if you will, and made a cognitive positive change so that Maggie didn’t need a challenge to find a relationship stimulating.
Now Maggie has healthier views of how a relationship should be and sees the old ways as the unhealthy paths they were.
Now when Maggie meets someone, she not only knows what she wants consciously but it is what she truly wants for herself. The conflict is resolved and it shows when she interacts with someone who fits the description of who she is looking for in a partner.
By Special Guest author, Jennifer Battaglino. Jennifer is an author and LCSW Certified Hypnotist in Larchmont, NY, specializing in chronic illness, tinnitus, fears, phobias, and anxiety.
Reader Interactions