Lately, I have found that freedom is very important when you love someone and want to be in a long-term relationship.
These days, it’s a REAL challenge to find someone to share the rest of our lives with. We are too busy to invest the time necessary to foster a long-term relationship, nor do we spend enough time thinking about what is most important to a strong partnership.
I think there are many things that need care in a relationship: Communication, Love, Respect, Commitment, Honesty… and Freedom is one of the most important. A free person is a person who has the power to act, speak or think for himself. True love allows us to go our own way.
When we are in love, we tend to control the other person and expect them to do only the things we like. If this doesn’t happen, we become disappointed and angry or upset. When we fall in love we want to please the other person and “change” our freedom to do what they want. This is fine, but how long can we do this and still be happy? One week? One month? One year?
It takes time to realize that we are not happy simply doing what our lovers want, and when we do, suffering ensues. The relationship begins to break down. We start fighting and blaming the other person because we are not happy.
Who wants a relationship where there is no freedom to be ourselves? We want another person to love us the way we imagine we want to be loved, which may not be the way our lovers show us. We may have an image of the perfect couple and we know exactly how we want them to act. When we find a person we like, we bring our “dream character” to life… and our fantasy begins.
True love is unconditional, but if we want our relationships to work, we can put ourselves in our lovers’ shoes instead of imposing our own expectations on them or trying to control them. Understand how they feel, who they are, what makes them happy, what their goals and dreams are. If they are happy with their own lives and we are happy with ours, then there is a better chance that our relationships will work. We all have personal interests, desires, challenges, and goals we want to achieve. Instead of trying to change them, and change our lovers, be a part of those achievements, support our lovers and enjoy our relationships.
This is what I say about my man: I want my man to have the freedom to choose what he wants, but he chooses me as his woman and lets me be an important part of his life…lol.