Are You Ready for a New Relationship?

Many people who work with me talk about wanting to find a new partner, but few of them ever ask themselves if they’re ready for a relationship. It’s always important to sit with your wants. There may be some bad habits, negative thought cycles, and emotional or cultural baggage that has become invisible to us lurking beneath your desires. This is true in many aspects of life, but when it comes to women and relationships – there is a lot of potentially harmful self-talk about needing to find “the one” or settle down or have children. After a relationship ends, these underlying thoughts are often coupled with a desire to “win” the break up. You feel the need to move on faster and generally do better than your partner. That is a lot of pressure to put on yourself and your new partner. Before you download every dating app and start asking your friends to set you up with their cousins, let’s take a breath and think through the answers to some questions. Instead of jumping head first into the next relationship, take some time to think through exactly why you want to be in a relationship and what your ideal relationship looks like. In this blog, I walk through important questions every person should ask themselves before starting a new relationship.

How Long Has it Been Since You Were in a Relationship? 

After a relationship ends, our brain needs time to reset itself. Just like grieving after the death of a loved one or other major loss, the endings of relationships deserve to be mourned. Even if the relationship wasn’t good for you, returning to your single, unattached self can be tough. There’s no shame in mourning for the end of the partnership and celebrating the happiness you experienced together. In fact, allowing yourself time to grieve after the end of a relationship while making plans for the future is an essential part of learning and growing through our partnerships. If you just ended a three year partnership last week, you may not be ready to jump into the next long term relationship. Give yourself some time. It’s okay. You don’t need to “win” the breakup by moving on first. The only way to win at life is to choose your own happiness over worrying about how people are perceiving you. Easier said than done, I know, but it’s true. 

How & Why Did Your Last Relationship End? 

Now that you’ve taken some time to think through and grieve the loss of your relationship, let’s tackle the reason it ended. Sometimes (actually often), breakups aren’t anyone’s fault. People grow apart, one partner needs to relocate for their family or career, or you just don’t get what you need from the person emotionally or physically. That’s okay. These are the relationships where you say, “Let’s stay friends,” and you mean it. After an amicable breakup, you should still take time to reflect and mourn before you move on, but you may not need to take months to process the situation. 

Now, let’s talk about those relationships that don’t end well. Whether you were dumped or did the dumping, a bad breakup can impact all aspects of your life. It’s really important to understand how the end of your last relationship (and maybe the end of other relationships) is impacting you before you move on to a new partner. Following a difficult breakup, some people are more likely to keep new partners at arm’s length to protect themselves from getting hurt again. Others, will cling too tightly to their next partner because they don’t want to “fail” again. Reflect on why the relationship ended and how the end of that relationship may be impacting the way you’re thinking about your next partnership. 

How Can You Apply the Lessons from Your Past Relationship in the Future? 

There’s a mile-long list of break up songs listing all the goods, bads, and uglies of ending a relationship, and there’s an equally long list of love songs about how the lessons learned from bad or unsuccessful partnerships lead people to the person they’re meant to be with. These are cliches. Real relationships and their endings are typically much more nuanced than this, but cliches are often overused for a reason – there’s a bit of truth in there. Every relationship teaches us something about who we are and what we want and need from our significant others. Understanding this can help you to grow and create better relationships in the future. Take some time to think about what worked and what didn’t work in your relationship. How can you change this aspect of partnerships in the future? 

So, Are You Ready for a New Relationship?

If you feel unsure about whether you’re ready for a new relationship or you’re struggling to move on, you may not be ready. If you want to dive a little deeper into your fears or ambivalence, consider working with a therapist. I regularly talk to clients about past relationships and help them plan for and create healthier, more satisfying future partnerships. If that sounds like something you’re interested in, I’d love to hear from you.