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What No One Tells You About Love

How Emotional Maturity Changes Our Relationships

By Cameron DominguezPublished 5 years ago 3 min read
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What nobody tells you about relationships is that sometimes you begin to realize your mistakes way too late. You look back and what seemed harmless, or even something that you didn’t think to consider, you realize was harmful behavior. The tricky thing about self improvement is that you’re never done. You don’t recognize what you’re doing as wrong in the moment because we live in a series of moments. Growth and change allow us to peel back the layers of ourselves and reflect on the choices we make, the reasons we make them, and our effect on others.

So why have you loved your romantic partners, your family, and your friends in ways that, despite your best intentions, may have been harmful? Because we’re human. Recall your childhood tantrums (I know, but withstand the cringe for just a moment for our purposes). When I was young, I was mostly well-behaved, but there was one afternoon where I wasn’t allowed to go out and play. Annoyed, I sauntered towards my mother's room ready to prove to her that I DESERVED to go outside to look at the rollie pollies, I threw open the doors, tossed my hands up and exclaimed, “Mom! I’m six years old!” and walked away toward the front door, thinking my point made.

Looking back on it, my argument seems a little lacking. This illustrates my point perfectly however. With the perspective that age and experience bring most of us we come to realize that our parents were probably just looking out for us. Others realize we had some pretty terrible upbringings. Regardless of your realizations or your compounding therapy fees, maturity breeds a certain coherence. The result of this coherence? Regret.

Regret, shame, disgust. All these “negative emotions” are indications. Your super-ego manifesting your will to be better. Perhaps you’ve lied and cheated, treated loved ones with cruelty and contempt, or simply did not appreciate what you had. Now you’re left in the ruins of past relationships. However, your foundations are still intact. You learn to be better and your relationships improve; but while this sounds simple enough, this is not a linear journey. This is a constant process that you will likely never perfect, and that’s okay. You and almost every other person on the planet are still learning how to love. What’s important is our resilience. And our understanding of what it is we need to improve.

One thing that I’ve seen countless people have a difficult time with is taking a step outside of themselves. Someone in an abusive relationship stays because of the difficult and complex nature of our relationships. It’s easy to say, “They should just leave,” from the outside. The logical conclusion when someone mistreats you is to find someone who won’t. But relationships are not about logic. They are woven deeply into us with threads of emotion. Emotions which make decisions like leaving, even for good reason, extremely difficult to make. Taking that step back is what can help us to come to these decisions sooner, and more importantly it’s what can help us maintain healthy relationships.

Abusers don’t view themselves as abusers. They are so close to the situation that they rationalize the terrible things that they do and often make themselves the victims. But how can people who are so objectively in the wrong distort their view until they are the ones in the most favorable of light? A lack of self awareness. The same self awareness that emotionally intelligent people develop to help them love their fellow human better, is devoid in abusers. Self awareness is not something that just comes from a vacuum however. It is something we must cultivate. We must ask ourselves hard questions about our behavior, hold ourselves, and each other accountable, and constantly be striving to be better.

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About the Creator

Cameron Dominguez

My writing tends to focus on relationships and our individual struggles.Let me know what you think on my socials. Tips are appreciated.

facebook.com/storiesbycam

instagram.com/iamdannydelight/

twitter.com/itscamdominguez

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