How to Find Love Again: A Helpful Guide

Finding Love

I’m in love. The head over heels, madly, deeply, and grinning like a fool kind of love. And let me tell you, finding love feels great.

I deserve this kind of love and happiness. And I think everyone else deserves it too.

But this is not the first time or even the second time that I’ve been in love with this man. We’ve actually been dating on and off for twenty-two years before we finally got married this summer.

And although timing played a huge part in our previous breakups, there was another glaring reason that things never seemed to work out for us until now.

The problem is that we all tend to get in our own way of finding love sometimes, and we self-sabotage our romantic relationships far more often than many of us even realize. And it’s time that we all learn how to stop doing that for our own sake.

Finding love is great and we’d all be a lot happier in life if we didn’t over-complicate it so much. So what can we do about it?

We can

• Be honest with ourselves about who we are, what we want, and what we need
• Be happy, independent, and driven on our own
• Have higher standards for how we’re treated
• Stay open-minded about dating people outside of our normal type
• Stop thinking it’s good to hook up and bad to catch feelings
• Not let our past relationships influence our future relationships
• Stop swiping left on so many people we’ve never even talked to
• Look up from our phones when we’re out in public and actually make eye contact with people

When we commit to doing these things, finding love becomes much simpler, and our lives change for the better in more ways than we can count.

We no longer

• Tell ourselves that things are good enough
• Lean on others to make us happy, fix our problems, or take care of us financially
• Allow ourselves to be mistreated or abused by our partners
• Dismiss good people just because they’re single parents, bald, overweight, or we just don’t like their haircuts
• Share our bodies with people but refuse to share our hearts
• Punish our current partners for things that others did to us in the past
• Make snap judgments about people without getting to know them
• Spend our lives on social media instead of actually socializing in real life

So knowing that so many of us tend to self-sabotage our romantic relationships and over-complicate things, the question becomes why do we do this in the first place?

Well, luckily that answer is simple. We compare our relationships to others, and we get jaded over time.

There’s a reason Teddy Roosevelt said that “comparison is the thief of joy.” It really is. The more we focus on other people’s relationships or partners, the more we start analyzing our own.

And I’ll let you in on a little secret, people lie on the internet. It’s true. No one is that happy with their partner all the time like they would have you believe on social media.

I’ll just say it, my husband is rocking a dad bod, he tells really bad dad jokes, and he mansplains simple things to me that I clearly already know, and it drives me crazy. I’m not afraid to share that at all. That’s true love right there.

He also gives the best bear hugs, surprises me with dark chocolate, and has stepped up to love and raise my two children like his own. He’s a keeper for sure.

My point is, he’s not perfect all the time and neither am I. I’m just lucky he’s not a blogger right now to spill the tea on me.

But if I only told you all of the good things about him in every post, and I acted like he was perfect all of the time, you might start comparing him to your own partner and that might not go so well. In that case, comparison could definitely steal your joy.

And like I said before, this is not our first rodeo together.

If either one of us would have held grudges against each other from our past or allowed the hurt caused by other people we dated to affect our current relationship, we wouldn’t be the family we are today.

Believe me, I know first hand that it’s possible to find love again, and finding love after heartbreak makes it even sweeter.

How to Find Love Again

Sometimes our biggest challenge when it comes to finding love is thinking that if we’ve already found it once, it’ll be nearly impossible to find it again. But that couldn’t be any further from the truth.

You deserve to have love in your life no matter what stage you’re in.

So if you’re wondering how to find love again, just remember that you have to be receptive to love, to discover what you’re really looking for in a partner, and to be willing to put in the work that all relationships need to flourish.

Finding Love Again

These 10 steps will help you learn how to find love again that lasts:

1. Believe That You Deserve Love

You must believe that you deserve love in order to find it. And you deserve love just the way you are, not once you lose ten pounds, not once you make more money, and not once your kids have moved out of the house. The right person will love you for exactly who you are today.

2. Know Your Worth

Knowing your worth is a huge part of finding the right kind of love. You have a lot of great qualities to share with someone, and the person who sees just how special you are is the person who can change your life in so many amazing ways.

3. Be Ready to Move Forward

There is no perfect timeline for finding love again. What matters most is that you feel ready, that you’ve given yourself enough time to heal from any past hurt or disappointment, and that you’re no longer carrying any resentments that could damage a new relationship before it even starts.

Remember, any new person you meet is not responsible for the actions of your ex-partner, and he or she is not guaranteed to treat you in the same way. Make sure you let the past go and commit to moving forward, so that you start any new relationship fresh.

4. Work On Your Personal Growth

In order to maintain a long-term relationship that benefits both partners, it’s important to continue to work on your personal growth and to be the best person that you can be. Being overly dependent, needy, jealous, or angry will damage even the best of relationships and make it incredibly difficult to find love.

So work on being a happy, independent, and driven person all on your own, and don’t rely on others to provide these things for you. You’ll be much better off, and you’ll make a better partner too.

5. Discover What You Want

Discovering what you want in a relationship is a big part of finding love again. Being focused on what you need in a potential partner ensures that you don’t settle for anything less than you deserve.

And it’s important to be honest with yourself and really consider the standards you set. If they’re too high, you may be dismissing people who are a good fit for you because of something really insignificant. On the other hand, if your standards are too low, you run the risk of jumping into relationships that have zero chance of creating a long-term, healthy bond.

6. Be Proactive

You have to be proactive when it comes to finding love. Whether you feel more comfortable striking up a conversation with a cute stranger in public, creating an online dating profile, or asking friends to set you up, these are all great ways to put yourself out there and to make it known that you’re available and looking for a new relationship.

7. Surround Yourself With Positivity

People are attracted to other people who are happy and fun to be around. So thinking positive thoughts, engaging in positive behaviors, and surrounding yourself with other positive people will be an attractive quality that others will notice.

8. Stay Open-Minded

The person you fall madly in love with may be very different than whom you had in mind. Be open-minded when you meet new people and consider giving someone a chance even if he or she is not your normal type.

We all look differently, think differently, feel differently, and are raised differently. So the perfect match for you might just be a fun surprise.

9. Believe People

People will show you exactly who they are over time, believe them. Finding love is pointless if you fall for the person you want someone to be instead of who he or she actually is.

10. Communicate Effectively

Playing games in a relationship is a complete waste of time for everyone involved. You’re an adult so you need to communicate effectively with your partner and expect him or her to do the same in return.

Waiting so many days to text someone back, pretending you’re committed when you’re still talking to other people, or only making time for your partner when you have nothing better to do are not examples of a mature, loving relationship.

In order to give and to receive love, there needs to be honest communication from both parties.

Finding Love After Heartbreak

Finding love after heartbreak can feel nearly impossible sometimes. But from personal experience, I know that’s it’s not only possible, it can be even better than expected.

After my divorce, I was convinced that I didn’t need or want to love again and that I would be perfectly happy on my own. And I was. That’s the best part.

When you don’t need love or need someone else to make you happy, you choose to be with that person because you want to and because your life is better with him or her in it.

And coming from a place where I never wanted to be vulnerable or to rely on another person again, I have to tell you, I’m so thankful he changed my mind.

Finding love after the heartbreak of a divorce or a breakup can be scary at first, but it can also be a beautiful gift.

But what happens when the heartbreak is even deeper?

A while ago, I shared a beautifully-written guest post by a friend who had tragically lost her husband to cancer at a very young age.

For years, she’s struggled to move forward, to continue to celebrate her deep love for her husband, and to help her children deal with their own grief while she worked so hard to deal with her own.

So when she recently announced that she met someone special, she was overwhelmed by the positive response they both received.

Finding love after heartbreak, even when it’s after a tragedy like losing a partner, is not only possible, it’s such a beautiful surprise.

So keep your heart open and realize that you deserve love whenever you’re ready for it.

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What has your experience with love been like? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.