12 Reasons Why Self-Aware People Actually Have A Harder Time Finding Love

The conventional wisdom is that if you don’t have romantic love, it’s because you don’t love yourself enough yet. This is not untrue. It is almost impossible to have a successful, healthy relationship with anyone when you’re unhappy with yourself.

However, people who absolutely do not love themselves sometimes find their perfect partner, and people who love themselves tremendously sometimes remain single for years.

“Loving yourself” is not the fast ticket to a soulmate that many people think it is. But what’s even more surprising is that people who are self-aware and try to work on themselves often have a harder time finding a significant other than most people would assume. Here, a few of the main reasons why.

1. They forget about timing, and assume that “finding love” is entirely within their control.

In recognizing the amount of power they have in their lives (which is a lot) they falsely assume that they can control when someone enters their lives. They cannot control that – they can only control the quality of the relationship once they do. The time that life leaves them single is time best spent working on themselves; it is not a purgatory that becoming “good” will earn you reward for.

2. They start attracting teachers, not soulmates.

People who are on a journey to awaken themselves start to subconsciously choose partners who exist to expose the dark parts of themselves that need to be healed. This is why it’s confusing that a lot of smart, put together people start picking partners who are objectively wrong for them. It’s not that they want to teach them – but rather, they are calling into their experience someone to help them wake up, not settle down.

3. Their standards skyrocket.

Considering the fact that we gauge the viability of a potential partner based on how we see ourselves, someone who is aware of their inherent worth is not going to settle for just anyone. However, sometimes this leads to them forgetting that people are people and even your soulmate is going to have flaws and issues you’ll have to deal with.

4. They become complacent, and assume that “it will just come.”

Of course there’s a degree of truth to the idea that love will come when it’s meant to. But you’re not going to cross paths with it if you’re hiding away in your apartment and not putting yourself out there whatsoever because you think the love of your life will just come knocking at your door one day. Trusting in the Universe does not mean that you can relinquish any effort on your own behalf.

5. The potential avenues to find love reduce significantly.

People who are self-aware often feel an aversion to meeting someone on an online dating site, or in a bar. There is absolutely nothing wrong with either of these, it’s just that they often express a feeling of disdain for them. (This is usually because people on Tinder and at the bar aren’t looking for the kind of love and companionship that they are – but there are of course exceptions to this.)

6. They’re faster to call it quits.

While in a lot of cases, this is very healthy and important, in others, it results in not actually giving someone a chance. If they identify a trait or behavior and assume will not work, they are more prone to just cutting people off so that they don’t have to deal with all of the potential pain that could come with them. In the end, they sometimes close the avenue of possibility because they think they know better.

7. … And faster to get their hopes up.

Self-aware people get their hopes crushed because, on the other hand, they are also able to identify a potential connection, sometimes with the kind of person who isn’t willing or ready to reciprocate it in return.

8. They think they know the exact kind of person they need. They become too set on who they think their soulmate will be.

Someone who is aware of themselves knows what they would need in a partner to complement them; or at the very least they’ve had enough experience to know what won’t work. Most of the time. The truth is that no matter how awakened you think you are, love never comes how we think it will nor does it usually look the way we think it might.

9. They become martyrs for a love that was never going to work.

Self-aware people know that they have the power to heal their relationships, and try to apply that on end to those that they think have the potential of working out. The problem that arises is that they spend years of their lives devoting their energy to someone who is not willing to match their efforts.

“You were just a blank canvas that I painted my love upon until it was beautiful.”

10. They assume they have to wait until they’re perfect.

Self-aware people commonly fall into the belief that when they are “good enough,” love will find them, and that every withstanding issue they have with themselves is what’s holding them back. They are prone to becoming extremely hyper-critical of themselves, and not letting themselves feel good or enjoy life until they think they’re “fixed.” 

11. They are too attached to finding love.

People set out to heal themselves to find other people’s love just as often as they set out to do it because they want to find their own. The reality is that knowing how capable you are of love makes you crave it even more, but sometimes, wanting it too much is exactly what holds you back. When your focus is “I want a partner,” you are consistently putting yourself in the energy of not having one.

12. They assume that a soulmate relationship is something you find, rather than something you build with an (equally willing) partner.

A lot of people who work on themselves are taught that if they do, they will find their soulmate, as though it is the reward that they immediately find in exchange for being a better person. The reality is that even when you do find your perfect match, a lot of hard work and time and effort and tears will have to go into making your relationship thrive. This is unavoidable. You can’t skirt around the edges of pain by trying to find the absolute perfect person. Rather, you have to work on becoming the kind of person who is fearless in the face of building something beautiful, not just sitting on the sidelines until it comes to them.