Anyone who has a “wish list” for a potential partner is asking for trouble. I’ve said before that I think the biggest problem with “finding love” in today’s society is that we try to shop for mates like we shop for a new dress or a juicy grapefruit. Looking for love, in my book, is a big mistake and one that rarely leads to anything positive or lasting. Relationships, as I’ve said before, are best formed organically, and you can’t interview for a soul mate. I’m all for keeping an open mind, for getting to know people even if they don’t look like your perfect life partner at a glance. I think people come into our lives for many reasons, and might be worth getting to know even if we’re never going to date them. I also think people can surprise us, and that the guy you were sure you’d never “think of that way” just might turn out to be the love of your life.
But there’s a big difference, a critical difference, between keeping an open mind and ignoring reality.
If you choose not to go out with a guy because he’s a hard core football fan and you’re not into sports, you just might be a little too picky–and you might be cheating yourself out of what could have been a good relationship. You might even be cheating yourself out of a new interest that you never anticipated. But if you choose not to go out with a guy because he’s an alcoholic, or because he has a history of abusing the women in his life, you’re not being picky. You’re not focusing on a “wish list”. You’re just being rational.
Somehow, it’s become blurry. People talk about “red flags” when they mean inconveniences, things that would take some getting used to. It’s a “red flag” if a guy has a second drink at dinner or if the toilet seat is up in his apartment or if he wants to make plans a week in advance when you’re more of a spontaneous person. Those aren’t red flags. They’re just differences–differences that you may or may not be able to tolerate, work around, even ultimately embrace. People who see red flags everywhere miss out on a lot. But the flipside is worse. The flipside ignores genuine, vibrant, rapidly fluttering red flags under the guise of keeping an open mind or throwing out the wish list.
A while back, Mike wrote about crossing off rules one by one in an attempt to force a relationship to work (or to avoid admitting that it wasn’t going to). Then, he presented it as a bad thing, as part of his ongoing downfall in relationships. Now, he’s telling us that throwing out the wish list is the way to go. And he’s right on both counts. The key is knowing what’s a wish and what’s a rule. Long blonde hair, for example, is a wish. Sanity is a rule.
