In my last blog post called How To Find The Perfect Girl, I pointed out that there is no such person, so you’ll never find her.

If you try to, you’ll just come up frustrated.

I also pointed out the same thing goes for you girls in your search for the perfect guy, to meet your list of criteria.

While the usual counsel is to compromise what you want, I suggested instead you consider Romantic Friendships.

Enjoy different people who bring different things to the table.

Then nobody has to be “everything.”

What I want to do in this post though, is correct a misconception I may have created.

In offering Romantic Friendships as an alternative to “relationship compromise,” you might have gotten the impression I was saying something like this:

“You’ll never find everything you want in one partner, so find everything you want across multiple partners.”

I can understand how you might have taken my meaning that way, since that blog post does play on the “search for love” you are absorbed in.

But there is a subtlety in what I said, you may not have recognized.

Although I definitely was pointing out you will never “find it all” in one partner, the key to the “solution” I was offering was in this statement here:

“The real problem is the way you’re looking AT romantic love.”

Notice I did not say this:

“The real problem is the way you’re looking FOR romantic love.”

In actual fact, the problem is that you are looking at romantic love as something you need to FIND. This makes love something you’re trying to GET.

Which shifts the whole discussion away from valuing your partner for who he or she is, to requiring your partner to be certain things you want them to be.

If you’ve hung around here much, you should recognize that word REQUIRE.

I’ve pointed it out when speaking of how your insecurities influence your choice of relationship style.

Whenever you start requiring things in a relationship, you’ve shifted away from real romantic love.

Love doesn’t require anything.

Love values.

Love shares.

Love gives.

No, romantic love cannot thrive unless it is reciprocated. But love never requires reciprocation either.

In love you never require anything of your partner.

You simply love your partner and offer yourself to them.

If they offer themselves back, you are both in love with each other.

If they don’t love you back, you let them go.

Love never demands, it only offers.

So you always love “with an open hand.”

If you don’t, you’re not loving at all.

In many ways love is much like happiness. You cannot find happiness either. You cannot get it.

Happiness is not something you can experience by pursuing it directly, despite the belief of some that the “pursuit of happiness” is an inalienable right.

Instead, happiness is a consequence of a life well lived.

When you find a way to live that is aligned with who you are and what you care about the most in life, you will experience happiness.

Because the experience of happiness is an indirect consequence of living by real value.

If you seek happiness directly, it will elude you.

Romantic love is the same way. It is a consequence of valuing your partner for who he or she is, and them valuing you back.

You cannot experience someone valuing you back, by trying to get them to value you.

This can only be experienced indirectly.

What I was really trying to get you to see in that previous blog post, is that what you should be focused on is valuing people for who they are.

Not trying to find people who fit your list of what they should be like if they want to be loved by you.

You’ve got things all backwards. You are trying to get people to value you first and meet your criteria of someone worthy of your love.

This is a central reason I prefer Romantic Friendships over monogamy.

Monogamy is all about requirements.

The first requirement is monogamy itself.

Your partner is required to be only with you.

Because with monogamy you can only be with one person as well, the fixation on what that person is like becomes paramount.

If this is the only person you can experience love with, they better be a good catch.

Because this is your one shot to get it right.

Do you see the problem here?

It is all about findingthe perfect match.

Requiring someone to be worthy of your love.

With monogamy it is all about you, not them.

Romantic Friendships aren’t about requiring anything from anyone. They are about enjoying and valuing each person for who he or she is.

They are about expressing the desire to share yourself with them because of this.

And because you are free to love anyone you find love with, you don’t need to require anything more of any person than to just be who they are.

And you will value different things in different partners.

You are never focused on what they lack, only what you value in them.

Because each person is special and unique in their own way.

This is why I say your search for love will always be doomed to failure.

Until you get your eyes off yourself and your requirements and begin to value each person you meet for who he or she actually is, love will always elude you.

But if you open yourself to simply valuing the people you meet and offering yourself to them, you will find them reciprocating your love because they’ll come to value you too.

If you don’t receive reciprocation?

No problem.

There are plenty of fish in the sea.

The only difference now is that instead of trying to catch one of those fish, you can let them come to you.

Because you’re no longer offering them just bait.

You’re truly offering yourself to them instead.

You’ve probably heard the saying, “If you want love you’ve got to give love?” This is what it means.

When you value someone for who they truly are?

It makes them value you too!

So are you ready to give up your doomed search for love? Ready to start giving love instead?