Finding True love 2

Everyone is looking for love, we are all in a way searching for people who can love us for who we are, love us even when we fail and love us during times when we feel so unlovable.

Often times we turn to the people around us usually our friends, parents, boyfriend, spouse to fill that void, and make us feel loved and accepted. Some of us, are truly longing to experience true-love because we have probably being hurt so many times, in a relationship and we almost find ourselves giving-up on hopes of ever finding true love.

Even Christians have this longing, to find that special person; God is going to bring into our life. Just because one is a Christian doesn’t mean, that they never have the need to find love, and spend the rest of their life with “the one” God created us with the desire to be in a relationship.

He put in us the drive to be attracted to the opposite sex.

The fact that you find yourself drawn to a particular person of the opposite sex is perfectly normal. True love begins with God; his love for us is the only perfect love that exists in the world. Without God pouring his love in our hearts, we will feel beating down, helpless, feel inadequate, and find ourselves struggling throughout life. Having a personal relationship with Jesus, is where we truly develop our identity.

Our knowledge of God brings an awareness of who we are in Christ, our self-worth, and it helps us understand our value as a person.

Only God can help a person love unconditionally. Without God’s love we are broken people, wandering through life without any hope, and looking to people or things to make our lives feel more meaningful. When we understand how much we are loved and accepted by God, we don’t rush into any relationship, or struggle in our relationship as result of lack of trust, or even live in constant fear of losing the one we love.

God’s love frees us from trying to define ourselves through another person’s eyes, his love allows us to show grace with our partner’s weaknesses and flaws, and finally his love allows us to learn how to sacrificially step away from our own selfish needs and really learn how to meet the needs of the other person. True love is the love that says I’ll love you no matter what, I’m committed to you, or I’ll accept you in the good times as well as the tough times.

True love is the kind of love that says something like this “it doesn’t matter what you do, or don’t do”, whether we agree on everything on not, “I love you, even when you hurt me, disappoint me, give me reasons to stop loving you”. It’s the love that says I love you in spite of your flaws & and weaknesses, “I want to be here for you, regardless of what’s going on in your life”, “I am going to stick with you like glue through thick and thin”. The signs I talked about in the first article are not easy to develop in our own strength, it takes great effort, and God to love your partner selflessly.

The first time you realize that you are experiencing true-love is when you become selfless. When you stop thinking solely about yourself and you become concerned about the well-being of the other person that is when you know you love someone for the right reasons. When you wake-up each day concerned about the other person, and what you can do to make their life better.

When you’re willing to sacrifice short-term goals, in order to enjoy the benefits later on in the future, when you love he/she regardless of their short-comings, that how you know, that you truly are in love with the person you are with. The way you know that you have found true-love, is when you love the other person not because of how they make you feel, or what you can get from them but rather for who they are. True love reveals itself more by actions and less by words. True love always has a friendship component to it, and this friendship is built on trust, honesty, vulnerability, and shared activities and interest.

The friendship part is a very important factor, in a relationship without it a relationship will crumble. Friendship is welcoming the other person into your world, as well as entering the other person’s world. Friendship in a relationship is talking about a wide range of issues from sharing about your day, to talking about what’s most important to you, talking about your up-bringing, and what your interest are. Try not to make your conversations solely about feelings and emotions. Friendship is what holds a relationship together; it can help anyone build a foundation for their relationship.

It is really important for us to build our relationship on a foundation that is going to stand the test of time. We need a solid foundation for our relationship, in order for it not to suffer under pressure. Friendship in a lover is very similar to friendship in any other relationship, except that in this case you’re eventually going to spend the rest of your lives together.

Friendship in a relationship can be but not limited to any of the following you hang out together, and engage in activities that you both enjoy, you both share problems, or concerns that you may have, you try new things together, talk very often and basically keep in touch, and support each other no matter what If you are thinking of getting married to this person someday, why not make it fun.

Share in your partners passion, if there is something that he/she enjoy read about it and share your findings with them, if possible join he/she one day in that passion. Talk about your dreams when you are together, share your plans for the future, and find ways for both of you to connect at the end of each day.

When you get together or talk at the end of the day, talk about your faith, your greatest fears, and the little things that you love about each other. Learn to be spontaneous, surprise the other person from time to time, like change your wardrobe, try on a new perfume, cook a something different and special, learn about your partner’s love language, or what makes them feel loved, and even pray together. One of the things that I love about my relationship is that early on we both created an atmosphere of transparency, where we both felt comfortable to be open and honest, and not hold back on anything.

Our communication was so easy, and it just came natural to talk about almost everything without judgment. Another thing that is really helping my relationship is the fact I am always trying new things, I am constantly learning about new things that would help make my relationship stronger with this person.

One way to keep your relationship alive and fresh is to always let the other person know how special they are to you, how much you love them, and how much you care about them. Always find ways to make the other person feel special, loved, and wanted. Ladies learn to encourage your man, let them know how proud you are to have them in your life, brag about them in front of your friends, compliment them each time they look great. If you don’t compliment and encourage the person you’re with someone else will.

For your anniversary write a special note telling he/she how much you love them, how special they are to you, how blessed you feel to have them in your life, the sweetest thing they have done for you, and maybe your favorite memory of them. People don’t have to celebrate their anniversary every year; they can celebrate it every month. Every day can be another opportunity to make the other person feel important, let he/she know every day why you love them and why you are so crazy about them. People respond to praise not to criticism, they never get tired of hearing how much you love and cherish them.

We all pray to find good men/women, somebody who is real or genuine, somebody that we can be ourselves with, somebody who loves, and respects us, and someone who encourages us to be our very best. While many of us desire a relationship like this, not many people are willing to be that for someone else; we just want to meet such persons and experience true love but not give true love.

Here are some ways we can maintain our relationship, and keep our love alive so that it stands the test of time.

1. Vulnerability: Go into a relationship with an open mind, and once you start getting close and building trust with this person, do not hold back. There is never a right time to say anything, trust your instincts and say things when you feel it.

2. Dates: never stop dating the person you are in love with, it doesn’t matter if you have become engaged or are married. Dates doesn’t end with marriage, do fun activities together, like go watch a game together, watch a movie together, take a walk in the park, do exercise together, maybe take a dance class together, (if you’re interested in that), take a vacation with this person, make a special dish and surprise the other person, give gifts for no occasion at all, engage in fun activities that you both enjoy.

3. Practice Forgiveness: As you get closer in a relationship, you get to see all sides of the other person, you get to see their flaws and their short-comings, what you do when you begin to notice each other’s imperfections, is to show grace in their weaknesses. Give the other person room not to be perfect.

Be quick to forgive every time the other person hurts you, and when you do completely let go. Relationships suffer when one person holds grudges that the other person doesn’t know about. Create an environment in your relationship, where you can freely talk about any and everything, that way issues are brought to the surface and dealt with.

4. Connect: Always let the other person know how much you love and cherish them. Make it a habit to let them know in words and by actions that you truly love them, and are crazy about them. If you cannot call him/her at the moment, text him/her, email, or write letters, do whatever you have to do. It is always good to connect during the day or at the end of each day, it helps keep things fresh.

5. God: This actually should be number one, let God be the center of your relationship from day one. A relationship without God is like running a sinking ship. It’s easy to love in the good times, when everything is going great, your connection is amazing, and your relationship is going smoothly.

It takes something bigger than us to stay in a relationship, where it feels like you have lost a lot of trust. God is our healer; he can also be our friend, and our strength, when we are going through a test in our relationship.

It takes more than just effort, and hard work to keep a relationship solid, it takes God. Which is why praying together, sharing the bible together, and also talking about things, God is teaching you and sharing this with your partner, will actually help your relationship grow and thrive.

6. Best Friend: Do you consider this person your best-friend? Is there somebody in your life, that you share more details with than you share with your partner? Your partner should be the person you share the most with, things like your pasts, your greatest fears insecurities, what your hopes and dreams are etc.

I would strongly encourage people to keep their male buddies, or female friends because those people keep you grounded and will be there to support you.

Many times when people get into a relationship, they dump their friends, because they feel like having a guy friend, or a girl friend is the greatest friendship anyone could have and nothing else comes close to it. It is important to keep and maintain our friendships with other people because it’s beautiful to grow together, but also as individuals.

The lists of things to do to maintain a relationship is endless, but I talked about the most important ones. I hope somebody reading this article is encouraged to 1). Not give-up on love, and to be open-minded and hopefully that someday they will find the right person, 2). For people who already have found true- love, to spice up that relationship and keep it alive. Love is a beautiful thing; cherish it when you have it.

For two people to really love each other, and commit to taking the next step with each other, it has to be an active will. It is an active decision that one makes every day, even when things are hard and life gets tough. A decision made from the heart.