Have you ever spent hours putting a puzzle together only to find out that pieces are missing?
If walked down the aisle of the local toy store and saw puzzles labeled 90-99% complete on sale, would you buy them?
I would bet you have done a puzzle with missing pieces and I would also wager you would not buy puzzles that are incomplete.
If that is the case, then why do we treat love and relationship the same way. We know in our minds that certain things are missing, but we ignore that voice and hide from it. Don’t you think you should search for those answers and look for those missing pieces? You would if you had invested time in a puzzle and pieces ended up missing. Sofa cushions would be over turned and floors searched, but when we see a flaw in our partner or the one we are dating we look right past it.
When love is new and exciting the subconscious focuses on the good and the feels we are getting in return. The mind is also camouflages or hides those little red flags that warn us that something does not fit. Those flags could be as small as he or she does not love your favorite band, to as large as they don’t like children. Yes, there are times when you do not or cannot ignore those signs, but that is not always the case.
Why do we pass right over the things that might change our mind about the current relationship path we are on? If I knew exactly why I would be in a different line of work, but from my experience it’s that we are hopeful we can ignore those things that don’t fit. We are overly excited about the positives, and that makes the negatives seem small.
Let’s revisit the puzzle analogy. Even on a 1,000-piece puzzle with small pieces when there is even one piece missing your eyes cannot ignore it. Remove 3-10 more pieces and see how incomplete the picture is. Can you ignore those blank spots and enjoy the picture you assembled or are you doing to throw it away and get a new puzzle?
I have had many incomplete puzzles in my life. It was easy for me to ignore the missing things that I wanted in a relationship, but over time those omitted things I needed became larger and larger. That also meant that the things I like in our relationship seem to get smaller and less significant. I would try to overlook them, but I was lying to myself.
Like I mentioned before all my relationships have had varying degrees of missing pieces, and they all ended in because we were not a fit. The connection was not there, we had different interests, I left the toilet seat up, or she didn’t put the lid back on the toothpaste. It was just not right. My timeline for each relationship was also varied. The missing pieces were a factor and so were the number of good things that helps mask the missing components I needed in a relationship.
Look back I wish I had put as much focus on the things that I ignored than the things I liked. Would it have changed anything, yes? I would have not committed to something that was already doomed. I would have asked more questions or looked for more answers, I would have looked under those sofa cushions for what was missing.
So in the search for love and partnership don’t spend all the energy putting that puzzle together only to find out that the picture will be incomplete. We all know where that will end. Listen to that voice inside you and don’t ignore it.