Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not.” You can find the perfect guy, and he may be everything your parents hoped for in someone. Unless you’ve found yourself, it doesn’t even matter if he’s your hopes and dreams. It doesn’t matter if he wants two kids, a dog, and a picket fence because if you don’t love yourself, you won’t ever be able to love him the way he deserves.

I have had my fair share of relationships, but I wasn’t happy. It wasn’t them, it was me. I wasn’t happy with myself. He constantly had to reassure my second guessing until it became a job for him, and he walked away. I took a step back, and I saw where I had gone wrong. I wasn’t happy with him because I wasn’t happy with myself. Since then, I have begun to work on myself, and I haven’t looked back.

People struggle with grasping this because they lack the confidence. They constantly second guess the relationship or how he could be with anyone like you. Lacking the confidence will mess you up before you even get serious with someone. They will constantly see the way you doubt yourself, or how you’re not comfortable in your own skin. They may get tired of constantly reassuring you that you’re enough. They will look deep down and see you don’t know what you want in life, but sometimes, we’re so ready to be in a relationship we don’t think about why we’re so unhappy. We don’t take a step back to work on loving ourselves.

Take a step back and reevaluate your life. We don’t change our hearts before we give it to someone else, and they suffer in the end. To be happy with someone else, you need to be happy with yourself first. It could be your weight, the way you treat others, etc., but until you figure out what it is, you won’t ever be happy. Sometimes, we don’t see the beauty in ourselves that someone else sees. They may constantly try to convince you until it feels like a job. There isn’t anything wrong with you, you just need to soul search until you find yourself. You need to figure out what you want in life, work on the things you’re unhappy with, and find your true beauty.

There may be a great guy who comes along, and he won’t think reassuring you is a job. He will be persistent in telling you that you are enough, and he won’t break you like someone in the past might have. He will build you up until you stop being stubborn enough to see it for yourself. He will help you discover who you can be and who you want to be. He will be patient enough to wait for you to find yourself because he understands it will be for your happiness.