There’s someone for everyone.

We all have that one true soul mate.

I keep rummaging through all the wrong guys, but I know Mr. Right is out there.

Mr. Right.

The person who is supposed to change it all. They’re kind, passionate, caring, hot as hell, driven, and well, to sum it up, the whole package.

We’re led to believe that one day, we’ll meet someone in a chance encounter and just know they’re the one.

Honestly, who can blame us?

I grew up in the Disney princess era. My entire generation was being fed the idea that we’ll all find our soul mate and live happily ever after before we could even speak. Granted, Disney still created movies like Mulan where it was quite the opposite, but the majority of the industry was around this idea of one true pairing.

When you’re a kid, you tend to believe what’s the most prominent. So, even if I didn’t know it at the time, Disney had me hooked.

Even in a broader sense, romantic movies have been around for decades. There’s a disheveled young woman looking to be saved, and then, when she least expects it, Mr. Right appears.

It’s bullshit.

The thing about relationships is that none of them is a mistake. There is no right or wrong guy. This is all an idea that we’ve been taught over time.

Truth be told, we’re going to date people that aren’t right for us. That’s a fact. Hardly anyone meets the person they truly want to spend their life with on the first date. However, regardless how the relationship ends, these people still matter.

Every single relationship we’re in is an assignment. We have something to gain from the people we meet. We don’t enter relationships to complete ourselves, but rather, to add to the person we already are.

I know some of you are probably yelling at me right now.

“Kim, he cheated on me. How are you going to tell me this person matters?”

“I’m completely okay with myself, but I keep attracting the wrong people. I want to forget these guys, so I’m ready to meet the right person.”

If someone cheated on you, of course, that blows. That hits your ego hard. You think of where you went wrong or what you would’ve done differently. Or, on the opposite end of the spectrum, you’re pissed. You know you deserve better and you want nothing but to remove this person from your life.

However, approaching this situation with anger is ineffective.

The anger you project on others is only reflecting back to you. Instead, you need to look deeper here. Understand that his actions were not in your control, forgive him for hurting you and let go. Don’t carry this weight of animosity on your shoulders.

This person taught you what you don’t want out of a relationship. They showed you how you don’t want to be treated. If you had never met this person, you wouldn’t know what you know now. Accept the relationship for what it was – a stepping stone.

People are in your lives for the exact amount of time that they’re supposed to be. If you keep falling back into old habits with someone, it is because the assignment wasn’t over.

You didn’t gain what you needed to learn yet so the universe will continue to give you the same assignment until you pick up on the lesson.

Moving on, let’s say you’re attracting the wrong type of people.

You have this image of your Mr. Right, but all these dudes keep appearing in your life. You want to stop wasting time, skip all the bad ones, and finally get to your dream man.

Well, you’re not going to like this answer.

The reason we tend to attract the wrong type of guy is because we aren’t ready for an actual intimate relationship. It all starts within. To our ego, we love the thrill of the chase. We love going after someone who isn’t that interested in us. It’s exciting. It seems emotionally dangerous to our ego to get involved with this mysterious, seemingly perfect person.

Well, let’s say we finally catch them. We go out on a date or two, and then: they’re totally interested.

They’re suddenly super into to us. They tell us all the ways we’re awesome and right on cue, we freak out.

You see, this wasn’t our ego’s plan.

If we enter a relationship looking to fill a void in ourselves but we aren’t fully ready to be loved, we won’t end up with the “right” person.

We know within ourselves if we’re ready to be loved or not, so if we’re not, our ego will stick to that. It will seek out people who won’t commit. It will gravitate us towards people who will keep us stuck and not allow us to grow. It’s comfortable. It’s safe. It’s easy.

So, if we approach a relationship with one of these comfortable people and suddenly, they turn out to be a lot more serious than we planned, we become scared.

Our ego tries to tell us that the emotional danger is in the closed-off ones who pay us no mind, when in reality, getting intimate with someone is as terrifying as it gets.

Only when we’re truly ready for an intimate relationship will we attract the right people. The fact of the matter is, you’ve most likely already met plenty of Mr. Rights. You just weren’t in the ideal place for that relationship. You were still growing from your past assignments.

Once you realize this, you’re free.

You need to become okay with who you are before you’re ready for that intimate relationship. In Marianne Williamson’s A Return To Love, she touches on this in terms of schooling. She says how most of us dive into romantic relationships when that’s really the Ph.D. level of love – most of us are only in elementary school.

My biggest advice to you is to tap into who you are. Become comfortable in being alone. Being alone does not equate to loneliness. I spend a majority of my time alone and I’m far from lonely.

Recognize in your own life if any of this applies.

Have you been attracting the wrong type of people? Are you holding resentment towards people who have hurt you? Are you bringing this resentment to new relationships?

I suggest getting a journal or notebook and letting out anything that comes up in your mind. It can become so clouded up there, so taking a few moments to release it can be life-changing.

Have comfort in knowing that most of us are in this together. Relationships can be hard.

However, you still need to show up for your life. Invest yourself in this work. Uncover what has kept you blocked.

Only when you full-on plummet into your own self-care can change occur. Make the choice to approach your life differently. Don’t stay stuck in your old habits with an old boyfriend who you know isn’t serving you anymore.

Know that there’s so much greatness waiting to occur in your life, you just need to show up for it. Change is only as hard as you make it out to be.