I was recently asked, “Is it true that we accept the love we think we deserve?”, a question inspired by a famous quote from The Perks of Being a Wallflower. While the simple answer is yes, I knew that this question required more time and explanation. After all, while it’s true that we do often accept the love that we think we deserve, what does this really mean?
The original saying that “we accept the love we think we deserve” was referring to people choosing toxic partners and relationships, thinking that they can’t – or shouldn’t – have better. I wanted to break this down and look deeper at why this happens, as well as discuss a scenario where expectations of others that are too high can also be damaging.
You can only receive what you understand.
Some of us may settle for less than we deserve simply because we haven’t been exposed to better. Imagine if you grew up seeing that you received more attention and affection from your parents when you accomplished something that made them proud. You may, then, start to believe that love has to be earned through hard work. Going into romantic relationships, you may take on a similar role and similar behaviors in order to win over dates and partners. Even when someone is distant or emotionally avoidant, you may think that this is normal, and you just need to work harder to earn intimacy and love from them.
The love that is familiar to you will seem most like “love” for you. It can be hard to understand love to be anything other than what you’ve been exposed to, even if what you were exposed to wasn’t particularly healthy. If you’re used to having to earn love, for example, a partner who is quickly attracted to you and caring towards you as a result may feel wrong. You may feel suspicious as to how they could possibly already care for you when you haven’t done anything yet to impress them. You didn’t have to work for their love, and their openness and easiness may make them seem less valuable to you. Not only that, but their way of loving may feel so foreign to you that you label it as anything other than love: desperation, manipulation, neediness…
Truth is, they may actually be able to give you the healthy, meaningful love you actually deserve – if only you can start to recognize it.
When you don’t value yourself, you don’t value those who do.
Similar to the last point, you may think poorly of others who think positively of you. Sound confusing? Think of it like this: if you don’t see yourself as being valuable and worthy of love, you may assume that the whole world sees you this way too. Anyone who can look at you and think you’re great must be, well, stupid, or have bad taste. If you look around at others and believe that they are inherently better than you, and you are not deserving of a relationship with them, anyone who is attracted to you will immediately seem like a low-quality option.
Instead of accepting love from those who are most willing to give it, then, you may chase people who feel like a challenge. It may feel more comfortable to be with people who you have to try to convince that you’re sort of a little valuable, similar to the point above.
You may even choose partners who are toxic and belittle you or put you down as a way to punish yourself. If you’re used to carrying around shame and negative thoughts about yourself, you may not believe that you’re deserving of love. It may feel like your flaws can’t possibly coexist with love. Which brings me to my next point…
You think you need to change to be lovable.
If you look at yourself in the mirror and quickly start criticizing yourself, it can be hard to believe that you’re deserving of love. There’s a lot of advice on social media and in women’s circles about loving yourself before anyone else can love you. While it’s true that having love and respect for yourself makes it much easier to show up authentically in a healthy relationship, self-love as a concept can also feel unrelatable.
If you’re struggling with loving yourself, start with self-acceptance: accept yourself. You aren’t perfect, you have flaws, and you have things you’re working on, but the person who you are right now is worthy of love. You don’t need to change to be lovable.
Once we can accept ourselves and accept that we are worthy of love as we are, it’s easier to make room for someone else to accept and love us. You don’t need to sell someone on your potential, and you don’t need to settle for someone who is only going to keep you down.
Your expectations are perfectionistic – and unrealistic.
So far, I’ve discussed how our thoughts about ourselves, and about love in general, can lead to settling for a relationship that isn’t healthy. Sometimes, though, believing that we deserve only the best, perfect relationship and partner can hold us back, too.
Just as you can accept who you are now without being perfect, we must accept others’ imperfections too. The reason I suggest that people get more familiar with their deal-breakers than their list of “musts” in a partner or relationship is because no one will ever be perfect – and that’s perfectly fine.
In fact, what you may think you “need” in a partner may sometimes be the things that will only keep you stuck. I’m not saying don’t have boundaries – not at all. Let me explain, using my own marriage.
My partner is very different from me: I’m introverted, he’s extroverted; I’m a bit anxious, he’s a laidback surfer-type; I need a lot of affection and quality time; he’s comfortable with space and independence. To be honest, he is not the kind of guy that I had envisioned for myself. I wanted a brooding, pensive, serious guy who played in a band or something. I wanted someone who would sit and feel anxious with me, or want to run away from the world with me when I was feeling most introverted and socially burned out. What I wanted was someone to keep me in my comfort zone.
In reality, my partner helps me grow and get unstuck. He wouldn’t have been my idea of a “perfect” partner, nor would he have met all the expectations I had. But my judgements about perfection and the expectations I had created wouldn’t have served me anyway.
Not only this, but it’s important to accept that there will be disagreements and conflict in your relationship. People make mistakes, and there will be fights, but that’s okay. So while you deserve a loving relationship, realize that a loving relationship may also not be exactly what you thought, and it certainly won’t be perfect.
How To Get the Love You Deserve
Our beliefs about ourselves and love strongly influence what happens in our dating lives and relationships. You deserve a happy, healthy, empowering love life, and I want to help you get it.
If any of this resonates with you, let’s talk about it in a free call. If that doesn’t sound like your style, you can sign up now for email coaching and start taking action right away to move you closer to the love life – and life – that you deserve.