A FEW THINGS I'VE LEARNT ABOUT LOVE

Do any of you remember that ‘A Few Things I’ve Learnt About Dating’ blog post from a couple of months back? It’s been one of my most-read posts this year, and at the time, I really needed to get all my thoughts down in a way that made sense to me. It’s weird to read it back now; it seems worlds away from how I feel sitting here today. I like to think I took my own advice, but everything changed for me within a matter of days of writing it. I genuinely cannot believe I’m getting settled down to put the next few thoughts into words, but I feel like I have learnt even more lessons, and I can’t wait to tell you all about it. Allow me to introduce you all to Kyle, and note down a few things I’ve learnt about love…

It’ll come from where you least expect it

I’m a hopeless romantic, don’t get me wrong, but I never really expected to find a truly meaningful connection with someone over a dating app. I really looked down my nose at them until about 6 months ago because I was in my last relationship before they were even invented. After the fuckery that was my last dating experience, I genuinely wrote it off. I wanted to go travelling and do my own thing, maybe date around a bit and think about things seriously much later down the line. But I didn’t really get the opportunity to do that with Kyle. Literally from the moment we started talking, I was so surprised at how invested I became, and how sure I was about it. I didn’t even want to let him know how much I felt that ‘click’ so early on because I didn’t want to come across as too intense. I was completely and utterly unprepared for how good it felt.

It will surprise you

This quote has been floating around the inter webs for  y e a r s  and I’ve never really paid much attention to it. I’ve read it a couple of times but it never made sense to me until now, so rather than butchering it; 

“And the third is the love we never see coming. The one that usually looks all wrong for us and that destroys any lingering ideals we clung to about what love is supposed to be. This is the love that comes so easy it doesn’t seem possible. It’s the kind where the connection can’t be explained and knocks us off our feet because we never planned for it.

This is the love where we come together with someone and it just fits—there aren’t any ideal expectations about how each person should be acting, nor is there pressure to become someone other than we are.

We are just simply accepted for who we are already—and it shakes to our core.”

It sounds so ridiculously cheesy but when I read it before, I just though ‘oh that’s cute’, but I totally relate to it now. Shaken to the core? Darling, consider me well and truly shooketh.

It might not be convenient, but it won’t matter

So I managed to like the profile of my new boyfriend without realising he lives over 100 miles away. How did I do that? Because I’m an idiot. And after spending the first few messages berating him for not lowering his mile radius [without acknowledging mine were also massively high] I’d already recognised the incredible connection we were to have. It’s not as easy as it would be if we lived within the same area, but it seriously doesn’t matter, and no obstacle could get in the way. The people who care about you will never let anything become too much of a task; you will be made to feel like a priority, and it is one of the best feelings in the world.

It will happen at its own pace

As the great prophet Phil Collins once said: “My mama said, "you can't hurry love, No, you'll just have to wait” She said, "love don't come easy, But it's a game of give and take”. HOWEVER, for me, it’s happened very quickly. Like ridiculously quickly. But it’s not the kind of thing I could’ve slowed down if I tried to. After our first few dates, I was already convinced that he was incredibly special and I no longer could imagine my life without him in it. 

It will transform the way you view your future 

If you asked me what my future plans were a while back, I’d have given you a fumbled answer about travelling and “seeing where I end up”. If you ask me now, it’s holidays, houses, dogs, weddings, kids. And honestly, if anyone’s aware that this sounds crazy fast, it’s me. I hate to be that cliché, loved up, smug girl, but I genuinely believe that when you know, you know. It’ll make you want things you never thought you did, simply because it’s the right person. On a super personal note, I went to ask to be sterilised at the doctor’s a few years ago because I never saw children in my future. They said no, and I cannot tell you how glad I am that they did. I’ve totally changed my mind on that one because I can imagine it for myself, and I can imagine it for my future because I am in love with the right person. 

It’ll change everything you thought you already knew about love

This is the one I never saw coming, and the love that showed me why it has never worked out before. It’s taught me why I had to go through all the trials and tribulations in all my relationships and ‘love interests’ before now. It’s made me realise that, if I’m being truly honest with myself, I never really knew what it meant to be in love before. Because this is the most incredible feeling. I feel like I’ve been airlifted into a Disney movie. As crazy as it sounds [and if I was reading this a few months ago, I’d have cringed] it has made me believe in love at first sight. It made me realise that maybe it isn’t about whether I was ready for love, but if love was ready for me. 

But maybe the most important thing about all of this is that love will never let you doubt. Love will never let you sit and wonder, worry and ask questions. For  s o   l o n g  I had resigned myself to that doubt, and thought it was perfectly normal to live with the constant anxiety that I wasn’t wanted. That is not normal and that is not acceptable. I can’t tell you how much I believe in that the right person will never allow you to question your worth, or how special you are, or how much you are wanted. People know exactly what they want from you, and the person who will blow everyone who came before them is out there somewhere. The one who will treat you right, and let you love them the way you should, is out there. 

Lots of love,

Jasmine x

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