Making Sense of Conflicting Relationship Advice
Have you ever found yourself seeking out relationship advice online only to be bombarded with pages of seemingly conflicting and contradictory opinions? If so, you're not alone - and today's episode is for you. I'm going to be sharing 5 examples of contradictory relationship advice that you may have encountered and struggled to make sense of, so that you can understand the nuances and practise discernment in finding the right way forward for you.
We cover:
Going after a life you love AND learning to be content with what you have
Knowing what you want in a partner AND not being overly prescriptive
Not dating someone for their potential AND wanting someone you can grow with
Not changing yourself to earn someone's love AND wanting to be your best self to attract a healthy partner
The importance of feeling your feelings AND knowing when it's okay to distract yourself
Making Sense of Conflicting Relationship Advice
Navigating the world of relationships can be daunting, especially when bombarded with conflicting advice. With countless voices offering differing tips and strategies, it’s no wonder many feel overwhelmed. However, understanding that both sets of conflicting advice can hold truth helps one develop discernment and self-trust. This article explores several key pieces of conflicting relationship advice and sheds light on how to make sense of them.
Pursuing Happiness vs. Contentment
One common piece of advice is that you deserve to pursue a life you love and shouldn’t settle for less. This can be empowering, especially for those feeling trapped in unfulfilling situations. It encourages taking risks and striving for joy, peace, and fulfilment. However, it is equally important to appreciate what one already has.
Cultivating contentment with your current life can bring a profound sense of peace. Constantly chasing the next best thing can lead to perpetual dissatisfaction. Therefore, it’s valuable to find a balance between striving for improvement and appreciating the present. This duality entails setting goals for a better future while finding joy and serenity in the present moment.
Knowing What You Want vs. Being Flexible
In the realm of dating, knowing what you want is deemed crucial. It’s advised to have clarity on your non-negotiables, ensuring you enter relationships with a strong sense of what matters most to you. This helps in making informed choices and not settling for connections that don't align with your values.
Conversely, being overly prescriptive can hinder the dating experience. Being too rigid in your requirements might close off potentially wonderful relationships. It’s beneficial to maintain a sense of curiosity and openness, exploring connections without the pressure of adhering to a strict checklist. Balancing these two can help in finding a compatible partner while enjoying the journey of getting to know different personalities.
Potential vs. Growth
Another conflicting piece of advice is avoiding dating someone for their potential. This stems from a caution against trying to change a partner into an idealised version. Dating someone for who they might become can lead to disappointment and an imbalanced relationship dynamic.
Yet, it’s also healthy to seek someone with whom you can grow and evolve. The key distinction here is to ensure that the desire for growth is mutual. It is about being with someone who inspires personal development and shares a similar vision for the future, rather than undertaking a project to mould them into a different person. Recognising this distinction helps foster healthier and more balanced relationships.
Self-Improvement vs. Self-Acceptance
The advice to never change oneself for a relationship aligns with promoting self-worth and authenticity. It advocates for maintaining one’s true self and avoiding people-pleasing behaviours to gain love and acceptance. This is crucial, as altering oneself can lead to a loss of identity and an unhealthy relationship dynamic.
At the same time, personal growth should not be overlooked. Investing in self-improvement can elevate the quality of one’s relationships. This doesn’t mean changing who you are at your core, but rather becoming the best version of yourself. As self-confidence and self-worth grow, you’ll attract healthier relationships. The key is to balance self-acceptance with a commitment to personal growth, enhancing relationships naturally rather than through forced changes.
Feeling Your Feelings vs. Healthy Distraction
When dealing with emotional challenges like a breakup, it’s often recommended to feel your feelings and allow space for grief and sadness. Suppressing emotions can result in them surfacing later in more detrimental ways. Engaging with and processing feelings is essential for emotional health.
However, distraction can also be a beneficial strategy. Sometimes, taking a break from intense emotions by engaging in activities like exercise, hobbies, or socialising can provide relief and help regain emotional strength. The important aspect here is discerning when to allow feelings to flow and when a healthy distraction is needed to regroup.
Embracing Nuance and Developing Discernment
The essence of dealing with conflicting relationship advice lies in embracing nuance. Each piece of advice can hold truth in different contexts, and it’s up to the individual to discern what resonates most for them. Developing discernment involves trusting oneself to determine the right course of action based on personal values, needs, and knowledge of the situation.
Discernment is inextricably linked to self-trust. It’s about navigating the complex nuances of relationships to make decisions that align with one’s authentic self. By balancing conflicting pieces of advice, one can foster healthier, more fulfilling relationships while maintaining a strong sense of self. In the end, the right decision is the one that feels true and right for you.
Questions for Discussion & Reflection
Do you often find yourself overwhelmed by conflicting relationship advice? How does this impact your ability to make decisions in your relationships?
What advice or messages around relationships have resonated with you the most, and why? Conversely, which pieces of advice have you chosen to leave behind, and what informed that choice?
Reflect on a time when you pursued a significant change in your life or relationship. Did this decision arise from a place of genuine desire, or was it influenced by external pressures or advice?
How do you balance the value of striving for more in your life with the practice of appreciating and finding contentment in what you already have?
In dating, what core qualities and values do you find essential in a partner? How do you navigate the line between knowing what you want and remaining open to unexpected connections?
Have you ever caught yourself being overly prescriptive or rigid in your expectations of a partner? How might this have affected your relationships?
Discuss a relationship where you might have been drawn to someone’s potential rather than who they were at the time. What was the outcome, and what did you learn from it?
How important is personal growth and evolution to you in a relationship? Can you distinguish between wanting to grow with someone versus wanting to change them?
Reflect on how self-worth and self-esteem play a role in the types of relationships you attract and maintain. In what ways has working on yourself improved your relationship experiences?
Have you experienced times when you needed to feel your feelings versus times when distraction was the best course of action? How do you determine what you need in moments of emotional intensity?
FURTHER LINKS & RESOURCES:
Check out my couples course, Secure Together (& save $200 with the code SECURE)
Save $150 on my Higher Love break-up course with the code PHOENIX
Follow me on Instagram: @stephanie__rigg & @onattachment
You might also like…
Episode Transcript
[00:00:29]:
In today's episode, we're talking all about how to make sense of conflicting relationship advice. So I think that in the online world in particular, but maybe even outside of that, we are pretty constantly bombarded with different opinions, you know, different ideas, different advice on how to navigate relationships. And while you could say, you know, having so much input and information can be supportive and can allow us to really learn more about ourselves and cultivate, you know, more awareness of our patterns and insights and all of those things, which we could say is a positive, I think it's undeniable that at times it could feel almost like a bombardment. And for those of us who are maybe a little lacking in self trust or maybe, you know, prone to doubting ourselves, second guessing things, having so much information and so much conflicting information, particularly when delivered maybe without nuance or context, with a lot of certainty, it can be really hard to know what's true or what's right for me. And so I'm going to go through today a few sets of conflicting advice, not with a view so much to determining for you which is true or right, but rather, I suppose, elucidating the reasons why all of it can be true. And I think so much of, you know, developing a stronger sense of self trust and discernment is being able to ascertain, well, is this right for me rather than is this objectively true? In a general sense, is this applicable to everyone? So teasing out, I suppose, when, where, why you might, you know, find certain advice resonates with you and and why you might leave other advice, as not being applicable to you or not being, you know, the thing that you need.
[00:02:28]:
So that's what we're gonna be talking about today. Before I get into that, I just wanted to remind you, I've mentioned it a couple of times, but, if you are someone who likes watching rather than listening or maybe in addition to, be sure to check out my YouTube channel. We're uploading full form episodes of the podcast, in video form. You can also find all of that on the On Attachment website. Again, if you didn't know, On Attachment has its own website at on attachment.com, which has, you know, not only links to the videos, and, you know, you can listen on Spotify there, but also full transcripts of the episodes, even discussion questions, and written summaries of what we talk about. So if you wanna go a little deeper and dig into some of those additional resources, all of which are totally free of charge, and be sure to check out on attachment.com and or my YouTube channel. Okay. Alright.
[00:03:23]:
So let's dive into this conversation around navigating conflicting relationship advice. So the first piece of advice, or I suppose the first 2 pieces of advice that seem to conflict with each other, that you deserve to go after a life that you love, which you do. And there is huge value in learning to be content with what you have. Right? So on the face of it, we go, okay. You know, yes, I deserve more. And I think there is so much content that is, speaking to that. Right? That you deserve a life you love, and if it's not like a hell yes, it should be a hell no. And, you know, all of these things that are essentially telling you that if you have any sort of dissatisfaction, that you should, you know, totally overhaul your life and keep reaching for more and more and more until you reach some place of happiness.
[00:04:15]:
Now, I think that for certain people in certain circumstances, it is really, really important to hear that you deserve to be happy, that happiness and joy and peace and fulfillment is available to you and is something that you, you know, should really feel like you can go after and that you should feel like you're allowed to want that. And so, you know, settling, so to speak, for a life that feels draining, and, you know, hardly tolerable, let alone fulfilling, you don't have to do that. Now when we look at the other side of the coin, I think it's equally true that there is a lot of wisdom and freedom, I would say, in learning to be at peace with what's around you, and really consciously choosing the life that you have rather than always feeling like you need something more or different or that you need to optimize every little piece of your life, of your relationships, in order to, you know, be happy. I think that sometimes, you know, letting something be good enough, rather than needing everything to be perfect, there can be so much kind of spaciousness and peace to be found in that paradigm shift of, can I, you know, be happy enough here? Now, as you can see, this is a really delicate 1, and I think it very, neatly illustrates the complexity of, you know, making sense of these conflicting pieces of advice because both of them are true. And yet if you just took 1 at face value, and sort of ran with it, then you could really easily take yourself to an extreme position that might not be helpful, which is why I speak so much about the importance of discernment and being able to find your way to a middle ground that makes sense for you. So letting both of these be true. Yes. You absolutely, you know, deserve and, you know, should really seek out a life that feels meaningful and joyful, and, and fulfilling for you while also learning to appreciate, be grateful for, and find peace with that which you already have, maybe, and the things that are, you know, good in your life rather than always feeling like you need to be, shifting the goalpost or raising the bar for yourself and looking for the things that are wrong and needing improvement.
[00:06:46]:
Okay. The next, set of pieces of advice that are seemingly in conflict, but maybe both true, is that in dating, it's really important to know what you're looking for, and being overly prescriptive will generally work against you. So let's break each of these down. So it is really I have said this many times, particularly for people who struggle more with anxious attachment, whose proclivity in dating is to just latch onto anyone who shows interest in them and get really swept up in, you know, the romance of it all, the the idea of it all, maybe where the connection is kind of lacking in foundation or in, like, core compatibilities. So it's absolutely important to know, like, what am I looking for in a partner? What matters to me? How do I wanna feel in relationships? You know, what does, you know, compatibility look and feel like? What are those qualities that I'm looking for? Most people that I work with have never turned their mind to that really in a way that they have clarity on, you know, what are my nonnegotiables? What are my deal breakers? You know, where are the lines that I would draw in the sand? What qualities really matter to me and a partner? Because when you have that framework, then it's much easier to kind of sift through. When you are meeting people, it's much easier to say yes and no, or maybe saying maybe to exploring something further. But you're able to go in with that clarity because you know what you're looking for and you know what you're not looking for. And you're much less susceptible to, you know, moving those standards, to accommodate someone that you've become infatuated with.
[00:08:32]:
Now at the same time, being overly prescriptive can make it really hard. So I think we don't wanna go in there with, like, a very long list, of very specific attributes that someone needs to have in order for you to be willing to explore a connection with them, because I think, you know, in doing so, you're obviously narrowing the pool. And you if you if you become too attached to very specific criteria, then I think not only is it less likely that you're gonna find someone and maybe more likely that you're gonna pass over people who could be really great to be in a relationship with, but I think you also kind of kill off the sense of curiosity and, you know, excitement that comes with getting to know someone, without the anxiety of, like, needing them to pass a test. So balancing these 2 of, yes, it's really important to kind of know what you're looking for and know what your standards are, while not being overly rigid or prescriptive in a way that, you know, makes that process either totally unenjoyable, and or knocks too many people out of the running because you've set the bar impossibly high or, you know, you're looking for some sort of mystery perfect person who maybe doesn't exist. Okay. The next set of conflicting pieces of advice is that you don't want to date someone for their potential. You know, we've all heard this so many times, make sure you're not dating someone for their potential. And it's totally okay, and I would say healthy, to wanna be with someone who you can grow and evolve with.
[00:10:14]:
Okay? So once again, the line here can be a little murky. And if you are someone who looks to, you know, external sources to always have the answer for you, it can be really hard to know where you fall on this line, which again is why I think that discernment and self trust is such an important piece, in the journey to becoming not only more secure in an attachment sense, but, you know, having a really strong sense of self and self confidence, self esteem. So don't date someone for their potential. We know that, again, if you are more anxiously attached, and it's not exclusive to anxious attachment, but we'll often see it there is, you know, you become so enamored with the idea of someone. And, you know, you're not deterred by the idea of a project, let's put it that way. And you can really latch onto, you know, what the relationship could be, or, you know, who this person could be if only they changed these things. Or, you know, maybe you catch little glimpses of them, but then, you know, 90% of the time, they are a different version of themselves. But 10% of the time, they are this version of themselves that, you know, you wanna nurture them into being more of, and you tell yourself that if only that were the case, then everything would be perfect.
[00:11:35]:
I think in that kind of setup where you maybe take it upon yourself to be the force that transforms them from a to b that kind of fuels their metamorphosis. I think that's a really dangerous dynamic to get into, because, you know, making it your mission to change someone is really draining for you, tends to be very detrimental to your sense of self and self worth, and frankly isn't really fair on them either. It's not a nice dynamic to be on either side of, and it tends to be very skewed energetically in a relationship, when 1 person is trying to change the other. So we don't wanna get too tied up in dating someone, based on some version of themselves that they might become in the future, which, you know, isn't really who they are today. But at the same time, it's totally okay to wanna grow with someone and to wanna be with someone who wants to grow. And I think that that's really critical here, and maybe that's the distinction. Maybe that's where the line is. Does this person want to grow, or do you just want them to grow? And so if that is important to you, that sense of growth and evolution and forward motion in your relationship, in terms of, you know, personal development, then I think it does have to originate at least in part, in the other person rather than it being your agenda that you're imposing on them.
[00:13:03]:
So I think, you know, having a level of self awareness and honesty, can be really helpful there in distinguishing between those 2. Okay. The next 1 is you don't and shouldn't have to change yourself in order to deserve a healthy relationship, and at the same time, becoming the best version of yourself will almost always be reflected in an up leveling of your relationships or the types of people that you are attracted to and you are attracting in return. So let's break this down. I think for those of us who struggle with some form of unworthiness, there can be this sense of, you know, I am unworthy of the kind of relationship that I want. I don't deserve that. I'm not good enough. I'm not smart enough.
[00:13:55]:
I'm not attractive enough. Whatever. Right? And so we can feel too small or, you know, too unworthy to think that we deserve that, that we can have that kind of relationship, that we can have a healthy relationship. And I think that when we're operating in that paradigm, it's very easy to then accept and and settle for, even though I don't really like that word, relationships that fall way short of what we truly want, because we don't believe that we can do any better than that. Right? Now, I don't think that that's healthy at all. And I think that, you know, that sense of I need to change myself in order to get someone to love me can really lead us into that shape shifting, people pleasing, bending over backwards, just trying to be likable and loved, you know, trying to be easy, low maintenance in order to, like, earn someone's approval. Obviously, those can be some pretty nasty dynamics in a relationship if that's kind of the the tone of the relationship. Now, at the same time, and again, this is, you know, why this advice can be so confusing.
[00:15:03]:
I think it's undeniably true that if you are someone who really struggles with low self worth, low self esteem, you know, a lack of self confidence, maybe you don't take great care of yourself, which I think all of those things can go hand in hand, I think it's undeniable that if you really double down on investing in your own growth as a person, and that can have a lot of pillars to it, whether that's, you know, going to therapy, sorting your shit out, whether it's getting healthy, you know, kind of up leveling your life, in terms of how you relate to yourself, how you take care of yourself, you know, your relationships. Maybe it's culling a bunch of relationships, friendships, you know, other things that you know are not in alignment or in integrity. Maybe they kind of energetically drag you down. Whatever it looks like for you, I think that it is undeniable that that process of kind of cleaning up, spring cleaning, we could call it, your life will be reflected in the relationships that you subsequently find yourself in. So it's not about, like, needing to prove your worth to someone so much as, if you are operating from a place of genuine self worth and self confidence, then that will most always be mirrored back to you in the types of people that you are attracting and are attracted to. So focusing on really becoming the best version of yourself, and maybe that's the point of distinction. It's not trying to become someone else to earn love, but becoming the very best version of yourself and trusting that from that place, you know, your life and relationships will prosper and will flourish, because you're really allowing yourself to to shine through in a really healthy, and attractive way there. Okay.
[00:16:51]:
And last but not least, it's important to feel your feelings, and sometimes the best thing to do is just distract yourself. So this might be, you know, if you have just gone through a breakup, for example, it doesn't have to be a breakup, but I think that's a nice example. If you've just gone through a breakup, I absolutely think that it is important to carve out space to really feel into the grief and the sadness and the loss and the disappointment and any other feelings that might be in there. I think if we try and bypass those feelings altogether, then they're gonna come back to bite us somehow. They tend to just get stuffed down deeper and, you know, kind of create layers within ourselves that we're going to have to tend to sooner or later. So, it is really important to connect with, to feel, to allow space for our emotions and our feelings. And at the same time, I absolutely do not think that you need to feel all of your feelings all of the time. I think that, you know, distracting yourself can be a perfectly reasonable, and indeed can be like the best thing for you at any given moment.
[00:17:59]:
And, again, this is where, like, discernment and tuning into ourselves is really important. Being self responsible, being kind of a a good caretaker of our own selves is, like, what do I need now? Do I need to, you know, have a really big cry and maybe do some journaling or talk to a friend and, and really be with the feelings that are arising within me? Or do I need to zone out? Do I need to numb out? Do I need to distract myself? And neither is, like, better or worse. It's not that, you know, distracting yourself is a cop out or is the easy way out. It might be at that point in time, at that moment, that you don't have the capacity to be with, you know, the bigness of whatever you're feeling, and that's okay. As I said, I think part of being self responsible and being really well attuned to yourself is knowing when you do have capacity, and coming back to those things when you're in a better space to be with them. So, yes, absolutely, we wanna find space for those feelings to be felt, because I think that a lot of us skip to thinking about our feelings or thinking about a situation, and we think that we've kind of ticked that box because we've spent so much mental energy on the situation. Again, the breakup's a good example here. But even just in a relationship, if you are someone who's kind of dissatisfied with your relationship and you think about it all day long and you're constantly ruminating and, you know, having practice conversations and all of those sorts of things, and you think that you've really connected with your feelings about it, I would argue that you probably haven't, that you've been using all of that kind of cognitive energy, as a way to skip past the discomfort and vulnerability and messiness of actually just feeling.
[00:19:52]:
And for a lot of us, you know, you're probably listening going, yeah, well, what does that even mean? What does it look like? I don't know how to feel the thing without going into the stories that sit on top of it and, you know, spinning around in all of that blame and accusation and and kind of victimhood or whatever else might be there. So it it can be a bit of a process learning to actually sit with the discomfort of the feeling without all of that other stuff attached to it. But, yes, as I said, at the same time, I actually think it's it's really can be very healthy to just distract yourself. It might be, you know, going for a run and and listening to music or going for a drive or watching Netflix or whatever it might be, if you don't have the capacity to be with those feelings at any given time, that can be a really valid and, you know, self caring act to distract yourself rather than going into the depths of those feelings, provided, of course, that you do carve out some time and space to to revisit them when you have more capacity. Okay. I'm gonna leave it there. I hope that today has been helpful, not only I suppose in breaking down those specific examples that I've offered, but I suppose in illustrating the point more broadly that there's always nuance, there's always, you know, shades of gray, and, you know, any advice that you encounter online or anywhere else from people in your life, you know, take it with a grain of salt. You can sort of assimilate it into the broader framework of, you know, relationship advice or or whatever, but, you know, take what works and, don't necessarily take anyone's, including mine, anyone's views as gospel or as necessarily right for you in your specific situation, because really only you can know that, and your job is to kind of figure that out for yourself.
[00:21:40]:
And as I said, kind of take what works, leave what doesn't, and figure out where that line sits for you. So I hope that you've learned something. I hope that it's given you something to think about, and as always, so grateful for those of you who leave reviews and feedback. I read them all, and I'm always very touched by your kind words of support. So thank you, and I look forward to seeing you again next time. Thanks, guys.
[00:22:10]:
Thanks for joining me for this episode of On Attachment. If you wanna go deeper on all things attachment, love, and relationships, you can find me on Instagram @stephanie__rigg or at stephanierigg.com. And if you enjoyed this episode, I'd be so grateful if you could leave a review and a 5 star rating. It really does help so much. Thanks again for being here, and I hope to see you again soon.
Keywords from Podcast Episode
conflicting relationship advice, attachment theory, relationship guidance, overcoming insecurity, healthy relationships, self trust, relationship self-awareness, relationship discernment, personal growth, dating standards, relationship compatibility, relationship dynamics, self-worth, self-esteem, dating clarity, nonnegotiables in relationships, managing breakups, feeling your feelings, emotional awareness, relationship mindfulness, relationship advice, online relationship guidance, personal development, navigating relationships, relationship contentment, life fulfilment, relationship goals, dating expectations, relationship needs, relationship improvement