I Will Not Change For You, I Will Grow Up With You

It is possible that this sentence surprises more than one. Many people understand and accept that in order to build and maintain a relationship, each spouse must give up certain aspects of their life.

And even more so, in order to “adapt” to the character of our spouse, we had to change certain personal aspects.

We’re not going to deny that being in a relationship and keeping a stable and lasting relationship sometimes requires giving up certain things.

However, everything has a limit. From the moment we see ourselves forced to change, we lose something of our being, and a void opens.

If I change my values, my tastes and my character for you, I stop being myself. The person one says to love is then a false mirage without substance or form.

If there is one clear and indisputable principle when it comes to maintaining a relationship, it is that we must never allow our rights and values ​​to be damaged. What defines us, in short.

And even more so, neither should you require the person you love to “change” for you, or to adjust to your needs. 

This would actually be unwarranted emotional blackmail, and this is what we will see in detail in the rest of this article.

Individual development and the development of the couple

We must begin by clarifying something essential: couple relationships are not fixed and immutable entities.

Nobody is insensitive to what surrounds him, to parallel social relations, to the professional context, to the family, to personal needs …

The couple is part of a process of continuous change where it is necessary to constantly update the links in accordance with new situations and years. There is therefore an “we”, sometimes confronted with the “I”.

One of the most frequent problems that we face is the need to harmonize the personal development and the development of the couple.

In a healthy and happy relationship, the two spheres are united and interconnected. In what way?

Each member respects, understands and allows the person they love to have their own personal spaces to cultivate themselves, to flourish and to be themselves.

We could say that this process is actually a curious paradox, because while working day in and day out to find unity in harmony, commitment and intimacy, we also allow the two independent entities to continue to exist. 

Thus, they are able to enrich themselves in their individuality to, subsequently, bring wisdom and happiness to the couple.

It would therefore be a question of developing the individual development of each member of the couple, knowing that we encourage internal balance, self-esteem and personal satisfaction, so that all this brings benefits to the foundation of the couple.

There is no point in wanting the person you love to change. If, for example, I ask him to be less extroverted, to invest less in social activities so that he can spend more time at home, what I would do, in fact, is fuel his frustration. and make its interests vulnerable. 

What use then is it for me to generate his unhappiness by means of my selfishness? No one can change someone by force, to the point where they become what they want. It is about building, developing and moving forward.

Walking with you I find myself

Mature love is the basis of healthy relationships. It is a conscious love, capable of respecting and loving the other as he is, without having at any time the desire to force him to change.

Perhaps we should also be aware of the need we have to develop relationships where this maturity teaches us that personal fears and insecurities almost always generate the need to control the other.

“I hope that the other person changes this aspect of their character, because in this way, I make sure that they will not leave me, that they will stay with me”.

But people are not puzzles, they are not solitary objects that have to “fit” together perfectly.

Your form does not have to adopt exactly mine and your voids do not have to be necessarily filled with my virtues.

It would be better to start realizing that we are really just imperfect creatures who are also looking for imperfect beings to go hand in hand and grow day by day.

This wonderful process will undoubtedly last a lifetime, but in the meantime we will also grow individually.

We will become more and more learned personally, while growing up alongside his spouse.

Love is actually a constant worry in life, a continuous search in which we cultivate our personality, while being interested in the development of the people we love. All of this will also be projected onto ourselves.