Want an exciting boyfriend

Dear Hishy,

I agree with you. If you go out and look for an unhealthy man you are bound to get hurt. But the real question is why you would want someone who is unhealthy, immature, self-centered, mean, and incapable of establishing a loving relationship. Actually what you are asking for is quite common and the reason you are giving is the exact one usually given. The idea of healthy love being boring is a very sad thing, but luckily one that is erroneous after a person becomes healthy enough to appreciate it.

It is a cliché that before you can be in a healthy love relationship you at first must be in love with yourself. This is a very true cliché. For someone to be loved they have to love themselves. But to love themselves they have to be first truly loved and cherished by their parents. Parents often feel love for their children, but it is much rarer to show the action of love. This means treating a child in a healthy, non-judgmental way. Often parents are too perfectionistic or have too many needs of their own to show that type of love. Even if they do we live in such a perfectionistic culture that children often do not feel that they measure up.

Whenever a child feels abandonment from one or both of their parents they internalize the hurt and the result is a feeling of not being good enough to be loved. This feeling is the feeling of shame. Even if parents are relatively healthy and loving a child can feel tremendous abandonment if their parents get divorced, if a parent is alcoholic, or if they simply work too much and do not spend the amount of quality time a child needs. This often leads to a deep emotional belief that they are unlovable. Later, they might consciously realize that they are loveable and in turn desire real love. Consciously they look for healthy love, but subconsciously they search out just those people who are incapable of showing real love. This is called a repetition compulsion. This problem becomes worse if the child has been physically, emotionally, or sexually abused. They find true love boring and yearn for people to treat them poorly which ratifies their feeling unlovable. They often become addicted to these abusive relationships and feel that they cannot live without them. They become intensity junkies instead of trying to experience true intimacy.

I would really suggest that you take some time to live alone and learn to really appreciate yourself rather than looking for addictive love. It would be a good idea to get involved in face-to-face counseling to deal with these issues as well. You are worth more than a thug in your life and true love can be much more exciting when you learn how to appreciate it.

Take care.