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What I learned about love after chasing the wrong version of it for years.
I used to think love was supposed to be hard.
That it required grand gestures and dramatic declarations. That it should feel all-consuming, like you can’t breathe without the other person. That if it came too easily, it couldn’t possibly be real.
The movies taught me that love is about chasing someone who’s unsure about you until you finally win them over. That obstacles and misunderstandings make the story more romantic. That passion means intensity, volatility, never knowing quite where you stand. That happily ever after comes after you’ve nearly lost each other multiple times.
So that’s the kind of love I went looking for. And predictably, that’s the kind of heartbreak I found instead.
After 13 years of working with people rebuilding their lives in recovery—watching them learn to love themselves and others in healthier ways—I’ve realized that almost everything we’ve been taught about love is wrong. Or at least incomplete.
Real love doesn’t look like the movies. It’s quieter, steadier, and honestly? It’s so much better than anything Hollywood could have prepared us for.
The Mythology We’ve Been Sold
Let’s talk about what we’ve been taught love should look like, because these myths have done more damage to our relationships than we realize.
We’ve been told that love is a feeling that happens to us—something we “fall” into, as if we have no control. That when you meet “the one,” you’ll just know. That soulmates exist and finding yours will solve all your problems. That love conquers all, even fundamental incompatibilities or toxic dynamics.
We’ve been taught that passion equals love, so if your heart isn’t constantly racing, something must be missing. That jealousy means someone cares. That drama is evidence of depth. That if someone doesn’t complete you or make you whole, they’re not your person.
We’ve learned that love should be effortless if it’s real—you shouldn’t have to work at it or communicate directly because true love means never having to explain yourself. That if you’re fighting or struggling, you’re with the wrong person. That love should look perfect from the outside and feel magical on the inside all the time.
And here’s maybe the most damaging myth: that romantic love is the pinnacle of human experience, the thing that will finally make us feel worthy and complete.
I spent years trying to create relationships that matched these myths. I mistook anxiety for chemistry, intensity for intimacy, and obsession for love. I thought if I wasn’t constantly thinking about someone, I must not really love them. If things felt too comfortable, I worried we were just settling. If I wasn’t fighting for the relationship, it must not be worth having.
Every single one of these beliefs led me directly away from real love and straight into relationships that looked romantic but felt exhausting.
What Love Actually Feels Like
The first time I experienced real love, I almost missed it because it didn’t match the script I’d been given.
There was no lightning bolt moment. No dramatic first meeting. No obstacles to overcome or grand gestures to win me over. It was just easy. Comfortable. Natural. Like coming home to a place I’d always belonged but never knew existed.
And that terrified me.
Where was the intensity? The butterflies? The constant wondering what he was thinking or if he really liked me? Where was the drama that proved this mattered, the uncertainty that made my heart race, the challenge that would make the victory feel earned?
It took me embarrassingly long to realize that the absence of these things wasn’t a problem—it was the whole point. Real love isn’t supposed to feel like anxiety. It’s supposed to feel like peace.
Real love is someone who shows up consistently, not sporadically. Who communicates clearly instead of making you guess. Who doesn’t need you to prove your worth because they already see it. Who makes you feel more like yourself, not less.
Real love is boring in the best possible way. It’s knowing someone will text back. It’s not having to strategize or play games. It’s feeling safe enough to be completely yourself, even the parts that aren’t impressive or attractive. It’s building a life together instead of constantly fighting to stay together.
Real love is choosing each other, over and over, even when the initial excitement fades and you’re left with the mundane reality of sharing space and negotiating chores and being human together.
It’s not a feeling that happens to you—it’s a practice. A commitment. A decision you make daily to show up for another person and allow them to show up for you.
The Difference Between Passion and Peace
Here’s something I wish someone had told me years ago: we’ve been confusing passion with anxiety, and calling peace boring.
That racing heart, those obsessive thoughts, that feeling like you can’t function without someone—that’s not love. That’s your nervous system in overdrive. That’s anxiety, fear of abandonment, or attachment wounds being triggered. That’s the chemical cocktail your brain releases when you’re uncertain about something important.
And yes, it feels intense. It feels like the most important thing in the world. But intensity isn’t the same as depth, and activation isn’t the same as connection.
Real passion doesn’t make you feel like you’re spinning out. It makes you feel grounded. It’s not volatile—it’s sustainable. It’s not about desperate need—it’s about genuine desire. It doesn’t leave you drained—it leaves you energized.
Peace, on the other hand, is what we feel when we’re actually safe with someone. When our nervous system can relax because it’s not constantly scanning for threats or trying to prevent abandonment. When we don’t have to perform or prove anything. When we can just be.
For someone who spent years in anxious relationships, peace can feel wrong at first. Too calm. Too easy. Like maybe we don’t really care if we’re not constantly worried about losing them.
But that’s just our nervous system adjusting to something it’s not used to: actual safety.
The beautiful thing about peaceful love is that it creates space for real passion to grow. Not the frantic, desperate intensity of anxious attachment, but the deep, sustainable intimacy that comes from truly knowing and being known by another person. From building trust over time. From creating something together that neither of you could create alone.
Love is a Practice, Not a Feeling
The biggest shift in my understanding of love came when I stopped seeing it as something that happens to me and started seeing it as something I actively create.
Love isn’t just a feeling—it’s a practice. It’s the small, unglamorous choices we make every single day. It’s how we speak to each other when we’re tired or stressed. It’s whether we show up when it’s inconvenient. It’s how we handle conflict, disappointment, or the mundane frustrations of sharing a life.
It’s listening when we’d rather be right. It’s apologizing when we mess up. It’s making time for connection even when we’re busy. It’s choosing to be curious about our partner’s experience instead of defensive about our own. It’s tending to the relationship like a garden that needs regular care, not expecting it to flourish on its own.
This was a hard lesson for me because it meant taking responsibility. I couldn’t just wait for the right person to make me feel a certain way. I had to become someone capable of practicing love, even when I didn’t feel particularly loving.
I had to learn to communicate directly instead of expecting people to read my mind. To express my needs instead of resenting them for not guessing correctly. To own my part in conflicts instead of keeping score. To choose vulnerability even when it felt safer to keep my walls up.
I had to understand that love isn’t something you find—it’s something you build. And building requires showing up with tools, not just good intentions.
When Love Isn’t Enough
Here’s another truth the movies don’t tell us: sometimes love isn’t enough.
You can love someone deeply and still not be right for each other. You can care about someone and still have to walk away because the relationship isn’t healthy. You can feel intense feelings and still recognize that those feelings are based on fantasy rather than reality.
Love without compatibility, trust, respect, aligned values, emotional availability, or willingness to grow together isn’t actually love—it’s attachment. Or habit. Or fear of being alone.
Real love requires more than feelings. It requires two people who are willing to do the work. Who can communicate through difficulty. Who are committed to both their own growth and the growth of the relationship. Who can show up for each other consistently, not just when it’s convenient or exciting.
I’ve loved people I had to leave. I’ve stayed too long in relationships where love was present but health wasn’t. I’ve learned that loving someone doesn’t obligate me to suffer in a relationship that doesn’t work.
This is where the movie narratives become dangerous—they teach us that if we love someone enough, we can overcome anything. That leaving means we didn’t try hard enough or love deeply enough. That real love requires sacrifice and suffering.
But sometimes the most loving thing we can do is recognize when a relationship isn’t serving either person and have the courage to let it go. Sometimes love means releasing someone so you can both find something better. Sometimes love means choosing yourself.
What I Know about Love Now
After years of getting it wrong, here’s what I’ve learned about love that actually lasts:
Real love is calm more often than it’s chaotic. It’s built on friendship, respect, and genuine enjoyment of each other’s company, not just attraction. It makes your life better, not more complicated.
Real love includes the boring parts—the grocery shopping and bill paying and quiet evenings at home. It’s not a highlight reel. It’s the everyday moments of choosing each other when no one’s watching and nothing exciting is happening.
Real love challenges you to grow but doesn’t require you to change who you fundamentally are. It accepts your flaws while encouraging your evolution. It sees your potential without making you feel inadequate as you are.
Real love is secure enough to include independence. It doesn’t require constant contact or proof of devotion. It trusts that you can have your own life, your own friends, your own interests, and that this makes you a fuller person to come home to.
Real love is honest, even when honesty is uncomfortable. It creates space for difficult conversations. It doesn’t avoid conflict—it navigates it with care and respect. It knows that temporary discomfort is better than long-term resentment.
Real love is consistent. It shows up not just when things are good, but especially when things are hard. It doesn’t withdraw when you’re struggling or punish you for having needs. It’s present through the unglamorous parts of being human.
Most importantly, real love starts with loving yourself. Not in a self-help-cliché kind of way, but in a practical, daily-practice kind of way. Because we can’t accept love we don’t believe we deserve. We can’t show up authentically in relationships if we don’t know who we authentically are. We can’t build healthy partnerships if we’re not healthy within ourselves.
The Love that Healed Me
The love that finally worked for me didn’t arrive when I stopped looking—that’s another myth we tell ourselves. It arrived when I stopped looking for someone to complete me and started looking for someone to complement me.
When I stopped seeking validation through relationships and started seeking partnership. When I stopped trying to prove my worth and started knowing my worth. When I stopped accepting breadcrumbs and started requiring reciprocity.
This love doesn’t make my heart race with anxiety—it makes my heart full with gratitude. It doesn’t consume my thoughts obsessively—it occupies a healthy, balanced space in my life alongside my work, friendships, passions, and solitude.
It’s not perfect. We’re not perfect. We still have misunderstandings and disagreements and moments of frustration. But we have tools to work through them. We have commitment that extends beyond the easy moments. We have respect for each other that doesn’t waver when we’re annoyed.
We have something the movies rarely show: the quiet, steady love that exists in the margins. The inside jokes and shared glances. The knowing each other’s coffee orders and bad moods. The comfortable silence that doesn’t need filling. The small kindnesses that happen when no one’s watching.
We have a love that doesn’t announce itself loudly but shows up consistently. That doesn’t demand attention but earns trust. That doesn’t promise to complete us but commits to growing alongside us.
And honestly? It’s better than any movie romance I ever fantasized about. Because it’s real. It’s sustainable. It’s a foundation I can actually build a life on, not just a feeling that leaves me wrecked when it inevitably fades.
Redefining Happily Ever After
Here’s what nobody tells you about “happily ever after”: it’s not a destination you reach. It’s not the end of the story where everything becomes perfect and stays that way forever.
Happily ever after is choosing each other again today, even though you chose each other yesterday. It’s working through the hard stuff instead of running when it gets uncomfortable. It’s continuing to date each other after you’ve already committed. It’s not taking the relationship for granted just because it’s secure.
It’s understanding that love evolves. The butterflies fade, and that’s okay—they’re replaced by something deeper. The initial excitement transforms into comfortable familiarity, and that’s not settling—it’s maturing. The desperate need to be together every second becomes confident trust in your connection even when you’re apart.
Happily ever after is accepting that your partner is human and will disappoint you sometimes. That you’re human and will disappoint them too. That this doesn’t mean the relationship is failing—it means you’re both real people doing the hard work of loving each other through imperfection.
It’s learning that love isn’t about finding someone who never triggers you, but finding someone willing to work through the triggers with you. Someone who doesn’t run when your wounds show up, but helps you heal them. Someone who sees your growth as important as their own.
Happily ever after is building something together that’s bigger than both of you. Whether that’s a family, a home, shared dreams, or just a life that feels meaningful because you’re living it together. It’s creating a partnership that makes you both better versions of yourselves.
An Invitation to Love Differently
So here’s my invitation to you: What if you stopped waiting for movie love and started building real love?
What if you released the expectation that love should be hard, dramatic, or all-consuming? What if you allowed yourself to enjoy relationships that feel easy, stable, and peaceful?
What if you stopped mistaking anxiety for chemistry and recognized that real attraction includes feeling safe with someone? What if you valued consistency over intensity, actions over words, partnership over passion that burns out?
What if you approached love as a practice you cultivate rather than a feeling you chase? What if you took responsibility for showing up as someone capable of healthy love instead of waiting for the perfect person to make you feel loved?
What if you trusted that the right relationship won’t require you to convince someone of your worth or compete for their attention or settle for less than you deserve? That real love doesn’t play games, doesn’t create unnecessary drama, and doesn’t leave you constantly uncertain?
The love story you’ve been sold doesn’t exist. But the love that does exist—the quiet, steady, show-up-every-day kind of love—is so much better than the fantasy.
It won’t always feel like fireworks. Some days it will feel like coming home after a long day and knowing you’re safe. Like having someone who knows your coffee order and your bad moods and loves you anyway. Like building something together one mundane moment at a time.
And that’s not the absence of magic. That’s what magic actually looks like when it’s real, sustainable, and built to last.
Real love doesn’t feel like the movies. It feels like home. It feels like peace. It feels like partnership. It feels like someone seeing all of you—the messy, imperfect, still-figuring-it-out parts—and choosing to stay anyway.
It feels like waking up next to someone and thinking, “I choose this. I choose you. I choose us. Not because it’s perfect, but because it’s real. Not because it’s easy, but because it’s worth it.”
That’s the love worth waiting for. That’s the love worth becoming ready for. That’s the love that actually lasts.
And it’s available to you the moment you stop chasing the wrong version and start building the right one.
What myths about love have you had to unlearn? What does real love look like in your life? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
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