Modern Dating Almost Ruined Me — Until I Was Finally Brutally Honest With Myself

I was painfully single for a really long time and there came a point when I started to realize I was becoming far too bitter and negative. I really couldn’t help myself; I’d dealt with a countless number of jerks and had more games run on me than I could handle. Eventually, my bad experiences took their toll on my enthusiasm and I started to truly feel like my potential for a happy, forever relationship was completely hopeless. I had to fight really hard to climb back out of the black hole I created, but I did thankfully. These are the harsh truths I had to face to get there:

1. It was partially and sometimes completely my own fault. I liked to place blame on every single guy I encountered, but the demise of the relationship wasn’t always all on them, or sometimes at all. Looking back, I think I got so used to being screwed over that I would inadvertently self-sabotage any new opportunities I came across with new guys by becoming gravely insecure and constantly in defense mode, ready to call him out for being just like the player I was used to. It wasn’t healthy.
2. Every guy isn’t a jerk, even if it seems like so many are. Even if modern dating culture has warped many male minds into thinking they’re entitled to bang and use any girl they please without considering their feelings, there ARE also a lot of amazing guys who don’t believe in any of the crap. Sure, they might be extremely rare and more difficult to come by, but they do exist, so it was unfair for me to jump to the conclusion that all guys were just out to hurt me.
3. I was being way too over-sensitive about certain issues. Perhaps I dated just one too many jerks and my caution and defenses were justified, but when I truly think about it, everyone deserves a clean slate until proven wrong. I needed to stop losing my head when a guy pulled back. I needed to stop taking the innocent comments of my friends and twisting them into a personal attack on me. Basically, I needed to chill the hell out and escape the no chill negativity I was stewing in.
4. I was jealous AF of anyone around me who was happy, and that was a problem. There was something about being painfully single and having a hard time in my dating life that made me inherently bitter and downright rude sometimes about the happiness of other couples. I’d convince myself that it was all fake and that a happiness like that couldn’t possibly exist. The truth is, I was too bitter and resentful about my own life to believe in what I saw around me, which is likely why I couldn’t find it. I needed to believe first.
5. Negativity attracts more negativity. The law of attraction isn’t a joke. If I’m bitter about dating crappy guys and constantly upset at the universe about it, guess what? I’m just going to keep attracting MORE crappy guys, and that’s exactly what happened. I needed to focus on being more optimistic about love, even though it was hard to wrap my mind around. It truly did take me a long time, a lot of meditation, a lot of positive self-talk and changing my thought patterns to get there, but as I started to progress, I saw the quality of the guys I was meeting start to change for the better.
6. If I wanted to find love, I needed to actually believe in it completely. Some people may get lucky in the love department, but it was crystal clear from what kept happening to me that the same logic wasn’t true for me. I needed to work harder, not in the sense of what I could do for a guy I’m into, but in what I was feeding myself. Being a Negative Nancy wasn’t going to earn me any kind of love, so I needed to believe that love was truly out there waiting for me to find it. I just needed to stop being a whining little brat first.
7. I let my bitter emotions about failed attempts at love affect other areas of my life. When a person gets sucked too far into the negative emotions that modern dating culture can bring, it trickles into other areas. For me, there was a point that I became so bitter, I was pretty much miserable to be around. I didn’t want to be that girl anymore. I’m a naturally bubbly, happy and cheerful person, but I had sunk so low from the douchebags that I didn’t realize how negatively it was affecting other areas and other relationships in my life. I either had to shape up and snap out of it or crumble beyond repair.
8. I really, REALLY needed to get my act together. It was finally time to put my head on straight. No more generalized guy bashing, no more disbelief in real love and no more sacrificing my happiness just because a few situations didn’t go as planned. I started to focus on being more grateful, on improving my health and removing toxic and negative people out of my life. I had to have a no nonsense attitude about getting out of the chronic bitterness I had stumbled into.
9. I needed to follow my own heart and not everyone else’s opinions. Even though some of my friends tried to be helpful at times, I allowed their fear mongering to get in my head and spin my thoughts out of control. Enough was enough. From then on, the only thing I was going to allow guide me was my heart and my gut feelings. I’m looking for love, not to appease everyone else by playing by their rules. I knew all too well that what might have worked for some doesn’t necessarily work for others.
10. No matter how many times I get screwed over, I need to keep believing. Perhaps it’s just that hindsight is 20/20, but when I look back at how I used to view dating and how I used to deal with any new guy in my life, I was truly bitter AF and it wasn’t good for anyone — especially not for my goal of finding real love. The truths may have been harsh for me to embrace, but it was absolutely necessary because once I escaped my bitterness, I unexpectedly and FINALLY found love.