You’re Not Unlucky in Love…Your Picker Is Just Broken
Why you keep choosing the wrong partners (and the exact system to fix it)
“Why does this keep happening to me?”
When you find yourself in a bad pattern filled with failed relationships, complicated sitautionships, or messy breakups, it’s the most natural question to ask.
You know the answer. It’s just painful to admit.
The answer requires a harsh truth: You’re the common denominator in your relationships.
Someone is responsible for picking (and tolerating) these problematic partners.
It’s a sign that your dating and relationship “picker” is giving you trouble. Perhaps it’s fluky, faulty, or completely broken.
Well, it just so happens that I’m a bit of a picker mechanic.
First, we’ll see what’s going on and then I’ll share a 3-step system to get it fixed.
Why do smart, successful people keep picking the wrong partners?
This week I had a conversation with someone (Tara...not her real name) that prompted me to write this guide.
Tara is smart, accomplished, and beautiful. Anyone would consider her a “catch.” She should have no trouble finding a high quality guy. Except, it hasn’t happened. (Yet)
As she puts it, she’s “unlucky in love” and keeps finding herself in “shituationships” (I wish I had thought of that term myself). Of course, blaming this all on “luck” is incredibly disempowering and practically guarantees that the pattern will continue. It’s not luck, it’s a survival strategy that outlived its usefulness.
In this conversation Tara started by saying, “I think I’m doing it again.” The relationship she described is a month and a half old with a partner who admits he’s “not ready for commitment,” “not good at relationships,” and tells her “you can do better than me.” He has a decent job, but lives at home with mom, and spends his weekends doing drugs (he freely admits this) and hanging out at clubs.
We can all see the red flags, right?
Well, so could Tara. But…and this is HUGE…she could also see lots of hidden potential in this guy. (This, of course, requires lots of mental gymnastics and giving him the benefit of the doubt in every possible way…benefit of the doubt that he has not earned.)
Before anyone starts judging Tara, or think she’s being naive, blind, or believing you would never do this…you’re wrong. You would, and you have (to some degree). We’re all susceptible…who hasn’t picked the wrong partner for the wrong reasons and justified their decision after the fact? (I know I have)
In other words, all of us have imperfect pickers. How do you know if yours is faulty?
7 Symptoms of a Broken “Picker”
Here are several signs your picker could use some help:
You’re Dating Based on Hope - You’re falling for the fantasy of what you hope could be, instead of paying attention to what actually is. You date on imagined potential instead of actual reality.