Your partner isn’t perfect and you must stop expecting them to be perfect.
You may idealise them in the first stage of the relationship but it’s important to remember they’re not an angel but they’re merely human.
Putting someone up on a pedestal devalues them and can make them feel very uncomfortable. You objectify them by placing them up above the level of flawed humanity.
You’re not perfect either but by putting someone up on a pedestal you’re digging a hole for yourself to stare up at them! We diminish ourselves because we perceive them as something beyond what they really are and something that they’re not. This can lead to a very unbalanced power play of a relationship or a very codependent prickly hedge!
You might over-give of yourself and put all the work into the relationship to try to “earn” that persons affection.
There’s no true intimacy in these relationships because that pedestal creates a gap between you of inauthenticity.
Many spiritual teachings say that when we gaze into the eyes of our lover we are gazing at a reflection of ourselves, as we are all created as an image of the Divine.
Perhaps in staying grounded in our own authenticity and our own “humanness” we can try to stop seeing our partner as a vision of perfection. Rather loving them as a fellow imperfect human.
Allow your partner to just be.
Cat O Dowd
Relationship Counsellor-Sex Therapist-Art Psychotherapist
