Few of us can escape the pull of longing and desire. Aren’t we all susceptible to the heat that can ripen with a shared look or the unexpected brush of a hand against our own? In their absence, we can still feel the longing for them.

Single or coupled, married or divorced, we each are vulnerable to desire and loneliness. Recently, I woke from a deep sleep with a handful of words shimmering in my mind:

I want a trail of kisses up my spine,

A warm sure hand slipped into mine,

To wake, our bodies still entwined.

With those words repeating themselves in my head, I reflected on the longing that came to me from the deepest of sleep. That’s exactly what I want. As a divorced single mother, I have a limited amount of time left over for a relationship. Most of the time my life feels so full that I’m quite contented with casual dating and the names that come and go on my tongue, yielding to new names and new faces when interests change on either side.

I’ve been fortunate to have a number of lovely first dates, a few that turned into second and third and so on. I’ve not had a single nightmare of a date, for which I am eternally grateful. Still, there’s a part of me that would like someone to stay, to share with me what little time I do have for a relationship.

Few, if any, of us are immune to desire or the need for companionship. We all experience loneliness at some point, regardless of our relationship status. For those of us who are single after a divorce or lengthy relationship, we have to examine what we want, weighing out our need for independence with a need for someone with whom to share our lives.

With that thought in mind and those words playing out in my head, I began to catalog what I truly want, and don’t, in a relationship. Some of these feel universal, but what we want may differ in the details. What’s important is not what our list includes but that we know, deep down, exactly what we want so that we don’t find ourselves compromising on the very qualities that we need. When we know who we are and what we need, we’re more likely to wait for someone who can complement our lives rather than settling for any warm body to satisfy the feelings of loneliness.

Here are a few things that I want and some things I don’t (and have heard other single friends express a desire for in a relationship):

1. Clarity. We shouldn’t have to guess if we’re in a relationship or not. Let’s define this, even if the definition is casual. Let’s be clear about what we want.

2. Honesty. This goes hand in hand with clarity. If we’re not looking for serious, fine. If we want to be free to date other people, fine. Be upfront. There’s no need for deception. Let’s put those cards on the table so that we can both decide what we want from there.

3. Conversation. I cannot carry out an entire relationship by text/messenger/emojis. I’m a big fan of IRL, and I also use my phone to have actual conversations. Conversation often helps us figure out our common interests and can also be an indicator of chemistry (see #6).

4. Mutual interest. While we may be captivated by the adventures in your life, please don’t forget to ask about ours—and listen to what we have to say. (#1 Pet Peeve: Not listening. This is incredibly rude and disrespectful.) A relationship (of any kind, no matter how casual) is a two way street. This also applies to the bedroom (Read: Everything is not about you.)

5. Presence. When we’re together, let’s put the phones down. Silence the distractions. Taking selfies together and uploading them is one thing, but let’s keep the scrolling and texting to a minimum to show how much we value this time together.

6. Chemistry. This should really be my personal number one, except I believe chemistry is nothing without clarity, honesty, the ability to have a conversation, mutual interest in each other and being present. I absolutely have to have this for a significant other, and I think this is a universal qualifier.

7. Emotional Availability. This is another factor that is key! When we’re very much in touch with who we are and what we want, we need someone who can handle the ups and downs of life without immediately running away from emotions. We’re going to get sad. We’re going to get angry. There are times we’ll disagree. We can’t have a relationship with someone who is emotionally unavailable, regardless of the reason. We all have our past history and scars, but if we’re willing to be vulnerable with you, we need you to show up and be vulnerable, too.

8. Respect for Women. Pay attention, ladies. Someone who is disrespectful toward women in their lives (i.e., mothers, aunts, grandmothers, past exes) is not going to be able to respect us in the long run. Keep in mind that how they talk about their exes could be an indicator of how they’ll talk about us!

9. Stability. This is pretty basic. Most of us want a significant other who is gainfully employed and has some financial stability (i.e., can pay bills on time, take care of responsibilities, etc.). For me, this also extends to family. Does this person have children, and if so do they take care of them (emotionally and financially)? These are questions that we need to ask to find out if this is the kind of person we want to be with.

10. Confidence. Confidence, and the assertiveness that often goes with it, is very attractive. To me, there is little that is more of a turn off than someone talking about how much they don’t like themselves or how they don’t think that they’re attractive. I actually had a potential date state that he wanted to put off meeting because that seems to be how all of his relationships end. That statement was so loaded with self-pity and poor self-esteem that meeting no longer seemed like a good idea after all. We can’t provide anyone else with confidence so markers of poor self-esteem are often glaring red flags for potential problems.

This list is my own, and some of the qualifiers on it are broad, to allow some general flexibility. We all share a universal longing. Sometimes it feels undefined, and at other times it feels very specific indeed—for a particular friend or lover, a certain career, an object we would like to possess. While we may strive to practice non-attachment to these things, our very fragile human hearts often yearn.

With each new name and face we meet, there’s a whole world of possibility. There’s the chance to hear someone’s story and to share their time, whether for one date or many more. There’s the beauty of being there, our souls meeting for however long they’re meant to meet. We have the opportunity to be for someone else who they need and to find what we’re seeking, but we may also meet people who aren’t for us at all but point us in the direction we’re meant to be looking.

I’ve found that as long as we attend to these encounters with open hearts we’re able to authentically share our time with others. I know that I’ve encountered many men while dating who are perfectly lovely individuals, although not right for me. There is, of course, a knife’s edge of disappointment when the hope we nurture turns out to be misplaced in one person or another as we get to know them and learn they are not for us. Trusting my intuition has been an essential part of this process, and I try to keep both my heart and my eyes open with each person I meet.

Regardless of the outcome of our encounters, the longing to share our journeys is lovely and lonely and so universal. We can take comfort in the fact that the one we’re seeking is likely seeking us.

 

 

 

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Author: Crystal Jackson

Editor: Travis May

Image: Jeremy Cai/Unsplash