Recently, I was talking to a woman I’ll call Jenny.
Jenny told me that when she was dating she always had walls up.
She was emotionally unavailable.
She tried everything—read self help books and took seminars.
But her walls remained fixed and impermeable.
Then she met a guy and as they started dating, her walls came down—naturally and effortlessly.
“I didn’t do anything differently but all of a sudden, I became emotionally available,” she told me.
“I’m not surprised,” I said.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Here’s the thing. You definitely WERE emotionally unavailable for all those years. But that’s because you weren’t supposed to be available to the wrong guys.”
She saw her detachment as a problem.
But it was actually protection!
She was being protected from guys who weren’t for her.
And once she met the right one, everything fell into place.
She’d never thought of it that way.
She’d bought into the notion that if you’re single for a long time, there must be something wrong with you.
But actually, there was nothing wrong with her—she’d just been with the wrong guys!
Photo by Artem Kovalev on Unsplash