How important is a relationship in your life?

When looking for a relationship, one of the most important questions to ask yourself is not simply “Do I want a relationship?” but “How important do I want a relationship to be in my life?” Understanding this can help you gain clarity about your priorities, create a healthier balance, and identify whether your current lifestyle truly leaves room for the kind of relationship you want.

The first question: “How important do I want a relationship to be in my life?” is a basic factor to be aware of when looking for a new relationship.

Imagine a scale from “Not at all important” to “It is everything”. You can write this on a piece of paper to help you visualise that scale.

The “My Life” box exercise

Next draw a diagram to represent how important you want a relationship to be in your life.

Draw a box that represents your life on a piece of paper and call this “My Life Box”.

Then ask yourself: “How important do I want a relationship to be in my life?”

Draw a heart in the “My Life” box to represent this. In the “My Life” box, fill in all the things in your life that are not part of the relationship and are important to you.

How much room do you need for them?

How much of your life do you want to give to a relationship?

Making space for a relationship

You might realise through doing this exercise that at the moment, a relationship is not that important in your life, and perhaps that is why you are not finding one.

You may want a relationship, but realise that your life is so full of everything else that there is no room, and you might need to clear out some “stuff” to make room for a relationship if that is what you really want.

Creating a healthy balance

It is not a very balanced option to make the relationship everything in your life.

It is essential for your own life balance that you always have some interests: work, hobbies and friends that are yours because ultimately, what can you bring to a relationship if you lose yourself within it?

If you feel a relationship is the only thing in your life, maybe 90% or more important in your life, perhaps you need to think about finding more things for yourself so you have more balance.

If a relationship that you have invested everything in and is 100% importance to your life should end, then how will you feel when, for whatever reason, it is gone?

Your priorities will change over time

This scale is not set in stone. It will change depending on what is going on in your life and what your priorities are at that specific time.

You may be going for a promotion or studying, so you have less time to give to a relationship.

It is about how important you want it to be. The idea is to help you reflect and figure out objectively where you are now.

Perhaps you may want or need to change something in your life to find a relationship, or perhaps you need to invest more or less than you have been doing to better the relationship you have.