Unless you are in your very first relationship with someone who's in their very first relationship, you're going to have to deal with your feelings and your partner's feelings about previous relationships. Most of us get to this stage before we're out of high school, but no one has bothered to tell us how to deal with the vast array of emotions that surface because of these previous relationships. What happens when these feelings are negative and self-destructive?
First serious relationship or tenth serious relationship, feelings of jealousy and insecurity can cause a lot of stress. These are feelings of wanting to control the other person. We all want to subtly, and sometimes directly, control other people - our friends, our parents, our boyfriends, our co-workers. We want to make them do, act, and say the things that we feel is best.
How to Deal With Jealousy and Insecurity
The easiest solution is to try to let go and understand that you simply can't control another person. You can love them and they can love you, but you simply cannot control them and make them act the way you want them to. This is an illusion that has shattered countless relationships.
One of the biggest underlying problems troubling relationships today is that people feel like they "own" their partner. This is the real reason behind fear, anger, jealousy, insecurity, and similar types of feelings. The best thing to do is to just allow other people to be themselves and love them for who they are and not who you want them to be.
Jealousy and Insecurity About Past Relationships
It doesn't matter who he or she has been with before. It's those decisions and those relationships that have made your partner the person you're in love with today. In the same respect, it's your experiences, or lack of experiences that make you the person that your partner loves today.
Live your lives together, enjoy each other today, and be happy on your journey together.
Article comments
1 - diana hartman
Congratulations! This article has been selected for syndication to Boston.com, where it will be enjoyed by even more readers.
2 - heather
hey i really have a hard time because of my past relationships i have had was were i was getting controled the person i was with and i dont trust my girlfriend at all but i don't know how to let that go because of my past ones because they cheated on me
3 - unkknown
this doesn't help at all... it's easy for them to say it but it's very hard to do...
4 - anonymous
yeah - easier said than done... especially when you broke up with your girlfriend for just a few months and she banged two guys during that time.....
5 - nick
Thought this was great,just wish my girl had enough self worth to read it.
6 - keepin on keepin on
My wife came from an open marriage, she has been around the block many times, My difficulty comes from my own insecurities, I learned to lean on the trust of what she says and belief hat she will do as she says. If she violates that trust then shame on me for not being all she needs.
7 - keepin on keepin on
btw...great article
8 - addison
yeah yeah we get it. we have to move on and forgive and forget blah blah blah. Apparently the person who wrote this article has never been in that kind of situation because its not that easy.
9 - cynic
I think the article writer underestimates the feeling of wishing something in the past never happened. There's nothing you can do to change it, but there's also nothing you can do to get over it. We've evolved to feel these emotions. It's fundamentally all to do with getting your genes passed on, rather than another persons, though knowing this does nothing to help you cope.
I had to read twice to make sure I hadn't missed anything. Apparently the article does actually completely lack anything useful and instead only contains clíches.
10 - facepalm
I'm really glad I'm not the only one reading this article in desperate search of help, only to be phenomenally disappointed by hollow platitudes.
The author of this article also went on to provide such insights as "The Cure to Alcoholism: Just Stop Drinking" and "Why have Cancer? Just don't have Cancer, and be awesome instead!"
11 - toughin it out
i have recently discovered a way to help deal with insecurities as i have tons of them. i realized that i always dwell on people's pasts, be it good times or relationships and focused so hard on what i thought was a better life than mine that i downplayed my own. so i compiled a sort of journal to remind myself of good memories and past relationships. after looking at that list it made me much more appreciative of my life and made me realize that everyone has their own past and since we all live such different lives there is no way that we can expect to have the same experiences as someone else. the article is not extremely helpful but does provide the basic structure for acceptance.
12 - Talbert
This article is like most dealing with this issue. They tell you to "just get over it", "be happy with your partner". All of this is good advice but I think people are more interested in "how" they get over their insecurities. If it was so easy we could tell alcoholics and drug addicts to "just stop". It's always easier said than done.