Love shouldn’t feel painful or miserable or unsafe

Mar 5

We make love way too complicated when we choose the wrong people to try to build it with.

I had a wake up call in my twenties that forced me to look at my patterns in love.

Actually, I had three wake-up calls. Because if I’m being totally honest, I did not get the lesson the first time around (and that’s okay, most of us don’t).

Moment #1

The first one came at age twenty-four when I realized that I was scared every single moment of the relationship I was in at the time. I never felt like I could fully relax, because I was always worried about which version of him I’d be getting. I was constantly preoccupied with thoughts about how to be good enough for him, strategizing over how to make him stay.

As you can imagine, it was not a healthy relationship.

But at the time, I was so deeply in love with him (or so I thought), that I was willing to do whatever it took to keep him around. Fast forward through a year and a half of that, and my nervous system was fried. I knew I couldn’t do it anymore, and some part of me knew it wasn’t supposed to feel this way.

Love shouldn’t constantly make me afraid of what’s going to come next.

The problem was, I was as terrified to end things as I was to stay. If I stayed, I knew it would only be a matter of time before I had a genuine psychotic break. Being with him was breaking my spirit every single day and I couldn’t do it anymore. But I was also incredibly fearful of how he would react to me leaving. I wasn’t ready to face it, and the truth is that I prayed to a god I didn’t yet believe in to end it for me. And miraculously, he did.

After things ended, I immediately began regulating my nervous system and processing the intensity of what just happened. I also began to look at the shadow side of things - the unconscious reason I chose him and accepted that kind of treatment in the first place. And what I found was a belief that love is inherently scary and unstable, and that I have to constantly work for it. He was a perfect mirror for the wounds I had yet to address.

>> by the way, this is how it goes.

We choose people who are a perfect representation of the wounds that our psyche is still trying to heal, and we try to get the story to play out differently with them. The problem with that approach is that we’re often choosing people with their own unconscious wounding that is guaranteed to hurt us in the same way we’ve been hurt in the past. It’s like a self-fulfilling prophecy. A really sad and exhausting one.

Moment #2

So after him, I vowed to choose differently. And I did, sort of. I chose someone happy, fun, playful, generous, and emotionally stable. I could predict how he would act 100% of the time. I loved how carefree I felt spending time with him, and let myself enjoy being treated well. It was light-hearted and joyful, until I realized that that’s all it was. It became clear that I wanted more of an emotional connection than he did, and that our fun little bubble really only worked if I had no needs other than wanting a good time.

So once again, I found myself neck-deep in a connection that I thought was love, but had me saying to myself: “it shouldn’t feel like this. I’m losing myself just to please him and totally losing the plot in my own life as a result. If it doesn’t feel safe for me to be me, then this probably isn’t love.”

Where the last guy showed me I believed love = fear, this one showed me I believed love = self-abandonment.

And that time, I had the strength to leave. I had the clarity to know better and to finally choose myself.

Moment #3

So off I went again, back into the world to find The One. I made a list and everything, detailing all the things I wanted in a partner and was determined to find. And I did. I found exactly what I had written on my list at the time.

Everything seemed so wonderful with this one, I figured I finally did it. I found the elusive soulmate love I’d been searching for. I didn’t feel scared and I wasn’t self-abandoning to keep him around, so we were off to a good start. When we were together, things felt so easy and peaceful, and I assumed that was the missing ingredient in my past relationships. Only we couldn’t quite seem to make it work, and it took me a long time to figure out why.

On paper, everything about us made sense. It should’ve clicked. But it never did, and for me it all came down to one simple fact: I could never fully exhale around him. My body could never fully soften, because though he felt familiar, he didn’t feel safe. And it’s not a reflection of his character. He was a wonderful person with many amazing qualities. But he lacked the consistency and emotional stability that I needed in order to feel safe enough to go deep. And love doesn’t stay on the surface.

Love requires us to have needs, and get messy, and make mistakes, and feel safe enough to come back and repair.

If you can’t do that, you’re going to have a hard time building anything real.

The mistake I made was thinking that easy and peaceful equated to safe love. In this instance, it felt easy because we never really challenged each other to go to vulnerable emotional depths. It felt peaceful because I never allowed myself to be in conflict with him or express big emotions. And if you can’t be vulnerable or express your emotions, it’s not actually safe love, no matter how calm it feels.

In fact, safe love will often cause us to feel MORE emotion, not less.

The difference is that there’s a kind and loving container to process and repair what comes up, rather than having to repress it like you may have in the past. Safe love exists when both people are taking accountability for their inner work, while also being willing to help each other grow and heal. And that’s the kind of connection worth getting uncomfortable for.

So now it’s your turn. What have you come to believe about love?

If you’re not sure, take a look at your relationships (past and present). They’re a mirror for what you feel worthy of, what you believe is possible, and what you’ve come to expect. If they’re working for you, then great! But if they’re not, this is your opportunity to ask yourself the hard questions and get to the kind of healing that ultimately brings you closer to love.

If you’ve ever found yourself saying, “I don’t think it should feel this way”, you’re probably right. And if you’re ready to do something about it, check the links below to find out how I can support you…

with love,

Megan

ps…if you want to learn more about calling love, authenticity and JOY into your life, you can work with me 1:1, follow me on TikTok for no BS advice, and even attend my 2026 retreat for women - it will change your life!

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