Dealing with Blind Spots

Ever heard of Blind spots?

Someone once told me that "when you get into a relationship, you drop your brain at the door" lol

Point is, a whole lot of us become blind to alot of things when we start dating a person we really like/love.

So I'd like to briefly highlight ways to make sure we don't get too blindly to notice important things such as red flags in a relationship.

A Blind Spot in the context I'm using it is an "inability to recognize a fact or think clearly about a certain topic or person, especially because of a prejudice or in the case of a relationship, because of "Love" 

It's what people talk about when they use sentences like "He's blinded by Love"

The truth is this when we're clouded by emotions, it becomes quite easy for us to excuse things that are supposed to be red flags, make decisions based off of our feelings and sometimes , even go to the extent of making enemies of people around who try to tell us the truth or rather, what they feel about certain situation.

Here are things I think we can put in place to avoid an "I should have known better" situation:

1. Assume that you have Blind Spots.

 I once read in the book "Good leaders ask Great questions" by John Maxwell. It said:

"If you don’t believe that you have blind spots, that is your blind spot!"

The truth is that most of us don't see clearly in the midst of raging hormones, which is why it's important that certain things like your values, standards and boundaries are settled even before you start a relationship. 

Never assume that you're completely immune to the effect being strongly attracted to a person has on you. It's safer to assume that you may just have blind spots and work on being able to identify them.

2. Remind yourself periodically of the values you had before the relationship started.

Alot of us had a lot of goals and ideas of what our relationship/marriage would look like, the things we can tolerate and the things we can't.  

I'm sure a number of the people who end up tolerating and even justifying a toxic relationship never set out to do so. 

This is why I think it necessary to periodically (and even when things in your relationship are "good") remind yourself of the values and standards you had prior to the relationship and see if by any chance, there are lines you had promised never to cross that you might have crossed in the name of Love. 

And if you're still single, I advice that you start to write your values and convictions down, deciding not to bend things that shouldn't be bent especially things that has to do with your Faith.

3. Intelligently consider the things your friends notice.

Permit me to start by advising that you have people around you that will tell you the truth even when others are lying.

Your close friends are sometimes not surprised at your "breakup"and this is because they've already noticed the things you realized at the end and probably just didn't want to highlight it. 

So when your friends do highlight things they've noticed that are sources of concern, give great attention to it.

I will give a couple of disclaimers here

Take note of the operating words in this key point:

i. "Friends" - not acquaintances or random people

ii. "Intelligently consider" meaning do not conclude on a subject solely based on a friends remark as they may not always be correct about their suggestions so consider before deciding if to agree or not. But do not be quick to dismiss their concerns and call it jealousy, instead you might want to consider my last suggestion.

4. Godly counseling

It doesn't hurt to speak to a Godly counselor about your concerns in a relationship. 

It is adviced that two people in a relationship have a Godly person they are accountable to as a matter of fact.

Ofcourse we're all human and can be mistaken or biased in our views and advice but then you have the Holy Spirit so you are not without help. 

In any case, do not ignore the place of Godly counsel.

I really hope this post helps us. 

I'm open to thoughts, ideas or advice on this subject so please leave a comment and share the post.

 

Until my next blog post, Stay happy!