Qualities you need to look for in a life partner

It can be hard to make your mind up when you’re searching for a spouse.

Because people have this way of looking their best while they’re dating, and ever showing you their good side. So how do you tell the sheep from the goats?

Fortunately, once you’ve decided someone is good looking enough, there are only a few other things you need to know before you can decide whether to marry them.

The first is whether they’re making their way in the world. Because there’s no point hitching yourself to someone who isn’t taking life seriously.

It’s fun being with a party animal, of course. But in the long run it’s more important that they’re financially stable.

You also need to decide whether their behaviour is ‘normal’. Maybe that sounds a bit extreme, but there really are people, both men and women, whose way of looking at the world makes them hard to live with.

PERSONALITY

Unfortunately, such people can seem very attractive to begin with, only to cause you endless distress as the years go by. So it’s a good idea to be sensitive to behaviour that’s even slightly weird.

For instance, don’t marry anyone who’s jealous, controlling or cruel. Or someone who’s driven by the need for attention, or is forever trying to make an impression.

They might seem intense and passionate to begin with, but the reality is different. And they can really make you miserable when things don’t go their way.

Then there are the people who seem utterly charming at first, but constantly explode into rage over the most trivial incidents.

So married life turns into one long battle not to upset them. Don’t marry someone who thinks they’re better than everyone else. They can be great fun when you first meet.

Exciting, charismatic, a little bit ‘dangerous’, and forever making breathtakingly romantic gestures. But in the longer term they try to dominate their partners, and are unfaithful, cold and unavailable.

NOTHING IN COMMON?

So take odd behaviour very seriously no matter how exciting it seems in the beginning.

Next, are your personalities sufficiently similar? Because you’ll be much happier with someone whose approach to life is reasonably close to yours.

So check out their interests and preferences. Nothing in common? Chances are you’ll not be happy together for long.

Are your ideas on politics, religion, possessions and money reasonably compatible? Then you’re likely to prosper as a couple.

And what about their attitude towards relationships? If you’re dating someone who’s highly independent, for example, while you can’t bear being apart, then there’s trouble ahead.

You also need to know whether you’re going to be happy together in bed. You’ll want your partner to be kind, sensitive and fun, of course. But the best indication is their smell.

Not their personal hygiene, their basic human smell, which is as distinctive as a fingerprint.

And if their smell is simply intoxicating? That’s your body telling you that it thinks you’ll be really great lovers.

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