What have you LEARNED from dating and breaking up?

Specifically, what personality characteristics you want in a mate?

Welcome to the forum! I moved your thread over here to breaking up because I thought it would be much more visible to people who would find your question and the responses helpful.

I learned a lot from my exes, which led me to finding my husband. From one ex, I learned I needed someone who had ambition and career aspirations. From another ex, I learned I did not want someone who was in the same field as me because we would get into each other’s head too much.

I came out of a relationship that was so unfulfilling to me I didn’t know what I wanted. Dating gave me the opportunity to figure that out. When a relationship didn’t work out for me, rather than feel like a failure (which I did) I would focus on what this short term relationship taught me that I wanted in other partners.

For example; I dated this one guy who loved to cook. He used to host parties for his friends (some single and some in relationships so that he could cook for them) I realized that I wanted to date a guy who appreciated good food, good wine and good friendships.

I dated another guy who was very affectionate. Just enought PDA to let me and others know that he was attracted to me. He taught me that I really wanted to be in a relationship where a guy was affectionate most if not all the time.

I have learned from my ex’s, but at the same time there’s a bit of the bittersweet in the factor of timing. There are people I’m meeting now who I would have loved to have dated 10 years ago - when I was in full -on “family” mode. At that time, I met many people who were not into the home life, wanted to travel, etc - things that I can do now. There seems to be a lot of “right person, wrong time” in my experience.

Most of what I’ve learned about relationships I’ve learned about myself, not about others.