One of the biggest mistakes that people make is falling in love too young. Investing nearly all your time and effort into someone else, before you even know how to love yourself properly: that is the biggest mistake.
Simply, don’t be in a super-serious relationship at fifteen or sixteen. Mess around, kiss more than just that one person – find out what and whom you enjoy the company of. Have fun!
As a teenager, you are still growing, have braces, don’t know how to fill in your eyebrows… nothing screams ‘romance’ quite like that!
You’re at an age where you don’t listen to your parents’ advice because you believe your opinion is the only opinion, and that they don’t really know what’s best for you.
Unfortunately, the danger of being in such a serious relationship at such a fragile age is that you end up learning how to be someone’s girlfriend, not yourself. You’ll learn how to be dependent instead of independent.
You give up a lot of the things you love, because you immerse yourself in the relationship as opposed to your hobbies, learning and work. You inevitably prioritise them over your family, missing events and spending those younger years away from relatives and friends.
You waste vast quantities of time unnecessarily worrying about whether it will last forever, cheating, or what to get them for the endless amount of occasions that require presents – odds are they will eventually just end up in the bin.
And finally, you find yourself having all these milestones in your life that are inherently attached to someone else – these memories (depending on whether it lasts or not), are tainted if the relationship ends.
These precious years are a time for learning to love and know yourself first: don’t get so caught up in the drama and romance and hurt that accompanies a serious relationship at 16. Have fun, make mistakes and most of all love learning about you!
If, years on, you are reading this and you did get into a relationship when you were young and it didn’t work out, don’t regret the relationship. You know what love is, and a lot of people your age don’t. But loving someone else before loving yourself? Now that you can regret.
