How to Know When Love Is Real

Ever wonder why it’s so hard to determine whether something is truly genuine or flat-out fake?

I’m talking about how to know when love is real.

More than anything in the world, I wanted to own a piece of that magical love that would move me to genuine happiness, confidence, and security in who I was and what my life was to become.

You know, the one that the Disney princesses had, and the one from “The Notebook”, and the one that all those RomCom characters found in the end!
I know, I know, I have high standards!
But I’ll tell you what, even when I thought I found “the One” I still felt squeamish inside.  I had no idea if I was making the right decision to give him my whole heart.
And this guy had just about all the right things that I was going for at the time:
He was smart and highly educated,
Very creative and admired the arts,
Healthy and took care of himself,
Was one heck of a dresser (it made me step my game up!)
And he cared deeply for me.
Seems like I found love, right?  The answer to all my love-life riddles.  This HAD to be real love.

How do you know when the love you found is actually real?

Crazy story… you ready for it?  Here goes.
Like any confused girl, I denied his feelings for me for an entire year!  I dragged this guy on and on, going back and forth as to why I thought it could work out, and/or why it would go terribly wrong!
We finally had to see where this “relationship” was going and decided to spend an entire weekend together.
Much to say, he was very excited.  He planned out the entire weekend!  I’m talking about events, meals, the whole nine.  And I was… well… scared.  I mean, my whole future was about to be determined in this one weekend!  I had no idea what to think!  After all the breakups I’ve been through, for all I knew it would’ve been a trap!  Moving on…
After the first day together, things were great.  We had a fabulous time of wining and dining.
On the morning of the second day, I woke up before him so things were a bit awkward.  I was away from my home and everything felt foreign.  So after several attempts of trying to get him to wake up, I decided to do my thing.

I decided to pray this out.

Sidenote:  I wasn’t much a prayer back in those days.  In fact, I probably only started having faith in God just a few months prior.  I had no idea what I was actually doing but I felt a strong sense of peace knowing that I could process my thoughts and emotions with a God who had things more in control than I did.
In a nutshell, I began to trust God with my love-life.  And while it didn’t make any sense to me at the time, I was sure that it did for God.  So that was good enough for me.

If you find yourself having trouble trusting God with YOUR love-life, then take my free test and see which areas of your love-life could use a trust boost!

Mind you, I didn’t feel an encounter with God during that time.  There were no deep revelations, no miraculous anything.  In fact, I felt a bit foolish for even doing it because nothing actually happened.
Or so I thought…
After spending the second day together, something began to feel “off”.
I couldn’t lay my guard down with this guy, despite how nice and romantic he was towards me.
Once the third day rolled in, something actually did happen, and I owe it all to God.

I lost all attraction to this man.

One second it was there.  The next it was completely gone.
As we sat together, watching football (because apparently that’s somehow always worked into any weekend getaway with a man!) I tried with every fiber in me to determine where my attraction for him went.  Not his smile, nor his looks, nor his future ambitions, nor anything we shared throughout an entire year lead me to want this man anymore.
Needless to say, things went rather south after this.  The excitement was gone.

Suddenly, I knew without a shadow of a doubt that this was NOT my Mr. Right, and I had to get out of there fast!

It took a LOT of guts for me to leave him wondering what the heck happened and to end our relationship.  Especially with everything going so right.  There was no explanation I could give him to explain my emotional reaction, and why I thought was best for us to part ways.  It was one of the hardest breakups I ever had to go through.  For once, I totally got the saying, “It’s not you, it’s me.”  It was bad.
Related Post:  What To Do When A Good Man Isn’t Good Enough

This is where most women go wrong:

They choose their “Mr. Close-Enough” because he’s been the best companion (so far) and is afraid to give him up in order to find God’s Mr. Right!!  It’s a matter of deep trust and some just aren’t willing to go there.
I’m so thankful to have closed that door in my love-life because later that year (almost an entire year later) I met my Mr. Right.

So how did I know that his love was real?  The very same way that I discovered that the love from Mr. Almost was not real:  I prayed.

And because I continued to feel a peace to get to know my husband more and more, that freaked me out so I would pray even more!  Yet, I continued to feel a great sense of peace to get closer to him.  And before I knew it, Mr. Right not only was right, but he felt right.  A future with him felt right.
Throughout our entire friendship and relationship, I prayed.
We prayed together about our relationship and I prayed on my own about the woman I was, that my relationship with God would not waver, and for God to prepare me to become the girlfriend/fiancé/future wife that He was calling me to be.
So my dear friends, how do you determine if the love in your life is genuinely real?
How do you when to keep pursuing this love or when to call it quits?

You pray.  And you rely on God to show up.  Because He will.  Each and every time.

Has there ever been something that God revealed to you in your life that leads you to know when a love was real or not?

Share your experience in the comments below!