The Endless Loop of Falling for the Wrong People
Human beings are hopeless. We can spot a red flag from a mile away, call it potential, and then sprint straight into it like we’re collecting emotional trauma for reward points.
I’ve fallen for the same kind of person so many times I could open a museum. Sometimes they change a little — different smile, different scent, maybe a new face left on my pillow — but that’s about it. Same movie, new actor. I swear I’m done every time. I say the line. I even mean it. Then some shiny new disaster walks in, laughs at my jokes, and my brain goes, “This time, maybe they’ll be the one to destroy me nicely.”
Why We Keep Doing It (Even When We Know Better)
We’re professionals at chasing different results with the same old stupidity. We swear off chaos, then swipe right on it again the minute it uploads a cute profile picture.
Maybe we’re not addicted to love — maybe we’re addicted to recognition. The pattern feels familiar, and familiar feels safe, even when it’s the thing that keeps killing us.
We dump one emotional vampire, post a quote about “self-worth,” and then fall for another one — just better dressed and slightly more polite about the damage. We call it healing, but really we’re just rebranding the same mistake.
And when it crashes (because it always does), we don’t admit it was our fault. We say things like “They fooled me” or “They changed.” No, they didn’t. You just didn’t want to notice.
Familiar Pain Feels Safer Than Real Change
Real love requires patience, honesty, boredom — three things most of us are allergic to. We’d rather chase the highs and lows, the drama, the guessing games. Stability feels foreign, and foreign feels fake.
So we keep replaying heartbreak like a favourite song: same lyrics, different verse. We tell ourselves it’s romantic, that maybe we just “love deeply.” No — we love poorly, passionately, and predictably. Because at least pain keeps its promises.
We romanticise “second chances,” but they’re just reruns with better excuses. “They’ve changed.” “I’ve grown.” “This time’s different.” It never is. Familiar misery beats unfamiliar peace because peace doesn’t give us adrenaline.
The Myth of Moving On
We think we want change, but mostly we want movement — something that looks like progress so we don’t have to sit alone and admit we’re repeating history.
So we “work on ourselves,” buy self-help books, write affirmations, delete numbers we’ll eventually retype at 1 a.m. We don’t heal; we just decorate our denial.
Real growth isn’t aesthetic. It’s ugly, lonely, humiliating. It’s saying, “I’m the problem,” and not dressing it up in poetry. It’s deleting the contact and the fantasy.
Breaking the Pattern
Change doesn’t start when you find someone new. It starts when you stop needing to be saved from yourself.
Stop worshipping chaos and calling it passion. Stop mistaking adrenaline for affection. Love shouldn’t feel like gambling with your sanity.
If you really want different results, betray your pattern. Walk away when it still hurts to do it. Don’t wait for closure. Don’t wait for “maybe this time.”
Magic doesn’t live in repetition.
It lives in the interruption —
that one quiet moment you finally say, “No, I’ve seen this movie. I know how it ends.”rns.
If you’re into repeating mistakes but smiling about it, The Dark Side of Positive Thinking is basically your sequel.
Still here? That’s either loyalty or curiosity — I’ll take both.
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