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There’s a quiet pressure around dating; the idea is that every relationship is either a prelude to forever or a prelude to failure. It’s a binary that feels neat and decisive. It also completely misses the point.

Somewhere along the line, we decided that every relationship has to justify its existence by leading to forever. That if it doesn’t end in lifelong partnership, it’s a failure. A waste. Something you should have avoided altogether.

And that logic just doesn’t hold up for me.

Here’s the thing: When this isn’t how you approach romantic relationships, people tend to not understand. There’s a particular look people give when you say it out loud, “I’m serious about this person, and I don’t think it’s going to last.”

It’s confusion, maybe a little pity, sometimes even judgment. And almost inevitably, this question comes next: “Then why bother?”

I genuinely do not get this question. What do you mean, “Why bother?”

You bother because you like them. Because spending time together makes your life feel fuller, brighter and more interesting. You bother because not everything meaningful has to have some sort of end goal. 

What a strange, bleak way to move through the world — to deny yourself something good, simply because you know it won’t last forever.

This mindset is especially unfortunate in college. We are all in the middle of becoming — figuring out who you are, what you want and where you’re going. And yet, somehow, we cling to the idea that every romantic relationship should be evaluated based on whether it could last forever. As if that’s the only metric that gives it value.

Well, I disagree, and I think it’s a deeply unhealthy way to approach something as human as connection.

Not everything is meant to last forever. That doesn’t mean that it’s a failure or a waste; that’s just not how life works.

We don’t apply this logic to friendships. You likely don’t look back at a friendship that lasted a year and think, “Well, that was pointless since we’re not still close.” You recognize what it was. You appreciate what it gave you. You understand that people grow, circumstances change and sometimes things just end.

Why are romantic relationships held to a completely different, impossibly high standard? There’s this exhausting pressure to define everything, label it, categorize it and assign it a trajectory. How serious is it? Where is it going? Is this your person? Are you wasting your time?

And in the middle of all that questioning, people forget to actually experience the relationship they’re in.

It is possible and fulfilling to be deeply invested in someone without treating the relationship like a long-term investment strategy. You can care about someone, commit to them, show up for them and still acknowledge that, for any number of reasons, it may not be permanent.

That doesn’t cheapen it. If anything, it makes it more honest because you’re choosing it anyway.

You’re not there because it fits neatly into a life plan or because it checks the right boxes; you’re there because you want to be, because you like this person, because the connection is worth it on its own, not just as a means to some imagined future.

And yes, maybe it will end. Maybe it will hurt. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth having.

I think we’ve gotten too comfortable framing relationships in extremes: it either ends in heartbreak or it ends in lifelong partnership. As if those are the only two outcomes that carry any meaning. As if everything else is just a detour, a mistake or a waste of time.

It’s such a reductive way to understand something that is inherently complex.

All relationships shape us. They teach us things about ourselves we wouldn’t learn any other way. They push us, challenge us, soften us and sometimes break us open in ways that ultimately make us better, more self-aware people. That doesn’t only happen in relationships that last forever. In fact, it often happens in the ones that don’t.

I am not the same person I was before I loved the people I’ve loved — even the ones who didn’t stay. Especially the ones who didn’t stay.

They’ve left behind pieces — ways of thinking, ways of caring, memories and growth. These pieces are a part of who I am. That doesn’t disappear just because the relationship did.

So no, I don’t think we should care all that much about finding “the one.” I think it’s a waste to deny yourself connection because you’re so fixated on the ending that you refuse to engage with the middle. We miss out on so much when we don’t just allow ourselves to have experiences for the sake of it. 

There is something incredibly freeing about letting go of the idea that every relationship has to justify itself through longevity. It’s freeing to be able to say: This matters to me, and there is love here, even if it’s not forever.

And maybe that makes people uncomfortable. Maybe it’s easier to believe that love only counts if it’s permanent, or that anything else is just setting yourself up to get hurt.

But to me, what’s actually sad is the alternative — living your life so cautiously, so conditionally that you only allow yourself to care when there’s a possible guarantee attached.

There are no guarantees. Not in relationships, and not in life. So yes, I’ll “bother.”

I’ll bother to show up, to care, to build something with someone, even if I know it has an end date. I’ll bother to experience something good while it’s here, instead of dismissing it because it doesn’t fit a lifelong narrative.

Because not everything meaningful is meant to last forever.

And honestly? What a waste it would be to only let yourself love the things that do.

Reach Hannah Parcells at letters@collegian.com or on social media @hannahparcellsmedia.