Before asking, “Is this the right person for me?”, have you ever asked, “Do I know myself well enough?” Dolly Ohanyere explores why that question matters.
Most women enter relationships asking the wrong question. They ask, “Is he the right person?” before they have ever honestly asked, “Am I the right person?” And the relationship pays the price for that unanswered question, not immediately or dramatically, but slowly, quietly, and consistently – in the arguments that go in circles, in the needs that cannot be named, in the dissatisfaction that has no clear address.
Here is what I have observed across years of coaching individuals and couples: the quality of every relationship you enter is determined primarily by the quality of your relationship with yourself. Your identity, your understanding of who you are, what you value, what you will and will not accept, and where you are going, is the foundation on which every relationship is built. A weak foundation produces a weak structure. It does not matter how beautiful the building looks from the outside.
Identity answers the most fundamental question a human being can ask: Who am I? Not who my parents raised me to be. Not who my past relationships shaped me into. Not who I present myself to be in public. Who I actually am at the level of my deepest values, my honest desires, and my genuine convictions.
When you do not know who you are, you will allow relationships to define you. You will stay too long in situations that diminish you because you have no clear sense of what you deserve. You will attract partners who are drawn to your uncertainty rather than your strength. You will make decisions from fear and loneliness rather than from clarity and wholeness.
When you know who you are, everything changes. You choose differently. You communicate differently. You hold your boundaries without apology. You enter relationships from a place of fullness rather than need. You are not looking for someone to complete you; you are looking for someone to complement you. Those are very different searches, and they produce very different results.
This is not about perfection. It is not about having everything figured out before you are allowed to love or be loved. It is about doing the honest, sometimes uncomfortable work of knowing yourself well enough that you can show up in a relationship as a whole person rather than a half looking for its other half.
The relationship you are in right now, or the one you are hoping for, is only as strong as your identity, not your partner’s identity, Yours.
5 ways to understand yourself better before love
1 Know your values
What do you genuinely stand for? Not what sounds good, but what you actually live by. Your values are the non-negotiables that determine which relationships will honour you and which will erode you. Write down your top five and ask honestly: Does my relationship reflect these?
2 Know your patterns
Every person carries patterns from their history into their relationships. The way you respond to conflict, to distance, to love, to disappointment, these are shaped by what you witnessed and experienced long before you met your partner. Name your patterns. They are running your relationship whether you acknowledge them or not.
3 Know what you need
Not what you want someone to give you. What you genuinely need to feel safe, loved, and respected in a relationship. Most people cannot name this. They feel the absence of it but cannot articulate it. A person who cannot name what they need cannot ask for it and cannot recognise when it is being given.
4 Know your worth
Not your achievements. Not your title or your salary or what others say about you. Your inherent worth as a person. A woman who knows her worth does not stay in relationships that consistently treat her as less than she is. Not because she is arrogant, but because she is clear.
5 Know what you were created for
Know What You Were Created For. Purpose is not a career concept; it is the answer to the deepest question you will ever ask: why am I here? A person who knows their purpose does not drift into relationships. They choose deliberately because they know what they are protecting.
Dolly Ohanyere is a Lawyer, Relationship and Marriage Counsellor, NLP Practitioner, and Founder of The Healthy Marriage Hub and Thrive360 Limited. She coaches individuals and couples toward identity, purpose, and thriving relationships.
