Olalekan Adebumiti
You say you have a type.
Tall. Driven. Confident. Mysterious. Soft spoken. Ambitious. Spiritually aligned. Financially stable. Emotionally intelligent. Attractive but not arrogant. Assertive but gentle. Funny but serious when needed.
You carry this checklist quietly in your head. Every new person is measured against it. And when they fall short, you tell yourself, “They are just not my type.”
So you wait.
You wait for the day your exact type walks in and everything clicks. No friction. No doubts. No compromise. Just perfect alignment with the image you have built over the years.
But here is the uncomfortable question.
What if your type is the very reason you are still single?
What if the pattern you keep chasing feels familiar for a reason that has nothing to do with compatibility and everything to do with your history?
Let’s look at the reasons.
1. Your Type Is Actually A Reflection Of Your Unhealed Wounds
Your type often feels intense. Magnetic. Hard to ignore.
But if you look closely, you may notice something. The people you are drawn to often carry the same emotional rhythm. Maybe they are distant. Maybe they are dominant. Maybe they are unpredictable. Maybe they need saving.
It does not feel random. It feels familiar.
Sometimes your “type” mirrors the love you first learned. If affection once felt inconsistent, you may now find yourself attracted to people who give you just enough attention to keep you hoping.
If approval once had to be earned, you may now feel drawn to partners who make you prove your worth.
You call it preference.
But it might be a wound asking to be replayed.
2. You Mistake Emotional Turbulence For Real Romantic Passion
Calm feels suspicious to you.
When there is no drama, no guessing games, no emotional highs and lows, something inside you says it is missing chemistry.
You want the spark. The butterflies. The tension.
Yet what you label as passion is often anxiety in disguise.
The push and pull keeps your nervous system alert. The uncertainty keeps you invested. The emotional rollercoaster convinces you it must be love because it feels powerful.
But love does not need chaos to feel alive.
If peace feels boring, it may be because your body has learned to associate instability with desire.
3. Your Rigid Checklist Is Designed To Screen Out Vulnerability
A checklist gives you control.
If they do not meet the criteria, you do not have to risk going deeper. You can reject before you are rejected. You can analyse instead of opening up.
Sometimes the list is not about standards. It is about protection.
If someone is “not your type,” you do not have to explore whether they could actually see you fully. You do not have to confront your fear of being known.
It feels safer to disqualify than to be disappointed.
But every rigid filter can quietly block the very connection you claim to want.
4. The People You Choose Are Built For The Chase Not The Commitment
Be honest. Do you feel most alive when you are trying to win someone over?
When they are slightly out of reach? When you have to impress, prove, and pursue?
Some personalities thrive in pursuit but shrink in stability. They enjoy attention, intensity, and ego strokes, but commitment feels heavy to them.
If your type consistently loves the chase more than the relationship, that is not coincidence. That is pattern.
And if you keep choosing partners who are emotionally allergic to settling down, the outcome will keep looking the same.
5. You Are Addicted To The Validation Of Winning Over The Unavailable
There is a certain high in getting someone who “does not usually open up” to choose you.
If they are guarded with everyone else but soft with you, it feels special. If they are hard to impress but approve of you, it feels earned.
But this dynamic keeps you chasing crumbs of affirmation.
Unavailable people force you to compete for attention. And when you finally get it, the reward feels amplified because it was scarce.
That does not mean it is healthy.
It means you may be wired to equate difficulty with value.
6. You Dismiss Healthy Partners Because Peace Feels Like Boredom
The secure one texts back.
They are consistent. They say what they mean. They show up. They do not make you question where you stand.
And yet, something in you whispers that it feels flat. Predictable. Too easy.
Healthy love does not activate your survival instincts. It does not require decoding mixed signals. It does not keep you up at night wondering where you stand.
If your body is used to intensity, peace can feel underwhelming at first.
But calm is not the absence of chemistry. It is the presence of safety.
7. Your Familiar Pattern Is Just Your Comfort Zone In Disguise
You think you are choosing your type.
But often, you are choosing what feels known.
Even if it ends badly. Even if it leaves you disappointed. Even if it repeats the same story with a different face.
Familiar pain can feel safer than unfamiliar health. At least you know how it ends. At least you know how to navigate it.
Breaking out of your type may require choosing someone who does not trigger your old patterns.
Someone who feels steady instead of electrifying. Someone who challenges your story about what love is supposed to feel like.
And that can feel uncomfortable.
But growth usually does.
If you keep attracting the same outcome, it may be time to question the blueprint.
Your type might not be your destiny.
It might just be your habit.
A Different Question To Ask Yourself
Maybe the problem is not that good people are hard to find.
Maybe the real issue is that you keep filtering them out before they even have a chance to show you who they are.
Having standards is healthy. Knowing what you value matters.
But when your “type” becomes a rigid script, you stop dating people and start dating a fantasy.
And fantasies do not build relationships. They keep you chasing an idea that no real human can fully embody.
Real connection often arrives in packaging you did not plan for. It challenges your assumptions. It feels unfamiliar at first. It may not trigger fireworks immediately, but it offers something steadier and deeper.
If you are still single and frustrated, it might be time to loosen your grip on the checklist.
Instead of asking, “Are they my type?” try asking, “Do I feel safe, respected, and seen with this person?”
Your future partner may not look like your past pattern.
And that might be exactly the point.
