Why I Don't Believe in 'The One' Anymore: Shifting from Fate to Choice

flowers from MD

I have only experienced being in love twice in my life—the kind of love that arrives like a storm. I call these my lightning lovers—striking suddenly, intense, unforgettable, and then, just as sudden, gone. Alongside them, I have loved two other people (not to be confused with being in love) whom I think of as my harbor lovers—steady, safe places where I could anchor myself and imagine staying.

My lightning lovers, or LLs, felt like destiny. From the very beginning, they carried that spark that made me think, this must be it, this must be the one. I remember my first lightning lover, how I compared us to Allie and Noah from The Notebook. We kissed at every stoplight, laughed constantly, and seemed to stumble into beauty at every turn. The rush of those relationships was overwhelming, rare, and intoxicating. They felt quiet and alive at the same time. There were mornings where I woke up convinced I had found what people spend a lifetime searching for. But I learned something about lightning—it doesn't stick. It strikes, electrifies, and then it vanishes, leaving silence in its place. When the intensity faded, I was left holding the memory of a love that felt both impossible to replace and impossible to sustain. It took me a long, long time to understand that as dazzling as lightning is, it was apparently not meant to become a constant source of light.

That doesn't mean my harbor lovers were placeholders, or that their love was somehow "less." I loved them deeply. Their love was just different. It wasn't explosive—it was enduring. With them, I felt grounded, safe, and at peace. Their love glowed steadily instead of blazing hot, and I realized there's a power in that, too. Being with them was like coming home after a long trip: nothing flashy, but deeply comforting. With them, I could exhale fully. I could imagine the long haul—shared routines, quiet mornings, building a home together. It was love like shelter, not a firestorm. And while it didn't rattle me to my core the way lightning did, it gave me something equally valuable: presence, comfort, stability, and the possibility of a shared future.

While I also experienced those kinds of plans with my LLs, they never seemed to go that way. I sometimes feel jealous of people who find a lightning lover who also happens to be a harbor lover.

Each of these four people felt like the one while I was with them. That's what I keep circling back to. Each relationship gave me something true and shaped the way I understand love. We grow up with the idea that "the one" is out there somewhere, waiting, and that we'll know them instantly when we meet—that everything will simply click into place. It's a comforting story. But what happens when you meet multiple special people? What if each one feels like destiny in their own way? "The one" suggests only one person can ever fit you. My experiences have shown just the opposite. For better or worse, each of them is part of the story of how I love. I have found "the one" takes on many forms.

I am monogamous and/or monogamish. This isn't me going into a conversation about polyamory (though we'll discuss that more at some point).

I don't believe in "the one" anymore. I used to imagine it as almost like a destination—that one day I'd arrive there and know I had finally found them. But love, at its core, isn't fate dropping a perfect match into our lap—it's a choice, an active, ongoing decision. I choose someone to be "the one."

The LLs? I chose to dive headfirst into their intensity. The HLs? I chose to lean into their steadiness, even when part of me longed for sparks. And if I've loved four people already, then each of them was "the one," for me, in that moment of time. Any future partner I commit to will be "the one," too—not because fate wove our paths together in some preordained plan, but because I'll decide, every day, to stay.

So maybe the question isn't whether there's one true love out there for each of us. Maybe the better question is: Do you believe in "the one," or do you believe, like me, that love is about choosing who becomes the one?