Choosing a life partner: What should you look out for?

There are different qualities people look out for when they decide to choose a life partner. But are there any basic rules one should abide by to identify who the right person is? Some respondents shared their personal experiences and what they think of the issue generally with Life Xtra.
Choosing the one you consider your ‘Mrs. Right’ or ‘Mr. Right,’ or finding that dream man or woman you look forward to spending the rest of your life with is one of the most important decisions a person makes in their life if they have plans to be married.
Some begin very early on from even their teen years, to start forming these visions of their perfect mate in their heads and they sometimes only look out for people who meet these specifications.
If expectations are met and a dream is thus fulfilled, living your life with the person you love can be a joyous, mutually-fulfilling experience, but finding the right person is a monumental task.
How realistic some of your expectations and goals? Do you have the right attitude and mind-set? If one makes enough effort and commits to a relationship one can share the rest of his or her life with the one they are in love with, most respondents said.
Twenty-five-year-old Jamila Abdullahi, who has been married for about two years, says she was able to identify her husband as a life partner the very moment she met him. She knew he was ‘the one’ from his attitude: “My husband is a very nice, easy going person and to me, I have always wanted to end up with someone with such attitude.”
For Aisha Muhammad, a 25-year-old undergraduate, such qualities as trust and maturity are very important because without them there won’t be any basis for the relationship in the first place: “It is only when you have a mind-set of what you want that you are guided in a certain direction and have focus. If you do not have a desire of who you want the person to be, then you will be exposing yourself to everything and anything.”
Thirty-year-old fresh graduate David Nwosu, who is looking to settle down soon, hopes to hook someone who will always give him listening ears, must be industrious and hardworking among other qualities a woman should naturally have.
“My partner must love me for who I am and not what I can give to her because we are going to have a family together and we need to start on a very strong foundation,” Nwosu explains.
When determining an ideal partner for yourself, you could start by making an accurate assessment and view of yourself. It is important for one not to undervalue oneself for fear of waiting too long just as it is important not to be ‘too choosy.’ It is necessary that we have at the back of our minds that in any relationship you are the most important factor and you should look out for yourself.
The journey to finding a life partner starts with you. To know who will be best for you, you have got to know exactly who you are, know what you like, what you don’t like, what you are good at, and what you are bad at. Know what you want out of life and what you want from your partner. Be realistic and honest with yourself.
When two people decide to spend their lives with each other, they need to be on the same page for almost all of life’s major decisions. Having a disagreement about a major, non-negotiable aspect of your life can stop a relationship in its tracks even when two people get along perfectly otherwise. Be open and honest about these goals because trying to lie to yourself can lead to long-term resentment and that wouldn’t be fair to your partner.
Also have it in mind that it helps you better when you draw your experience from your past relationship. If you are  having trouble determining what you want in a partner or what you want out of life, think back to relationships you had already been in.
The choices you make in your relationships, conscious or unconscious, can help clue you in to the sorts of things you are looking for in a partner and even the sorts of things that you may need to work on to make a long-term partnership work.