Red Flag = Deal Breaker?

Listen to me, stupid!

As I’m slowly getting back into the dating scene I’ve been analyzing and reanalyzing the failure of my last relationship, and I’ve come to the conclusion, that of course, there were some red flags that I ignored. The problem is that when you really like someone, you can have trouble seeing things clearly, especially if you don’t want to. So what’s clearly a red flag when looked at head on, can look more like this:

 if you just glance at it from the corner of your eye.

And why would you get upset over something that’s clearly just a joy-bringing ribbon dancer?

But now that I know, now that I’ve been there, I should be able to see those red flags and call them deal breakers, right?

The trouble with that train of thought is that it’s too easy to swing too far in the opposite direction.  The last thing I want to do is to shut down every new guy I meet because he happens to exhibit one red flag behavior that an ex of mine did.  After all, aren’t relationships about compromise? Won’t there always be a few flaws in every otherwise well-suited pair? I don’t want to become one of those hardened bitches with an 18-page long list of automatic deal breakers. It’s too easy to believe that something that was a symptom of a problem in one relationship is a symptom of the same problem in another.  It’s like, if your ex was way too obsessed with cars and racing and you meet a new guy, it’s all too easy to  find yourself thinking: “He washes his car every week? Clearly he cares about it more than a relationship, so DEAL BREAKER!” Or, “he calls his mom every day? Momma’s boy!  She’ll be in our business all the time! DEAL BREAKER!” When really, his relationship with his mom may be entirely different (in a good way) than your ex whose mom practically picked out his underwear every day.

So when, exactly, does a waving red thing become a red flag? And when does a red flag become a deal breaker?  I’m torn because I really want to give guys the benefit of the doubt by waiting for concrete evidence that not only is the red thing I think I see a flag, and  that this flag isn’t just merrily announcing a sale on used cars, but that it’s actually sitting on a whole pile of real problems. 

Essentially, it’s a problem of timing: when you’re first getting to know someone, before the feelings have started to really set in and you’re most likely to be objective, if you end things because of a perceived red flag, you could be prematurely judging something that’s really just a ribbon dancer.  The longer you wait to find out, though, the more likely it is that you’ll (or maybe it’s just me?) start to develop feelings, which makes it tempting to just sort of turn the other cheek so that you (I) can pretend what’s waving furiously over in the corner isn’t a giant red flag.

How do you find the balance?