I grew up hearing that common sense isn’t common, and honestly, the older I get, the more I see it.
I’ll be scrolling through social media or having conversations with people, and I’m just amazed at some of the things grown adults actually believe.
Last week, I read a woman’s post on a Facebook group, asking people if her boyfriend would eventually leave his wife for her because he was unhappy in his marriage.
And I’m thinking, sis, where is your common sense?
Because if you believe certain things about love, money, people, or life in general, you’re setting yourself up to be disappointed and manipulated by people who can spot naivety from a mile away.
Some beliefs are so disconnected from reality that holding onto them basically guarantees you’ll make poor decisions.
If You Believe These 7 Things, You Might Lack Common Sense
1. “If I Love Him Hard Enough, He’ll Change”
This might be the most dangerous belief women carry into relationships.
You meet a man with issues..
Maybe he’s commitment-phobic, financially irresponsible, has anger issues, rude, lazy, or treats people poorly, and you convince yourself that your love will transform him into a better person.
See, people change when they want to change, not when you want them to change.
Love can influence someone to change, but it is not a magic potion that transforms character flaws into virtues.
Love is not therapy, nor is it rehabilitation.
If a man is 35 years old and still can’t hold down a job, your love isn’t going to turn him into a responsible provider.
If he’s been treating women poorly for years, your love isn’t going to make him respectful.
Yet women waste years of their lives trying to love men into becoming worthy of that love.
Save yourself the heartbreak and love people for who they are right now, not for who you think they could become with enough love.
2. “Good Things Come to Those Who Wait”
This saying has probably ruined more lives than it’s helped.
Yes, patience is a virtue, but passive waiting while life passes you by isn’t patience; it’s procrastination.
I used to be a chronic procrastinator, so I can relate.
Some women have been waiting for the right man for years, yet they never put themselves in situations where they might meet someone decent.
Some are waiting for their dream job yet refuse to update their skills, network, take courses, or apply for positions that could be stepping stones to their ultimate goal.
They call it having faith, but it’s really just avoiding the work, because even the Bible says, ‘Faith without works is dead.’
If you really have faith, you’ll show workings.
Let’s not even mention people who are waiting for their finances to improve, yet never create a budget, learn new skills, gain knowledge, or change their spending habits.
Waiting only works when you’re waiting for something specific that you’ve actually worked toward.
Like waiting for exam results after studying, or waiting for a job offer after an interview.
But the idea that you can sit around hoping and the universe will eventually reward your patience with everything you want?
That’s not faith, that’s delusion, hun. 😒
Good things come to people who identify what they want, make plans to get it, take action toward those plans, and yes, then wait for the results of their efforts.
However, if your strategy for getting what you want is simply waiting around, hoping it will show up, you’ll be waiting forever.
The people who get good things are usually the ones who got tired of waiting and decided to go get them instead.
3. “Money Doesn’t Buy Happiness”
I think this phrase was coined by a poor person who wanted to console themselves.
Because I don’t know why anyone would believe that money doesn’t buy happiness.
Money might not buy happiness, but poverty definitely buys stress, anxiety, envy, and limited options.
Having enough money to pay your bills without panic, to take care of your health, to provide for your children, to have some security for emergencies, and to help out others absolutely contributes to happiness.
I’m not saying you need to be rich to be happy, but basic financial stability is a foundation that happiness can be built on.
4. “Everything Happens for a Reason”
Some things happen for a reason, some things happen randomly, and some things happen because you made decisions that led to predictable consequences.
Believing that everything happens for a reason stops people from taking responsibility for their choices and learning from their mistakes.
Your relationship didn’t fail because the universe had bigger plans for you.
It failed because you chose someone who wasn’t compatible with you and ignored red flags that were obvious from day one.
You didn’t lose your job because God was redirecting your path.
You lost it because you weren’t meeting expectations or the company was cutting costs.
See, sometimes things happen because of poor planning, bad judgment, ignorance, or circumstances beyond anyone’s control, not because there’s some cosmic purpose behind every disappointment.
When you blame everything on fate or divine intervention, you miss the opportunity to learn from what went wrong and make better choices next time.
5. “If It’s Meant to Be, It Will Be”
Again, this is just another way of avoiding personal responsibility.
They say life doesn’t give you what you deserve; it gives you what you demand and work for.
How will you fight for anything if you believe whatever will be will be, or if it’s meant to happen, it’ll happen without your input?
People who live by this motto have relinquished control over their own lives.
Some people lose relationships because they believe that if love is real, it would survive.
Meanwhile, they’re not communicating, not compromising, not doing any of the actual work that relationships require.
Some people miss job opportunities because they think that if it were their destiny, the position would be offered to them automatically.
No networking, no follow-up calls, no proving they wanted it more than the other candidates.
This belief turns you into a spectator of your own life instead of the main character making things happen.
When you don’t fight for what you want, when you don’t demand better, when you don’t work toward your goals, you’re basically telling the universe that you don’t really want those things that badly.
And the universe responds accordingly by giving those opportunities to people who are willing to fight for them.
6. “Age Is Just a Number”
This one shows up in dating advice constantly, and it’s usually used to justify relationships that don’t make practical sense.
Yes, age gaps can work in some situations.
But pretending that life experience, maturity levels, and life stages don’t matter is just naive.
A 22-year-old and a 45-year-old are in completely different places in life, regardless of how mature the younger person seems or how young-at-heart the older person is.
People who are decades apart in age usually want different things and are dealing with different life challenges.
This doesn’t mean every age gap relationship is doomed, but you need to be realistic about the challenges instead of pretending they don’t exist.
Many of us can agree that the things we want in our thirties are not the same as the things we wanted in our twenties.
So, age isn’t just a number.
7. “You Can’t Help Who You Fall in Love With”
This belief has been used to justify every bad relationship decision in human history.
Falling in love is often a choice, and staying in love is definitely a choice.
You can absolutely help who you fall in love with by being intentional about who you spend time with, who you open yourself up to emotionally, and who you allow into your intimate space.
Love isn’t this uncontrollable force that strikes randomly like lightning.
It’s something that develops over time, with communication, attention, and emotional investment.
If you’re constantly falling in love with people who are unavailable or bad for you, that’s not bad luck.
That’s a pattern you need to examine and change.
Why Common Sense Isn’t Common
We live in a world full of romantic movies, fairy tales, and social media posts that make us believe in magical thinking.
We’re told that love conquers all, that everything works out in the end, that if we just believe hard enough, the universe will give us what we want.
But real life doesn’t work like a romantic comedy.
Real life requires planning, good judgment, realistic expectations, and the willingness to make tough choices based on facts rather than emotions.
Common sense is about seeing situations clearly instead of through the filter of what you hope will happen.
It’s about making decisions based on evidence instead of wishful thinking.
And it’s about taking responsibility for your choices instead of blaming everything on fate, timing, or forces beyond your control.
Because the truth is, common sense might not be as romantic as magical thinking, but it’s a lot more likely to get you the life you actually want.
And that’s worth more than any fairy tale.