There are a million advice sites on how to get into a short term relationship or develop a relationship where you and your partner, if you can even call it that, are no more than f--k buddies, but what if you are beyond that stage in your life and you are looking for something more permanent, someone long term, that wants to stick around and commit to you? What should you or they expect?
It will require a bit more time and energy
Relationships do require your time. If you're ready for them, they require that you be present, that you devote part of your time to the other person, that you show up for them, and stay with the relationship. These aren't one night stands where there is no expectation of follow through. If you say you're going to hang out next weekend, commit to it, not because you're forced to, but because you genuinely like this person and want to spend time with them.
If you want quality, be quality
If you want someone else to stick around, you, yourself, have to be worth sticking around for. If you haven't gotten over your player or playette ways, aren't at a place in your life where you are ready to commit, or haven't dealt with any previous baggage or things that have been preventing you from moving forward in your life, you may want to reconsider getting into something serious until you've handled those things. It also helps if you are either on the road to or have accomplished some of your dreams and goals for yourself personally. Most people in a long term relationship want to be with someone who wants more out of life.
Chill out with the desperation vibes
It is very unnerving when you meet a date and you start in on how your number one priority in life is to find the right woman or man by the time you're x years old, and have x children, and live in another country. Woah, woah, woah! That's overwhelming for a lot of people who just met you literally five minutes ago. It's okay to say you are looking for a serious relationship, but when you go hard core on them and you start in on how there's no point in wasting your time if they aren't serious---it doesn't give them even a breath to let them show you who they are.
Your time is precious
This isn't high school anymore. You've got a life. Other people have their own lives, but you make time for what is important and for those whom you want in your life. If someone really is into you and is taking your potential relationship seriously, they don't constantly flake on you, or you them. Some women and men are really busy, that you will get to know about a person really quickly if it's the truth. However, most have an evening to spare somewhere in the week, so if you're noticing someone not communicating with you and returning your calls or showing up without being prompted all the time, they probably aren't serious about getting serious, or at least, not with you.
It's not all about the sex, all the time
Sex is great, wonderful, fantastic, amazing, but every time you hang out with a person, if it just always ends up as being about sex and they never want to see you outside of the bedroom, it's probably not headed towards anything serious. If you're going to see someone potentially every day in a long term relationship, there are going to be moments you share that have nothing to do with sex, and you need to know that person wants to spend that kind of time with you.
The other person should become important to you
When someone truly gives a damn about you, they should care where you are at 3 in the morning, or you should want to notify them of your travel plans, or you should want to show up for something they've stated is really important to them. In a serious relationship, you're becoming a team, and a team works together with one another, supports one another, and cares what happens on that team. If you or the other person don't care what the other person is doing and you rarely if ever commit to showing up for them or expecting them to show up, it's probably not all that serious.
You can be truly honest, gross, and weird
Each of us has a facade that we put up around us with people we casually see or who don't mean much to us, but when you want to get into something serious, that facade needs to come down. No one can pretend 24/7 to be something that they aren't. Someone serious will accept your honesty, and will let you be gross and weird because they are too, and you're going to need to accept them for all of that, and them for all that you are.
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