Here's How You Know You're With the Person You Should Really Be With

Impact

The vacation test.

Summer is the season of beach trips, cabin weekends and sun-filled getaways to exotic locations. Oh, and stressing over whether you should go on said vacations with the person you've only recently started dating.  

Tinder and Expedia recently partnered up to find out when is too early to go on vacation with your significant other. Surveying approximately 1,000 Americans, they found about 30% would feel comfortable going on a weekend getaway with a partner within one to three months of starting the relationship. About 14% would be willing to go within the first month, while 16% would want to wait more than a year. 

Meanwhile, experts have other opinions, one telling Marie Claire that "four to six weeks is probably a good rough estimate."

So what's really the right amount of time to start talking about a vacation? When you're ready to get to know the person you're dating for who they really are. 

Someone you can be boring — but not bored — with: Of the 20- and 30-somethings Mic spoke to, nearly all agreed that there isn't a set timeline for when a vacation is right. Rather, you go when you feel ready, and that readiness is telling about the relationship itself.

Vacations aren't a perfect test of a relationship's stamina, but traveling does bring out certain qualities in a relationship, including the ability to spend time together, no matter the activity.

"I don't think it's about how long you're together, but more about whether you think you can go away with them without wanting to murder them," Yasmine*, 26, told Mic. Yes, vacations can include exciting sight-seeing and novelties, but also mundanities like plane rides, waiting in endless lines and hanging in hotels or hostels. 

"As soon as you're comfortable spending that amount of time alone with the S.O.... could be a month in, could be a year in," Jane, 25, said. "Hotel rooms are close quarters — if you're still at the stage where you hide the facts that you use the bathroom or don't sleep in a full face of makeup, you're not ready." 

That said, the ideal partners can hopefully turn even the mundane stretches into adventures. 

"I'd honestly be down to go on an adventure with someone I'm dating pretty early on," Ella,* 26, said..

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The real traveling payoff: "As much as we think we know someone in everyday life, there are some things we can only find out on vacation," relationship expert Kimberly Moffit told the Huffington Post. "Traveling can have pitfalls and can be complicated."

But the payoffs are real. As the Atlantic reported, we feel happier when we collect experiences, not things. Taking a trip together can create happy memories of experiences to reflect upon later. Bonus if you plan the trip together: A 2010 study published in Applied Research in Quality of Life found that "the largest boost in happiness comes from the simple act of planning a vacation," wrote the New York Times.

Really, the fact of choosing to travel in the first place is as good a sign as any. 

"I would never do it, no matter how long you are together, if you are at the point in a relationship when you see the end in sight or want to be out," Michael*, 26, said. Going means you're in — and you're ready to know your S.O. beyond the "dating" phase, boring plane rides and all.

* Names have been changed to allow subjects to speak freely on private matters.