What Not To Love: Unrequited Love

Picture of someone who has been through the unrequited love game. Poor guy.

Most of us admit that once (or maybe thrice) we’ve fallen in love with someone who doesn’t return the feeling. It could be that you’re in love for a best friend, a colleague, or a neighbor. You might spend too many hours waiting for a text or hoping the one you love appears at the same conference, bakery, dog park. If you’re really into self-torture, you’ll pick someone who is on the other side of the world — maybe an old friend you’ve reconnected with or a travel buddy who parted ways with you in Brazil. Whatever it is, it’s hell falling in love with someone who either doesn’t have a clue or doesn’t return the feeling.

If you’ve talked yourself into believing that the one you love feels the same way about you but the cockamamie-wacko still hasn’t texted or called or sent you flowers, it’s time to break the illusion. It’s time to say, “I’m over it!” Actions, as they say, speak louder than words.

The first step to getting over it requires admitting the truth. Your loved one isn’t going to walk down the aisle with you amid a storm of rice. No, there won’t be any slow dancing under the moon or sharing of a glass of wine at Mont Blanc because the two of you are strangers as far as the bedroom is concerned.

So, take it from an old-timer. Get over it by doing these three things:

1. Every time you have the urge to check your loved one’s social media account, or reread those text messages about how romantic the movie Midnight Express is, or “accidentally” run your bike over your crush’s shoes in the crosswalk, distract yourself. Call a friend or draw a picture of something other than your loved one or read a book about someone who doesn’t fall in love or bike thirty miles to the nearest forest and scream at a stream. Do anything but check that social media account, text message, doorway-where-you-sometimes-sneak-a-peak!
2. Get a hobby, fast! Instead of staring at photos of your loved one, pull out your grandmother’s old guitar, the one lying in the closet where the fantasy version of you and your loved one once played naked hide-and-go-seek. Give that old guitar a wild strum and then restrain yourself from throwing it across the room. If that doesn’t work, take up knitting skull caps and growing cucumbers in old garbage cans. You might even begin blogging about unrequited love, except that this isn’t advised due to the high risk of losing your mind.
3. Find someone else. Yes, it’s harder than hard, but start looking for your next victim. He/she/they/it/that/them/you/whoever-the-whatever will certainly return your feelings. Love is always just around the corner, after all.