My Experience: Unrequited Love is Not Romantic
........Now, I would change it to "A Nerd's Night of Tears"
I
was 22 and answering personality questions on okaycupid. I had already aced the “wherefore art thou
Romeo” question unaided by google. I
stumbled over the sex questions because they assumed I had sexual experience. And finally, I arrived at the divisive
one: the question that separates teenage
Dan from the adult version.
To you, which adjective best
describes hopeless, unrequited love?
·
Romantic
·
Foolish
·
Creepy
Prior
to 2011 I would have ascribed nobility, romance, selflessness and a degree of
faith to “hopeless, unrequited love.” I
would never call it creepy, with just the information provided, but for the
past nine years my opinion has stood firmly in the “foolish” category. Did I become jaded as I grew older? Perhaps, but here’s 7 reasons for my belief
that unrequited love is not romantic.
#1 Energy is a
Resource
As
I write this post, I’m uninstalling gigabytes of unused files, from my
computer, for learning C# programming. Earlier,
I had cleaned up my documents folder
and found a poem about Sarah. Who on earth is Sarah? I asked
myself. A few lines of the bad poem
reminded me of a crush I had on another young woman with a boyfriend. In retrospect, was I better off writing poems
for someone unavailable or learning a useful skill that could be very helpful
in my job search today? Wasted energy
can be unromantic.
It
seems strange to do a cost benefit analysis for our own romantic feelings but
we should not respect their autonomy. While
it’s a conversation starter to be able to say, I ran into a cayote in the woods at night, it does not offset the
fact that I put myself in danger just to deal with unreciprocated feelings. Energy is not unlimited: best put our eggs in a sturdy basket for the
right recipient(s). How do we know the
right recipient(s)? See point #2!
#2 The Right People
Make Us Better People
This
might seem obvious, but when romantic feelings are involved this fly on the
wall can be hard to notice. It took
three years for me to realize I had romantic feelings for a person that was
unhealthy for me. I focused on one
perceived good thing I couldn’t live without, while the rest my world crumbled
around me and that just made me need that perception to survive. This, was a depreciation of self-worth: the opposite of becoming a better person.
The
years I spent unravelling this knotted cord could have been avoided by some
common sense entering the romantic
portion of my mind or heart. When we
feel good, safe, or our own interpretation of the word loved, it’s easier to be the best version of ourselves.
#3 Ideas vs.
Reality
As
an aspiring fantasy-romance novelist, my imagination normalized waltzing on-top
of a lake, spores that glow at night just to sparkle and highlight the
shortening distance between two people and that singing can be spontaneous,
improvised and harmonious if there are mutually strong feelings. Over a decade later I still believe romance
can have its magical moments. Yet I’ve
found the magic in moments that are imperfect, the beauty within something unsuccessful
and the inglorious return to home base. While
fantasy is still favored over reality in my life, I’ve learned to moderate the
exchange between the two.
#4 Time,
Knowledge & Experience
Chance
is a necessary and exciting part of life, however, do risks need to be blind? Perhaps there is a reason small talk exists,
and it need not always be criticized. Morality,
psychology and innovation were things I loved to talk about. Yet, there was literally no buildup: “hi, you look like someone who would be good
at sword fighting”. This young man ended
up thinking I was trying to ask if he was gay.
Misunderstandings are much more common without time, knowledge and
experience.
#5Why are
Feelings Strong?
Are
feelings strong because they occupy our thoughts to the exclusion of all else? Are feelings strong because we’ve come to
depend on them? Or are feelings strong
because we’ve built them brick by brick from mutual learning and understanding? Unrequited love can rarely claim a level of
learning and understanding to justify the prominence and dependency of our
feelings.
#6 It Takes More
Than One
I
used to think my love could inspire the love others had inside. While this might be a good philosophy, it’s
unlikely to generate and maintain a romance.
A relationship can be challenging enough with two people rowing the
oars. With one person paddling and the
other watching the scenery, or both paddling in different directions, little is
achieved for the exertion.
#7 Opposites
Don’t Always Attract
It
seems romantic to have feelings for someone in a radically different social
circle. While this does happen and can
work, it requires compromise. I had my
own idea what was right and I expected someone I had strong feelings for to be that.
I’ve also been on the opposite end:
someone I had no romantic interest in telling me this is what you should have said, expecting me to conform to the
fantasy she wanted. We all have our secret desires, but I truly
believe it can be more rewarding to have a pleasant surprise than our secret
fantasies to come true exactly as we envisioned.
Conclusion: I wrote
this months ago, put it down, thought I’d never finish and then decided I’d
give it one more try tonight. This inconsistency
is not unlike efforts to progress a love or dating life. For the longest time I wanted something above
all else. I’m years past the point of
longing for something I do not have. It’s
not a matter of jealousy. The right
person for me is not interchangeable nor an image in my mind. This person would be impossible to describe/predict
accurately except that they reciprocate.
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