Love Unrequited

Unrequited Love In Depth

Let us learn more about what unrequited love really is by examining the experience from different angles to get a bigger picture. 

To begin, realize that Unrequited Love in itself is neither good nor bad. If one views the experience from the outside, one will find that it's simply an experience when one's love for others is unreturned. And everyone will react to that same experience differently.

For instance, there are some of us who can constantly give out love without experiencing pain when the love is unrequited. For instance, a doting mother, a volunteer worker, a pickup artist who is always asking for girl's numbers, and so forth.

Some people just don't care when they are rejected by the people they want affection from.

So, everyone will react to the experience of unrequited love differently. Some will not be affected by such an experience; some will suffer.

Then, what is causing the experience to be Suffering?

It's the way one perceives the experience. For instance, if one can perceive the experience of being rejected by others as something of a natural and normal occurrence, one will be able to easily accept the experience and move on.

On the other hand, if one cannot see the experience of unrequited love as a natural one, then most likely one will have a tougher time accepting it. And the more one cannot accept the experience, the more one will experience pain inside.

So, if one wishes to explore the true cause of one's pain, one will need to learn about why one is perceiving such experiences so negatively rather than see the person who rejected them as the cause of their Sufferings.

One can ask the following question to gain clarity:

Why can't I simply accept the experience?

What is causing me to reject this experience?

The more one questions, the more one will find answers. Ultimately, one will find the cause of one's inability to accept the experiences of unrequited love comes from one's beliefs about what love is. These beliefs often involve ideas about what we should receive when we give out our love. It can also be ideas about what kinds of love we need in life to be happy and fulfilled. 

And what kinds of specific ideas these may be, one will have to discover themselves. So it's important for one to develop their own Self-Knowing to find answers.

But these ideas will always be about our expectations of how others should love us. And to each mind, "love" can be defined in different forms: may it be a hug, words of approval, gratitude, sexual acts, money, and so forth.

And the more we expect from others, the more pain we will experience when the love is unrequited. 

So, in other words, if one can throw away all their ideas about what love should be and their expectations on what kinds of love they need in life in order to be happy, the experience of unrequited love won't be a suffering one. 

In fact, one will experience greater happiness from releasing oneself from the attachment to these ideas.

Realize that all the pains that we've been experiencing this time have been caused by the attachments we have towards our beliefs of what we need in life.

And the higher we set our expectations of what we need to be happy, the more we will set ourselves up for inevitable disappointments. 

This is because we simply cannot control the world and the people around us to love us in the way we want them to.

How hard is it to change someone's mind?

How difficult it is to transform our own minds?

Trying to control others will bear no fruits but just the bitterness of failure.

In failing to control others, one will also experience the negative states of mind: judgement, hurt, anger, vulnerability, self-criticism, regret, guilt, and so forth. Usually, the suffering states of the mind are highly charged in experiences of unrequited love because of the strong attachments one has for a particular outcome to manifest.

As you can see then, it's our perception of unrequited love that makes the experience a suffering one.

So, to transform the suffering, one will need to to transform their perception. And this can be done by developing wisdom.

What kind of wisdom?

The wisdom to develop is the realization that everyone will have their own definition of what “Love”. Everyone will always give and reciprocate love in their own special way.

For instance, a child may believe that love is about getting everything they want from their parents.

But some parents may believe that love is about learning not to spoil kids.

For instance, a man can believe that love is about having sex with their partners every day.

But a girl can believe that love is about having emotional connections instead.

These are just some examples of how people can think about love so differently from the other. As a result, one can easily fall into the belief that they have been rejected by the other when in reality people are just being themselves.  

But it will take time for one to develop such wisdom: to accept people for who they are. And it won't be an easy journey because when we desire something so much, we can become blind to the wisdom of acceptance.

Thus the journey towards true happiness is better to be taken in small steps: to accept people more and more for who they are, step by step, day by day day, learning not to dwell in the frustration and anger of not getting the love one expects and desires, learning to forgive and be more compassionate instead.

With time, the experience of unrequited love will become less dark. One will no longer take it so personally because one has learnt that everyone has the right to choose who they wish to love.

And the more one can love others conditionally, the more one will see that it's ok for one to love oneself unconditionally as well. And developing this wisdom will greatly transform the painful experience of unrequited love.

Because the pain of the heart will always be caused by the lack of love one has for oneself. The heart aches because one has fallen into the belief that one needs more than oneself to be happy.

The Heart is always telling you that you are already perfect as is!

And it aches everytime you fail to hear this!

So, it will be an enlightening journey of Self-Discovery where one learns more and more about oneself. And as one learns to love and be happy with themselves, one will be able to let go of their expectations of others because one will no longer need to be loved by others to be happy.

It is then, one can desire for love from others out of love rather than out of attachment and expectation. Although the difference in intention can seem subtle, the quality of experience is vastly different!

There are millions of fish in the sea, why suffer by going after one that you can't get?

Stop torturing yourself!