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What To Do When You Love Someone You Can’t Have

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loving someone you can't have, when you love someone, loving someone you can't have, what to do when you love someone you can't have

Allow me to tell you what to do when you love someone you can’t have. 

If I were in your shoes, which I have been for different reasons, I would consciously remind myself of reality on a regular basis. Whenever I would ruminate about why I can’t have the person I love or obsess about the fantasy of what could have been, I’d remind myself of reality.

Breaking the train of thought that causes obsession and rumination is one of the most important steps to breaking your attachment to the thought of someone.

What you feed is what will grow.

If you are constantly fixating on someone, you are feeding these feelings with obsessive thoughts. 

People often misunderstand what is meant by the following phrase: you can control your feelings.

You are not meant to control how you feel and no feeling is permanent. That’s a fact of life. All feelings are intertwined. 

Take happiness and sadness for instance.

Some may argue that happiness is defined as a lack of sadness and apathy. 

This may be a simplistic method of defining emotions but it adequately paints the picture of how emotions are reliant on each other.

If you react to every feeling, you will be chaotic throughout your entire life. 

But, if you choose to respond to your feelings, well, you have a great chance of controlling your mind and heart.

Let’s use laziness as an example. 

When you feel lazy, your thoughts and body respond in kind. Your default reaction is to feed laziness by not performing in a manner that you ought to.

But, this may not be congruent with your beliefs and goals.

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The minute you take on a lethargic, lackadaisical and dismissive demeanor when you feel lazy, you feed it. It will affect whatever you’re doing and you lose.

But, if you were to make the conscious decision to act in accordance with your goals, expectations and beliefs, you would choose to take action instead of sitting around.

Some mornings, I feel lazy to get out of bed and walk for 30 minutes outside. 

What do you think I do?

I get out of bed and walk for 30 minutes outside.

I did what was expected of me, regardless of how I felt.

The more I respond to emotions instead of reacting to them, the easier it gets for me to live uncontrolled by those emotions so that I have space to let go of them. 

This is a prime example of what is meant by controlling your feelings. 

When it comes to loving someone you can’t have, how are you choosing to control your feelings?

Every single time you miss the person you love but can’t have, what are you doing?

  • Do you react and contact them or ruminate over them? 
  • Do you spend time on their social media or browsing through old mementos?
  • Do you isolate yourself and stop living the life you dream of having? 
  • Do you unfairly critique yourself and diminish your self-worth?

These reactions serve no purpose other than to feed your obsession. You’re literally reinforcing the idea to your subconscious mind that your self-worth, happiness and future are reliant on the idea of having or not having this person.

So, to remedy this issue, remind yourself of reality.

“I will not be with this person because it’s not meant to be but I deserve to be happy and to get what I deserve because I’m choosing to work through this phase in my life.”

Then, you need to have a set of specific actions to execute that all pertain to your self-development and future.

Prioritize actions that make you feel fulfilled and wholesome while also doing things that elevate your status as a person physically, emotionally, financially, mentally, spiritually and so on.

The first few times that you partake in this will be difficult but the payoff feels great. You have to be consistent with it because you’ll experience a wave-like flow of emotions and thoughts. Some up and some downs.

In time, you will program your mind to associate these sad and heavy emotions associated with unrequited love with doing something positive for yourself.

This will nullify the fear you have of these tough emotions and you’ll be able to feel them and heal them without ruining yourself and your life. 

I cannot begin to emphasize the importance of honing a healthy and strong mindset. Believe me when I tell you that life can and will test you without warning. You have to be prepared or else you will lose.

I know that I am taking on an extreme approach to this topic but life is extreme. If you are not getting pissed off at the idea of losing valuable years of your life and failing miserably until you’re plagued with depression, then that is a problem! 

You have to fight for your own well-being because nobody is going to care enough to fix your problems or cure your feelings of depression.

So, when you’re feeling depressed over the idea of loving someone you can’t have, you should be making a long list of all the things you could be doing with this energy that is reverberating throughout your mind and body.

Use pain and don’t lose to pain.

That’s my philosophy in life now because nobody will get through life without experiencing pain. It’s a given. 

A guarantee. 

But, it can be a good thing because it provides you with motivation or fuel to become someone stronger, smarter and happier in the long run.

Okay, now that I’ve shared my ideology or philosophy on dealing with pain and unrequited love, we can touch on some practical things you should do when you love someone you can’t have.

Related post: Can a girl change her mind after rejecting a guy?

Tips On What To Do When You Love Someone You Can’t Have

loving someone you can't have, when you love someone, loving someone you can't have, what to do when you love someone you can't have

1. Get away from them

Some distance makes the heart grow fonder while complete distance makes the heart lose fondness. 

We are investment-based creatures.

The more we spend time around someone and the more we do things related to someone, the more invested we become in them.

Effort will feed your own desire and love like nothing else. 

So, what you need to do is strictly limit or completely eliminate access to this person to avoid investing yourself in them anymore.

It’s the hardest thing to do and your feelings will try to encourage you to go against this idea. But, that’s when you need to refer back to our previous discussion on acting in spite of your feelings.

Even if you can’t jump all the way in, start at the shore. 

Take a step into the water and start.

Related post: What to do after a girl rejects you

2. Don’t agree to friendship

The number one way to impose torture upon yourself is to accept friendship with someone you love and can’t have.

You have nothing to gain from friendship in this scenario because it goes against the very essence of what you want.

It is in times like this when you must exercise self-respect above desire to ensure that your state of well-being is preserved.

I’ve never met a single man or woman who was truly happy with being friendzoned and watching the person they love in the arms of another man or woman.

The worst part about it is when the ball drops and you realize that your friendship helped this person end up with another person.

Related post: Why your avoidant ex wants to be friends

3. Talk about it with someone who cares about you

When you have people in your life who are not making stupid decisions pertaining to romance and they understand the issue which you are grappling with, they are most likely to advise you correctly.

You need someone who can exercise logic and rationality when you are overwhelmed with emotions.

They’ll check you and make certain that you are aware of the consequences of your choices before you make any decision.

That’s invaluable to you.

Apart from that, it’s always good to feel connected to someone who genuinely cares about you.

I speak to my family and my closest friends who know my strengths and weaknesses. Most importantly, I speak to them because I know that they are looking out for my best interest and are not entertained by drama.

There are some people in your life who claim to be your friends but they are always excited to hear about the drama.

They aren’t going to advise you correctly and you need to be wary of their advice. 

Do not take advice from people who are unsuccessful in the same area of life and continue to do the same thing over and over again.

4. Meet new people or make new memories

For the first few weeks or months after realizing that you can’t have someone you love, remain single and avoid dating.

You’re too emotionally invested in this person and anyone you run into will fall short because you will unfairly compare them.

If they fall short, you’ll find yourself panicking and irrationally assuming that there’s nobody out there for you like this person you love.

Take some time to accept everything and when you start to feel bored but content, that’s when you start looking to date.

You should be okay with the idea of not being with that person before you start dating other people.

But, do not sit around forever just living in the past.

Meet new people and experience new things.

Once you begin to remember that life can be fun and good again, you won’t feel as depressed over someone you can’t have.

Related post: Why can’t I move on from my ex?

5. Journal about it

When it comes to journaling, I have adopted a new mindset about it. 

There is merit to expressing your feelings on paper. It’s cathartic and a great release of pent-up emotion.

But, it’s not productive or healthy to enforce a victim mindset throughout your journaling process.

What is more helpful is to express your feelings and then reflect on things you can do to improve your life, move on, sharpen your skills and develop into a stronger and happier person.

Use it as a tool to track different techniques you’re using to move on and feel better, use it as a tool for accountability and use as an outlet to discuss your feelings.

Do this as much as you possibly can and I promise you that it will make a significant impact on your life.

6. Don’t embrace a victim mindset

If you sit around all day and cry about life being bad and that you’re not good enough for love, you will get nowhere slowly. 

It’s the biggest waste of time to sit around and feel sorry for yourself.

If you think I’m lying to you, do it. 

Let me know if you feel better after a day of talking negatively about your life, about people and about yourself.

Get rid of victimhood.

You have all the power and talent within you to change most things in your life! 

The same time that you spend sulking and crying about being a victim could be used to make you stronger, smarter, richer, healthier, wiser and skillful.

Think about what you could do with your life if you just spent more hours on actually leveling up your character instead of crying about being a victim of rejection.

You don’t need anybody to come along and save you.

Save yourself! 

With that being said, if someone doesn’t love you, that’s their prerogative and their loss.

You may love them and that’s okay. Everyone has been through the same thing as well. 

But, the ones who actually went on to find love are those who did not sit around and beat themselves up like a punching bag.

You need to read this article: How to handle rejection from a guy

7. Ride the wave of pain

Don’t be afraid to feel the pain of heartbreak. 

It’s a part of life and you are lucky to have the luxury to be feeling this pain because there are people in the world who are watching their loved ones being bombed or gutted in front of their eyes.

I’m not dismissing your pain. 

Pain is relative and I understand that.

But, you should not ignore the different perspectives and realities of the world.

Unrequited love is not nearly as painful as the scenario I described above.

When you start believing that rejection is the height of pain a person can experience then you have been far too sheltered or wrapped up in your own mind.

Be that as it may, even if you do feel that way, it’s still an opportunity for you to grow through something that has shaken you up.

This could be a test and the way for you to pass it is by feeling the pain, growing through it and becoming a stronger person who exercises more compassion toward yourself and others.

Pain and failure are the greatest teachers in life and I promise you that there is a valuable and useful lesson for you in this pain you’re experiencing.

Search for it by sitting with your pain, surrendering to it, letting it go and then observing the lesson you learn from it.

I highly recommend that you read a book called Letting Go by David. R. Hawkins. It’s a great read on developing a healthy relationship with your feelings. 

Related post: How to get over someone

8. Get rid of unnecessary reminders of this person

To move on from unpleasant experiences, you need space and acceptance. 

Space is crucial. 

It gives you distance and time away from something or someone that causes you feelings of immense distress early on.

A simple but effective way to let go of someone is to begin by removing all the reminders of them that lock you into past memories.

Pictures, videos, gifts and letters should all be stored away for the foreseeable future.

When you’re healed enough, it will be okay to have these things in your life but early on, when you’re struggling, you need to avoid these things.

Because if we are being honest with each other, your mind is already stuck in past memories of this person and you’re probably being reminded by them even if you’re looking at the rain or something like that.

Reduce the number of reminders to create some space for you to sort through your thoughts and emotions.

Related post: Should I delete photos of my ex?

Final Thoughts

Of all the things I could tell you, I want to say this – time will help you to move on.

The pain you feel early on isn’t the same as the pain you may feel two years from now.

You’ll learn to live without this person and even if you miss them, you’ll heal enough to manage those feelings.

If you’re not ready to move on, that’s okay.

There’s no set period of time for you to just shut off these feelings and find someone else.

But, I do know that you can build a life for yourself that has meaning and purpose without them.

You have to do it because the alternative is to remain stuck in the past and let your life fall apart and that will be of no benefit to a single soul.

Taking care of yourself and continuing to live a meaningful life is of benefit to yourself and those around you.

A lot of good can come from trying.

With that being said, I hope you found this article on what to do when you love someone you can’t have to be practical, insightful and comforting. If you require my help to move on or to possibly attract someone, check out my services page for more information on my email consultations.

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