I received my rude awakening on unrequited love when the boy who I thought cared for me brought home another girl; and had sex with her in the bedroom next to mine (we were sharing a house with a few other friends back then). This girl, who everyone was convinced would be a one night stand, ended up being his girlfriend for another five years.
Most importantly, prior to bringing her home, he had informed me that “I do not want a relationship with anyone right now”. However, just two weeks after he said that he wasn’t looking for love, he managed to find the one thing that I had been desperately searching for that past year. So how did he do it and what can we learn?
What did he do right?
Realists will protest that when a man says he does not want a relationship right now, he actually means he does not want a relationship with you. While it is partly true that I probably wasn’t the right fit for him, we had been best friends for years before this incident; so I knew him well enough to know that he meant it when he said he wasn’t looking for anything. It was our final year of university and instead of looking for love he was solely focused on propelling his academics and career.
He threw himself into college life. He became more involved in sports; he joined mentorship programs for freshmen, volunteered in student body committees etc. Essentially, he immersed himself into activities that he was passionate about and tried to live life to the fullest before having to enter ‘the real world’. When you are living life to the fullest, you don’t focus on what is missing, instead you focus on what is present. By doing so, the often arduous task of trying to find a mate becomes almost effortless; because you’re enjoying yourself enough to not bother about whether love is in your life or not.
What did I do wrong?
Opposite to him, I spent almost the entirety of my time at university secretly hoping to find love. When I went out to bars or parties, I would be slightly disappointed if I didn’t mean a cute male prospect at some point during my night. I wanted that fly across the world for you, walk hand-in-hand into the sunset, kiss in the rain kind of love. And I wanted it desperately. Little did I know that I was going about it in the completely wrong way- I was focusing on the wrong thing.
A cliché grounded in truth
Have you ever heard the cliché “love will find you when you are not looking for it”? Well there’s a reason it exists and I will explain later how you can use it to your advantage. A year after graduating with honours, I still found myself relying on my parents, broke and struggling to find a job that matched my qualifications (if you can relate go check out my previous article: 7 Lessons Learned: Being Unemployed for a Year After Graduating from a Top UK University).
My biggest priority was no longer finding love, which it had been almost the entirety of my university life; instead it was getting my career on track. I quit an internship that was paying me pennies and over-promising a conversion to a graduate job that I knew was never coming; I started to send out applications; and I networked liked crazy. At the same time, I was getting ready to move back to London after trying my hand (and failing) to establish a career in Singapore.
It was the most inconvenient time to get into a relationship … and yet in an ironic twist of fate, that was exactly when I found my still-going-strong- today boyfriend.
Love will find you -A practical approach
How can you apply this to your own life? The bottom line is that you need to find yourself loving life first before you can find love in your life. Throw yourself into passion projects, learn a new skill or improve an old one, focus on creating career goals and hitting them. At that time, I also threw myself back into my old sports. I started playing netball and touch rugby more regularly again. Rugby ended up being the thing that bonded my boyfriend and I together at the start. So don’t be afraid to delve into all sorts of different activities- you can’t predict how it could potentially serve you in your love life in the future.
“The bottom line is that you need to find yourself loving life first before you can find love in your life”
Wait isn’t that kind of counter-intuitive, pretend not to be looking for love in order to find it? You shouldn’t pretend. You should genuinely try to refocus your energy into enriching your life. People are attracted to those who can independently fulfil themselves. Some suggestions to try and start doing this can include but not be limited to:
· Getting yourself into shape
· Learning a new skill or relearning an old one
· Reconnect with old friends
· Create a step-by-step plan to reach your financial goals and start executing it
· Tackle a new project at work
· Create art
Let’s be clear here, if you search hard enough for a relationship, you will find something; but you are also likely to find yourself settling or lowering your standards in order to get it. That should not be your aim when finding a romantic partner. So fall in love with your life first, before you choose to fall in love with someone else.
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This post was previously published on Hello, Love and is republished here with permission from the author.
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Photo credit: Unsplash