Why Do We Chase Love?

We all know that love isn’t tangible.

Yet many of us have at least once, tried to chase it even though we know that by doing so, pushes it further and further away.

Love gurus tell us to wait and not to expect. To attract rather than search. But despite these warnings, many of us have still fallen into the trap of looking for something that cannot be found.

I reflected on this question recently as I was reviewing my past relationship history. After writing about my experiences of serial dating, I asked myself the questions;

Why was I so intent on chasing love?

What kept me going through my long search that made my efforts seem so worth-while?

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The romanticized version of love

The romanticized version of love told me that it would complete me. It convinced me that it would make me happy, at least happier than I already was. It promised me that it would protect me from my self deprecating insecurities.

In my head love was like the elixir of life, it was worth fighting for and I would chase it for as long as it took to obtain.

After being in a solid relationship for a year I would now like to think that I have actually found love. Whilst it hasn’t been long, it has felt different from all the other times. It is a love that I have never experienced before.

From this I have learned that love is complex. It has caused me pain, jealously and frustration. As well as the laughs, the happiness and the empathy which goes on in between. The high’s come with a cost and love’s deceptive beauty from the outside holds many darker undertones which are unique to every situation.

To want love without really knowing what it is, is to search for something unknown.

The reason why I spent so long chasing this entity was because I hadn’t come to realise this. I thought that I knew what I was searching for and it was for exactly this reason I couldn’t find it.

I was merely chasing my own expectations of love which were nothing more than an imagined fantasy.

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Love has become synonymous with tangible things

The love that I was chasing appeared in forms that I wrongly associated with love itself.

In my mind love had often become synonymous with tangible things that I was frequently exposed to such as a person, a relationship, social media. It was these forms that were dangled in front of my eyes, making my legs run faster to catch them. I thought that if I gained these I would automatically and simultaneously capture love as well.

What I later came to realize is that these are merely the by-products of love. Love itself is a feeling, invisible to the naked eye. A unique connection between unique kinds of bodies. These displays of affection, the idea of a relationship and the person that I wanted to be with didn’t guarantee love itself.

Rather it merely opened the door of possibility.

If I hadn’t convinced myself that love was something visible then maybe the point of my chase would have been forgotten.

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Work hard mentality

I have grown up in a society that teaches you that working hard almost always guarantees success. It is the key to your own fortunes and if you don’t succeed it must somehow be your fault.

I applied this mentality to all areas of my life. Sometimes it worked out and other times it didn’t. It particularly failed when I tried to apply this mentality to love.

It never occurred to me that love was outside this equation.

I spent many years dating, talking, flirting, and chasing all sorts of different people hoping to eventually obtain a love that I thought I deserved because I had worked so hard to achieve it.

Looking back, whilst this seems silly it also fills me with a sense of sadness. The working hard mentality is often given as a template for your whole life. It does not distinguish between the things that it doesn’t affect and makes you feel like a failure if you don’t succeed.

Love is not something you can work hard to gain.

Whilst you can work hard on yourself in maintaining your mental and physical well-being, love comes and goes when it pleases.

Once you have found it you can start working on it, nourishing it, cherishing it, but before this happens there is nothing to work hard on.

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Love has always been about another person

Until a few years ago love was always something that I associated with someone else. It was almost like a middle word sitting between two beings like glue, keeping them together. Without this, they wouldn’t be together. The feelings of happiness, warmth, and security would not be exchanged between them.

This is where I went wrong. I spent so long chasing love in other things and other people I failed to realize that there was a love to be experienced within myself. I just didn’t pay it any attention to it to reap the benefits.

Loving yourself is not the same as being loved by another, but it can be equally if not more empowering. Throughout my years I was so busy looking externally for love that I was blind to the love that I could give to myself. The kind that would have increased my confidence, my faith in myself, and my happiness in general.

By constantly attaching this to an external being I was chasing something that I already had.

This was ineffective and perhaps explains why I couldn’t catch what I was looking for at the time.

My chasing drew my attention away from my own power, and the more I ignored that, the less likely I was to find love.

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Thanks for reading.

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Previously published on “Hello, Love”, a Medium publication.

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