Why We Want Unavailable People

I’m taking Billy Collins’ MasterClass on poetry right now and he made a comment that made me think of something unrelated but important.

Poems tend to have two subjects: the initial subject with which the poem begins, and the real subject which dovetails from the initial subject but takes up the majority of the poem. If you read Collins’ work, there are tons of examples of this and he’s certainly a master of it.

Some time passed after learning this and my brain made a link between this and relationships.

When we struggle to get into a relationship or to get the relationship we want, we get really frustrated because we’re trying so hard to get a specific thing and failing.

But what if that was just what we think the problem is? What if there is a more real and fundamental problem that the initial problem is hinting at?

What if the truth of what you want is exactly what you are experiencing right now?

In The Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle wrote, “Observe how the mind labels [the present moment] and how this labeling process, this continuous sitting in judgment, creates pain, and unhappiness.

Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it. Make it your friend and ally, not your enemy. This will miraculously transform your whole life.”

What if being single is exactly what you need to be, but you keep resisting the present moment? And if what you resist, persists, then no matter what you do you’ll always find yourself back at square one.

Then you end up resisting what is even more, wrapping you tighter into the web of resentment.

On the surface, there are several reasons one constantly finds oneself with people who cannot go along with one’s desires in the relationship. Maybe we’re reenacting the neglectful or abusive love we received as children or perhaps we flat out don’t want a relationship but bow to the societal pressure to be in one. Maybe you just want to be safe from potential relationship pain.

Whatever the reason, you’re not in touch with it right now which is why you may have tried over and over again to get into a relationship that works but it never works out.

Just for now, be in the mindset that what your life is right now is the life you want to live.

You mean I should live like a sad loner who’s missed out on love?

No, that’s a judgment on the circumstances. What I mean is that you should be without a relationship for now.

In addition to the reasons a relationship never happened listed earlier, when you embrace being single without trying to change it, you might learn that you were waiting around for a relationship because you actually wanted sex and romance as entertainment.

Then there’s the possibility that you finally get into a relationship because it was a far simpler process than what you were making it out to be. But all you had to do was take it easy and to stop being so proactive.

Being proactive is virtually always seen as a good thing. “Follow your dreams. Chase after your goals.” However, we never stop to consider that we’re already taken care of and if we feel the need to take action, it could be out of insecurity. In this kind of situation, security would be to stay at peace with how things are in the moment.

There will be a time to act, that’s for certain. But if you’ve been going round and round, and it hasn’t changed anything, why not take a rest? Why stretch yourself so thin to the point that you injure yourself?

Nothing is so important that you have to burn yourself out in order to get it. Because by the time you get it, you’ll be so emotionally and even physically exhausted that you won’t be able to enjoy it.

So take a load off. Get into the feeling of being alone. The more you do this, the more comfortable you will feel.

There may be a fear that to give into this feeling might ruin your ability, power or desire to get into a relationship. The way I see it is if accepting the opposite of what you want makes you not want it anymore, did you really want it?

Probably not.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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