I’ve mostly figured out how to turn unrequited love off, but I suspect it won’t work for most people (like many similar techniques).
Short version: One of the more common effects of infatuation is a blindness to the person’s flaws. Sort of like anosognosia, but for someone else’s personality instead of one’s own body. To get rid of unwanted unrequited love, force yourself to make a list of the person’s significant character flaws. Everyone has them, but they’re really hard to notice in a crush.
For me, usually just making the list is enough to turn the fuck-like hurting into something more manageable, but reading it over and over has been necessary in a couple of exceptional cases.
Totally agreed, but its also been a damn good motivator for a lot of personal changes in my life. Like growing a backbone.
Granted, that sort of stuff might not be necessary if all love was requited, and if I ever can’t find stuff I want to change about myself then I could imagine wanting this drug.
A lot of this is probably going to sound incredibly unconvincing. I’d assert that I would have found it unconvincing had I not gone through it.
The first time around it was mostly a matter of me realizing that it was hopeless with this girl and that I have better things to do than worry. Not particularly vertebral, but sort of significant for me nonetheless.
The next time was a bit weirder—there was someone who was a friend that I got a crush on, then we dated for a while, then split up, then at various times started dating again before I ultimately wound up in the friend zone. (I’d like to mention that she was pretty open about the whole non-interested not-seriousness of everything after the initial split, and it was more my pigheadedness that allowed it to continue). At various points during that, she would become somewhat interested in other guys.
After one incident (inviting one of said interests to a meeting with me), I had decided that I had enough of it and called her out on it. I then actually accepted that she wasn’t interested, and had backbone enough to stop trying to accommodate her in every way possible. Following up, I became more secure in myself in general, more assertive and demanding of my own interests, and less worried about the opinions that other people don’t actually have because they’re not on average interested enough to judge you. So overall less of a pushover.
Not much, it just didn’t seem in my opinion as important (though it felt that way at the time), and the backbone growth didn’t particularly propagate through my life, apart from ending that whole middle school/high school like-someone-but-never-do-anything-about-it thing.
Short answer, yes.
Long answer, we’re good friends now, and its working out much better with a backbone. The main issue with the relationship not working is that a lot of what Robin Hanson speculates about “mating behavior” is true with her (to the point that when I explained those ideas to her she thought I was just being ridiculously insightful and empathetic). Other than that, she’s really fun to be around.
Why on earth would anyone want to remove unrequited love?
I’d want a drug that made me not feel hurt when people criticized me.
Because it hurts like fuck, that’s why.
I’ve mostly figured out how to turn unrequited love off, but I suspect it won’t work for most people (like many similar techniques).
Short version: One of the more common effects of infatuation is a blindness to the person’s flaws. Sort of like anosognosia, but for someone else’s personality instead of one’s own body. To get rid of unwanted unrequited love, force yourself to make a list of the person’s significant character flaws. Everyone has them, but they’re really hard to notice in a crush.
For me, usually just making the list is enough to turn the fuck-like hurting into something more manageable, but reading it over and over has been necessary in a couple of exceptional cases.
I’ve tried this technique and it works for me somewhat, but it’s not enough and I still want a drug.
Oh, agreed. Self-modification should be easier than it is.
Are you still planning on writing a post about jealousy?
I haven’t had the time/energy to get much writing done lately, but that post will exist at some point, and hopefully sooner than later.
Totally agreed, but its also been a damn good motivator for a lot of personal changes in my life. Like growing a backbone.
Granted, that sort of stuff might not be necessary if all love was requited, and if I ever can’t find stuff I want to change about myself then I could imagine wanting this drug.
Could you expand on the details of growing a spine and becoming less susceptible to unrequited love?
A lot of this is probably going to sound incredibly unconvincing. I’d assert that I would have found it unconvincing had I not gone through it.
The first time around it was mostly a matter of me realizing that it was hopeless with this girl and that I have better things to do than worry. Not particularly vertebral, but sort of significant for me nonetheless.
The next time was a bit weirder—there was someone who was a friend that I got a crush on, then we dated for a while, then split up, then at various times started dating again before I ultimately wound up in the friend zone. (I’d like to mention that she was pretty open about the whole non-interested not-seriousness of everything after the initial split, and it was more my pigheadedness that allowed it to continue). At various points during that, she would become somewhat interested in other guys.
After one incident (inviting one of said interests to a meeting with me), I had decided that I had enough of it and called her out on it. I then actually accepted that she wasn’t interested, and had backbone enough to stop trying to accommodate her in every way possible. Following up, I became more secure in myself in general, more assertive and demanding of my own interests, and less worried about the opinions that other people don’t actually have because they’re not on average interested enough to judge you. So overall less of a pushover.
I’d have said that realizing in the first case that you were running your mind and your time was fairly vertebral. What am I missing?
Probably just curiosity at my end, but in the second case, did she turn out to be someone you wanted to spend time with at all?
Not much, it just didn’t seem in my opinion as important (though it felt that way at the time), and the backbone growth didn’t particularly propagate through my life, apart from ending that whole middle school/high school like-someone-but-never-do-anything-about-it thing.
Short answer, yes.
Long answer, we’re good friends now, and its working out much better with a backbone. The main issue with the relationship not working is that a lot of what Robin Hanson speculates about “mating behavior” is true with her (to the point that when I explained those ideas to her she thought I was just being ridiculously insightful and empathetic). Other than that, she’s really fun to be around.
/me shrugs
Sometimes it doesn’t.
The most salient example of unrequited love in my mind did. Oh man. That sucked so much.
Why? I greatly suspect that the feeling of being hurt is part of what makes criticism useful.
I think I might even enjoy a drug that induced a mild form of unrequited love.
Ok, I want the drug which gives me access to the control room for my emotions.
Before that, I’d better get the drug which gives me enough sense to use the first drug without wrecking myself.