This Is What It Feels Like To Love Someone Who Isn’t Ready

By

They say that it doesn’t matter who you fall in love with, but rather when you fall in love that truly determines whether two people will spend their lives together. While most of us can silently accept this generality as true, it does not stop our hearts from beating faster around that one person who you know is not ready for your love. So many of us fall in love with these people, and so many of us aren’t even ready ourselves; we’re too young, we’re too inexperienced, and we’re too wild. It is when you allow that love to grow only for it to wither away, just as you knew it would, that you feel the true pain that comes from loving someone who isn’t ready.

1. You would forgive them for anything.

When you know someone isn’t ready to wholly accept your love, but you love them anyway, you are forced to make sacrifices that no one should have to make in any loving relationship. Your significant other can cheat on you, lie to you, or treat you horribly, but you love that person so much that you accept it. You knew they weren’t ready. You made your bed, so you force yourself to lie in it.

2. You would wait for them.

Sure, you can recite the age old “there are plenty of fish in the sea” mantra to yourself periodically throughout your day, but once your heart has a hold on it, you’re stuck. This is a pivotal point of pain in loving someone who isn’t ready. You realize wholeheartedly that it is irrational to wait until that person is ready, even crazy, but any possibility of a future with them is worth the present heartache. It is a terrible feeling to wait for someone who isn’t ready; you’re so blinded by your emotions that you can’t see that you could be waiting for a future that isn’t there at all.

4. Your life is put in a stand still.

We can go on all the adventures we want, or have the most fabulous careers, or move to Bali in hopes of finding some meaning in this life, but when you love someone who isn’t ready, everything else is put on the back burner. Your thoughts and your dreams revolve around the person you love, and you can’t help it. How could you? Love is the single most beautiful emotion in the human soul, and it is also the most capable of producing heart wrenching agony.

5. Your heart doesn’t break just once, but over and over again.

Loving someone who isn’t ready usually entails them coming and going fairly often. Regardless of if they love you back, if someone is not ready for your love, they will not stay. You have to brace yourself for the pain of them leaving, not once, but many times. You know this is coming; you place a clock in your subconscious and wait for it. You would think that each time would get easier, but it doesn’t. You watch them come and go as your heart aches for the day when they finally stay.

6. You miss other opportunities for love that is ready.

The saddest truth about loving someone who isn’t ready is that it closes you off to so many people surrounding you that would be ready for your love. Some of those people are right in your line of vision, but you don’t even see them. Even if you do open your eyes and see the opportunity for love, you won’t let that person get close enough for the fear that you’ll drive another love away – the love you’ve been waiting for.

For more raw, powerful writing follow Heart Catalog here.