It’s okay if you fell in love with potential. There’s nothing to be ashamed of.
In fact, there’s not a single thing about loving someone’s potential that should warrant shame or embarrassment. You loved someone with a love that was greater than love, and this extended even to their future self. You were able to put your heart on your sleeve, and you wore it bravely.
People might say that you are naïve, but I call that courage.
The ironic and worst part of only loving already perfect and put together people is that they don’t see the beauty of it all — you don’t see who they can become. You can’t see the experiences that shaped them or their possible growth, you simply judge them based on the person they are now. You completely miss the best parts of their personality or character, their willingness to change and develop their inner core beliefs and values.
People are not stagnant and unchanging. People bloom and flourish all the time, and they’ll grow to become a person they are satisfied with. Loving someone for who they are can be risky because you’re betting on something that you can’t see or touch yet. You’re putting hope and all your eggs in one basket into a person that might or might not change, and if that isn’t courageous, I don’t know what is.
Being in love with potential involves falling, and you weren’t afraid of heights. You jumped without even thinking if there was a safety net underneath. Instead of painstakingly evaluating the potential risks and rewards or creating lists of pros and cons in your head, you were able to take a blind leap of faith.
You were able to see someone’s good and positive qualities and still decided to believe in their best. On your own volition, you chose to see this person could even be greater.
The truth is, falling in love with potential tests our ability to connect and relate to others as well as seeing if we are capable of placing faith and trust in others. People are multidimensional beings, with good and bad aspects to them, and loving a person’s potential means you were willing to see past their negative qualities in order to trust that they could succeed.
If you fell for their potential, there is nothing wrong with you, and it is far from a fault. You were able to see the best in someone, wanting them to be the happiest versions of themselves.
