Why You Shouldn’t Be Mad at Yourself For Catching Feelings

This unrequited love

To me it's nothing but

A one-man cult

And cyanide in my Styrofoam cup

It's a bad religion

To be in love with someone who can never love you

• "Bad Religion", Frank Ocean

We've all been there. You're just going about your day, and when you think about a certain someone, a stupid grin splits your face - and it hits you. You've caught feelings, got a crush, fallen in love, all three different ways to say the same thing.

You like someone, and the feelings aren't reciprocated.

We hate this because it makes us vulnerable.

But we have this idea in our heads that if love is only unilateral - that is, if it's unreciprocated, it's inherently a bad thing. Which can be true - if someone takes advantage of the situation or abuses the position of power they have over someone else. But in an of itself, unrequited love is not an inherently bad thing.

Of course it hurts, but all of the forms of love hurt - unrequited love is just the one that has the reputation for being the most painful.

But even when love is unrequited, it still has value. It improves the life of both the giver and the receiver. Of course, in the moment it hurts. It hurt to be rejected, and it hurts to have to to let someone down. But to know that someone loves you, even if you don't feel the same way, helps you. To know that someone sees the beauty in you, helps - especially if you're struggling to see it in yourself.

It reminds you that you're valuable and wanted. If someone likes you, it means they've seen that spark inside of you that makes you who you are.

On the other hand, it is a beautiful thing to love someone else - regardless of how they feel. Everyone has something to be discovered about them, something about them that is admirable

And if you catch feelings for someone, it just means that you see that intangible thing inside them.

That's why you shouldn't beat yourself up for catching feelings for someone. I like to think of it as an appreciation of art - just like how you let yourself fall in love with a song, or a piece of art, you fall in love with people, too. Of course it hurts more, but it is still an appreciation of beauty.