In my friend groups, I’ve always been the perpetually single friend who, despite my grand lack of experience, has to find a way to give relationship advice anyways. But on the occasion that I actually find myself with a guy who seems genuinely interested in me, it’s never really gone smoothly. I’ll always reject the idea that he’s actually into me but say I should give it a shot and see what happens anyways. From past experiences, I’ll either tell him I don’t feel the same way or he’ll turn out to be not-so-genuine anyways. Either way, after all is said and done, sometimes I’ll slowly then suddenly find myself wanting him. But is it because I genuinely like him or is it because I liked the idea of him – the fact that he liked me.
I read that a good way to figure out if you like him or just the idea of him is to ask yourself how you would feel if he all of a sudden wasn’t a part of your life. But I don’t think that this is an effective way of handling the situation because there are just so many other factors at play. He might be an old friend you can’t imagine life without, a new friend you’ve come to love spending time with, or an acquaintance you're not all that close with. Either way, you’d probably be pretty sad if they just disappeared suddenly, but that doesn’t mean you should’ve gone for them without considering everything else.
My situations aren’t sweeping, but this kind of thing happens to people all the time. You’re not sure if you’re just bored and found a new boy toy, or if this could really be a keeper. Even if you didn’t want him, the fact that he likes you makes you think that you should give him a chance. Even after you’ve ended things, you still wonder about him. And why shouldn’t you? He was sweet and nice, he was so funny, you enjoyed his company and you had a lot in common. But no, you chose to let him go, and that was the right decision. If you weren’t sure, or if you found that one thing that just didn’t work, you have to remind yourself of that instead of toying with both him and the idea of him.
This doesn’t always have to be the case, though. Maybe you’re still thinking about him because some little part of you was never really sure. Or maybe you were just scared or not willing to put in the effort to make it work before. So maybe you should reopen that chapter and give it another go. But you have to calculate whether or not these feelings are genuine because it’s not worth messing with him again if you aren’t 100 percent sure.
But if you know you made the right choice, you’ve made a huge leap towards being an emotionally mature person who understands herself and knows what she really wants. Maybe you’ll feel a little extra lonely for a while and the sappy songs on the radio will hit a little closer to home, but you can’t let that get you down. It didn’t work out for a reason, and that’s not the end of the world. He’s not the sun, you are, and one day there’ll be someone who you like the idea of, but you truly like him too, no questions asked.
