In our society, love can be described and shown in many ways. Whether you show your appreciation of someone by posting a picture of them with a cute caption on Twitter or simply sending them a text message. Either way, love is shown in your own way. But when will you realize that the person doesn’t love you back?

You talk about many different things yet at the end of the day do they love you? You spend time together but do they love you? You’ve never actually put a label on each other, yet here you are thinking it’s love. You'll never get a concrete answer until you both talk about it. So the first thing you'll think about is where you both stand. If they're in a completely different world than you are, that's when you know.

Your definition of love may be different from their definition. If you have a set of standards in which a person shows their love, do not downgrade. If you expect them to be a decent conversationalist, don’t change that. If they start off dry with no content, don’t adjust your standard. Don’t be the one to always keep the conversation going just because you want to talk to them. End that adjustment. If you expect them to communicate, don’t change that. If you expect them to let you know if they’re going to be busy or not, do NOT change that. If they don’t talk to you for a while with no explanation do NOT adjust your standards, simply accept.

At the same time don’t expect too much from them. Knowing that the person doesn’t reciprocate the same feelings isn’t their fault. Don’t expect them to remember everything about you. Don’t expect them to act differently than before. To them you’re just a regular person, and that may take time to accept and adjust with but that’s okay. Things happen for a reason, things don’t work out for a reason and things will not go your way.

Love will be a one-sided thing until the other person realizes it too. They will realize that what you have is something great. Do not change your standards. Adjust some of your understanding. Do not change who you are and what you think of love just because of this unrequited love situation.