Crushing on a Friend

First off, good for you for being in therapy. It sounds like you already have some good insights in general, and you should trust yourself about his lack of emotional availability. This right here that you said: “Except that often when we are in long distance connections at our age, it’s to block real love from landing in our hearts. To feel safe and familiar in a fantasy rather than reality.” SPOT ON. He is emotionally unavailable, that’s on him, you can’t do anything about it except let go of the idea that he has relationship potential. Because he doesn’t, not any time soon, not without doing so much self-work that he is not currently already doing. At 39, the chances he will are slim, and slim to none on any timeline that would be helpful to you and your goals. Which makes the situation incompatible, without fault or any bad guys in the equation.

You’re also right that it’s not on you to do anything about his decisions, you’re not responsible for anything, but that doesn’t mean he’s bringing it up to make you responsible for it either. Sure, maybe he is, since emotionally walled off people can do that, but also maybe not, since friends also ask for advice to get more information to make their own decisions with without putting any actual responsibility on the friend. You don’t actually know, but either way, his intentions don’t matter. *You* keep your own boundaries on what’s healthy for you, and in this case that’s you not being responsible for him or his issues.

To answer your question, I think it’s fine to have male friends, but I also think in this specific case that you will need to distance yourself for a bit first to accept the situation and process your feelings. Otherwise you’ll stay in crush limbo. After you get more right with yourself, you can revisit if you still want to be just friends and can do so without feeling longing. What’s most important is not abandoning yourself or pushing down your needs in service to the idea of him feeling good or thinking you need to do that to keep him and any sort of connection in your life. You deserve to feel good, too.

I’m sure he’s lovely, but unrequited crush limbo usually happens because there’s something familiar about the other person that subconsciously is jostling older unhealed wounds you have. You feel a connection but never get together because there’s also an emotional disconnect… they mirror whatever caused those old wounds which is why there’s a lack of compatibility there, if that makes sense.

I empathize with your frustrations around dating, being lonely, wanting a family, and encountering flaky men. Do you and your therapist ever discuss attachment theory? People with insecure attachment styles are attracted to and attract insecure attachment styled partners who are their opposite, then fall into the anxious-avoidant trap and things fail. I’ve found that long patterns of what you’re describing are related to choosing avoidant and unavailable partners over and over. Learning this and having a new perspective on *choosing* which of my dates to continue seeing and which situations not to pursue at all (instead of making it all about hoping any man I met with “potential” would like me and stick around) changed my life. I was about where you are and then everything turned around within a couple years and I met someone amazing. But it didn’t happen until I was ready and fully open and emotionally available myself, which wasn’t about giving up on the outcome and having no control. It was about accepting that I’ll truly be okay no matter what, but it was also okay to be unapologetic about what I wanted even if I’d also be fine if I couldn’t find it and would need to come up with a new plan.

Keep working with your therapist and remember that your feelings for this man are reflecting back important information and lessons about yourself. Don’t focus on solving his problems or longing for him to meet his potential. Continue focusing on feeling good about yourself and accepting yourself and knowing you’ll be okay. You’ll get there!

Reply to Maddie:
I actually have two therapists :) A jungian analyst and a somatic therapist.

I’m familiar with attachment and I am an Avoidant-Anxious, who slides more into secure these days.

The connection is so relatively new. We’ve only spent time outside the yoga studio less than 13 days ago, its been 6 days since the revelation concerning his long-distance non relationship.

I had a dream about him (And I revealed this dream to him in person too) where I went into an empty apartment room where he was sitting on a couch. I gave him one good look and decided not to sit with him, walked out the door and moved away. He chased after me, tailing behind and asking, ‘Wait… Did you want me to follow you?’ and then I woke up.

I feel sometimes that in the dating world, especially among women, there’s this constant conversation that feels like power-over men. Who has more power over whom, and that who has more power will get what they want which in retrospect is a disturbing way of perpetuating really disturbing relationships.

I want an equal. Not a one up.

I guess what I’m seeking are ways to create space for love and learning to grow in this new connection while releasing expectation and pressure.

I just need to learn how to create space so I can land into a healthy friendship that may or may not turn into something more, without expecting it to turn into something more, and appreciating the presence of what is there rather than what can be.

But I won’t deny that it is hard, really hard. I hear what you are saying about wounds attracting wounds but this attraction existed BEFORE I KNEW he was unavailable. And the reality I keep encountering again and again is that you will always attract you wounds. Period.

Reply to Mama

No defensiveness. I think as women or feminine identified beings we just want to be felt, heard, held and understood by one another as we navigate our desire for connection. I know I do. And if that can be achieved through a random dating site, it helps. And I do feel heard.

Reply to Maddie:

She’s not an ex – She’s a friend who weaved in and out of his life over the last 5 years. They only now are entertaining a connection, and he was clear it was neither exclusive nor committed with plans of when they would meet again or plans of one person moving to the other, seeing as they’ve never kissed. But he claimed that there was a soul connection there And it is what he needs right now.

Which is a red flag, for sure. All I see is a safely projected fantasy of someone who reminds him of his life in a city he left last year so he could be with his family in the city we are in: My guess is he doesn’t want to let go of the past and has packaged it neatly into this connection, even as his world is changing and he is being required to shoulder family responsibilities in our hometown.

Anyways, that’s a lot of energy analyzing one human’s motives. :)

Thank you for your advice. You’ve echoed a lot of my internal sentiments and I appreciate the non-judgment in your advice as well as the absence of calling him a jerk or ways to manipulate the outcome or shutting down a connection all together because it doesn’t match my expectations (Which is distorted and disturbing, imo).

I feel the lesson in this is to practice those boundaries. Be honest. Clear. There may come a point where I turn to this person and tell him very succinctly that it is very easy to be attracted to him, that it’s hard not to have a crush on him because despite the unavailability he really is a warm and loving selfless spirit. The pain of rejection might happen. The friendship may disintegrate. Or it may not. And saying that out loud maybe exactly what I need to do so that my system can really alchemize truth and surrender in realtime, with no expectation of what may or may not happen.

Reply to Liz:

We’ve been acquainted and had conversations over the last 2 months off and on, since we share the same Yoga Community. Its been 2 weeks since we spent time outside the studio and gotten to know each other more intimately.

I think the romanticization may stem from our yoga teacher, who really enjoys the both of us greatly and is one of our favorite teachers, is the one who started the attraction for me by pointing out she really liked what she saw between us when she witnessed our casual conversations and exchanges before/after class.

I agree with all the points about taking a step back and just being present with this new human in a curious and thoughtful way without agenda or expectation. I disagree with advice about spending less time or stepping way back which I don’t think is necessary and probably damaging towards something that could either be a really fruitful friendship or a potential relationship. I don’t intend to chase fantasies but if things progress organically, they progress organically. if not, they don’t.

Such is the wisdom I’ve gleaned since my first post. :) Thanks good humans.

Because mutual friends have been noticing his turn of behavior over the last two months in my presence.

Hell. I just had another yoga teacher ask me straight up if there is something between us and that he has been making an extra effort to come to the studio during hours I volunteer and that he does not interact with anyone else the way he does me.

I told her that I had no idea what was going on and she might as well ask him what’s up.

She said she was determined to ask him and encourages this match.

So 🤷‍♀️

Yes to what mama said. I think the worst thing for a budding relationship (or even the possibility of one) is having other people’s noses in it. Relationships aren’t a spectator sport, whatever develops between two people needs to be between them… organic yes, and private too. (Unless you’re talking an arranged marriage, which we’re not). It’s not helpful to have outsiders egging you on and putting assumptions in your head. So please, step back and don’t let the nosy yoga folks into your head. Or us on the internet, for that matter!