In today’s society there are many break ups that happen after a very short time and many break ups that happen even after 10-15+ years of marriage. But why? Well it’s easy to answer the short term question because it’s simply a matter of incompatibility and noticing it. But the tougher question why do these long relationships fail?

In my mind, relationships and love fail due to a lack of reciprocation. As much as it can joy you to do something for someone else, if it doesn’t make them happy or they don’t try and do things to make you happy then the love will eventually fail. While you can be “in love” with a NP, the love will not last. Eventually you will see the futility and it’ll burn.

“Love” in itself is a completely different animal. For me, the definition of love (in regards to people) is “the inability to visualize your life without a person without extreme pain or emptiness.” Even when you don’t want the thing you love at an exact moment, you still don’t want them to be gone forever.

I think the saying “I want to be with you ever waking moment of my life” (or something similar) is what we always hear in the movies, and couldn’t be more wrong. We all need personal time – alone – to reflect. It’s just the way of life. I know I feel this way sometimes and even though I don’t want to be with my significant other/mother/father/whatever at that time, I still think of them and want them to never leave me for good.

I have more thoughts (esp. on the topic of love in death and how love seems to have an easier time carrying on after death than after something like a break-up.) but I’ll save them for another day.

I think that the definition of “love” in your entery is to specific. I mean, i love my cat, i love ice cream, i love buffy (the show, i hate the character), i love my friends. but i do not want to spend the rest of my life with the above (though i wouldn’t mind the occasional visit). I think that what you are calling “love” is really being “in love”. I define being “in love” as wanting to be with someone the rest of your life, wanting them to be happy and, most importantly, THEY FEEL THE SAME WAY. I do not believe that you can be “in love” with someone if they are not “in love” with you.
I might add that you can love someone while still being in love with them.
As for when one person does not have feelings for you, and you do for them, then you are not “in love” with them. You may love them, and think that you could be happy with them, but until they reciprocate in any way you are not “in love” with them, nor are they “in love” with you.
And as for how someone ought to react when another person has strong feelings for them, perhaps we all ought to look at it from that person’s point of view. If there were an individual that seemed really interested in you, would you not owe it to yourself to look into it? This is not a bad thing, if you want to be nice or flirt with someone then go ahead-so long as it is not malicious in intent. Which i think in most cases it is not. If a person claims to love you, then wouldn’t you be at least interested and persue the possibility? you know, think about it before dismissing the person- i know that if i were not in a relationship i would do just that.
And for the other side, the one who has feelings for the NP, should the NP decide that they don’t have feelings for you then they are obviously not good enough for you – if they aren’t in love with you then why should you delude yourself to think that you are with them? when it is supposed to happen then it will, and until that time don’t force the issue.
Oh, and i will leave out the rant about abortion, as i assume that it is just a misunderstanding… if it isn’t you will see another comment here shortly.

I only had two brief “relationships” in high-school– in one case she wasn’t feeling it and eventually broke it off, and in the other case, I wasn’t feeling it and eventually broke it off.

And both were misery.

I’m not saying that love doesn’t require a lot of sacrifice and compromise to genuinely work out, just that it’s stupid and cruel to pretend something’s there that isn’t “just to be nice.”

I must agree with Christine in that love is the necessity of another’s happiness for one’s own. I feel that way towards the most valued (and loved) people in my life. There is nothing I want more than their happiness. In fact, there are two people in particular, whose happiness has become my priority lately, even though they seem to be feuding – I’m pretty sure you know who I’m talking about, Jeff. Love is wanting everything for someone else, no matter how it affects you. You need that person to be happy, and everything else is secondary. Love doesn’t always have to be for someone you’re attracted to, either. It can be for a friend, a neighbour – anyone. Love isn’t something you can control – you can’t make it come, and you can’t make it go away. It is an entity. It causes irational actions, and makes people think something is wrong with you.

As for the topic of unrquited love . . . it seems like a painful scenario. You have intense feelings for someone, but they don’t have the same feelings for you. It isn’t reciprocated. I agree that takling to this person is a better option than just keeping them in the dark. If this person doesn’t know about it, then it could develop into an unhealthy relationship – stalking, perhaps. Talking about it openly could help ease any pain imposed on the person in love, and possibly help him/her get over these feelings, in time.

This is a very touchy subject, so I think I should probably clam up, and wait to see if anyone responds to what I had to say. Jeff, you’ve given me a lot to think about.

I find what you said about unrequited love interesting. Specifically what you said about what the NP party ought to do. You say that they ought to humour the one who is in love. What did you mean by that? If one knows that someone is in love with oneself, and does not recriprocate, what more can be done? While I feel that love is much much more than a giddy rush of feelings, it’s still not quite something that one can decide “I’m going to fall in love with this person” so as to help out a friend. And I think that definitely holds true in your case.

As for your statement that unrequited love is true, I think that I would agree with that, except to qualify it in a way which I’m fairly sure you agree with: it CAN be real love. There are as many, if not more, ways that someone can delude themselves into thinking that they’re really in love when it’s unrequited as when it’s a mutual infatuation.

I’m not sure that everything I said made sense, but you know how to get ahold of me to harangue me for clarification.