Relationships • Finding Love
Our Love of Unavailability
We are used to feeling pity or comic disdain for people who fall in love with those who are very obviously unavailable; for example, the obsessive teenager who swoons over a famous singer; the fan waiting outside the house of a celebrity who barely registers their presence as they make their way to their limousine; the stalker who has spent a decade tracking the movement of a star who couldn’t care whether they lived or died.
It can seem far removed from us, a dramatic case in the psychology of unrequited love. We laugh at the absurdity of the situation: to deliver one’s deepest wishes for intimacy to someone who doesn’t know one even exists. To develop feelings for someone one will never meet. To use a word like love – associated with cuddles, hand-holding and lovemaking – for someone who is many hundreds of miles away and has only scorn or disgust for one.......Start your 7-day free trial to keep reading and access 2,000+ articles, courses, and tools with a subscription to The School of Life App. Follow this link to find out more.
It can seem far removed from us, a dramatic case in the psychology of unrequited love. We laugh at the absurdity of the situation: to deliver one’s deepest wishes for intimacy to someone who doesn’t know one even exists. To develop feelings for someone one will never meet. To use a word like love – associated with cuddles, hand-holding and lovemaking – for someone who is many hundreds of miles away and has only scorn or disgust for one.......Start your 7-day free trial to keep reading and access 2,000+ articles, courses, and tools with a subscription to The School of Life App. Follow this link to find out more.
