For better or worse, love is something that comes unexpectedly . It does not listen to reason or rational calculations of what is good for us from a realistic perspective. It simply comes with falling in love, like a wave of emotions, and makes our way of experiencing life change in a matter of days or a few weeks.

Therefore, there is nothing to prevent unrequited love from appearing, or a clearly asymmetrical one in which one part of the couple gives a lot and the other does not invest much time, effort or affection. Thus, many people end up asking themselves a classic question: how can I stop loving someone who doesn’t value me? In the following lines we will develop precisely this theme.

The characteristics of unrequited love

As we have seen, although relationships are (or should be) made up of two people who love each other and who form an affective bond, love can perfectly well be given unilaterally. Loving someone does not imply that that someone loves us , as many people painfully discover throughout their lives. But that does not mean that we should resign ourselves to passively suffering the consequences of that disappointment.

It is true that one cannot directly manipulate one’s own emotions, but we can take several measures to make the bad moment pass as quickly as possible and to focus our attention on life projects that do allow us to be happy.

So the key is not to start hating or despising the person who has not corresponded to us, but simply to stop making it a priority to spend time with that person or thinking about him or her . Repaired love does not stop hurting overnight, but if we do not feed it by turning it into an obsession and through rumination, its psychological repercussions and relevance will simply be extinguished in a matter of weeks.

How to stop loving someone who doesn’t value you

To find out how to go on your way without worrying obsessively about someone not loving you, follow these steps.

1. Avoid reminders

As much as possible, avoid exposing yourself to contexts that bring back memories related to that person. Do it in a reasonable way, since in practice it is impossible to avoid this kind of stimulus. Take into account the most relevant ones, and adopt habits that do not make you think about them.

For example, change your bar to go for a drink on the weekends, or go for a walk in other places. Similarly, it is good that at first you don’t have contact with that person , although that doesn’t mean you should adopt a hostile relational dynamic with him/her.

2. Take a distance perspective

In almost any situation it is possible to take a distant perspective that allows us to analyze in a calmer and more objective way what is happening. This is very useful when working on love problems, as it helps to discard the idea that the psychological pain we feel in the face of the frustration of not feeling loved describes what we are worth.

Thus, it is a way to have a more realistic and reasonable view of oneself, one that is not subject to the pessimistic biases that come with experiencing disaffection because of rejection by someone who does not value us.

In the end, that person does not know us in a complete and exact way: his way of perceiving us is conditioned by the way we have related to him, which in turn is a way of interacting that we have not used with other people and which in fact does not have to be the same as what we do when we are alone.

3. Think about what you know about yourself that the other person does not know

Make a list of positive things you know about yourself that you think the person who doesn’t value you enough doesn’t know about. The aim of this is not to prepare a list of arguments to convince them to love you, of course, but a reminder that beyond the image of you that reflects the way that person relates to you, you have many strengths that you should not forget .

4. Give yourself time

It is important not to set unrealistic goals about how long it should take to recover emotionally. If you think you’ll be fine in three days and this doesn’t happen, that can make you more obsessed with the problem , making it last longer.

So it is best not to set a temporary goal that marks a time when you should feel good. Instead, set goals in your daily life that have nothing to do with feeling one way or another, but rather with doing certain actions that lead you to get excited about other projects in company or alone.