There are those who, when it comes to love, prefer not to leave their comfort zone and remain in a healthy singleness. But sometimes this vital option is seen not so much as the fruit of a decision taken freely, but as an imposition; the world forces us not to bet on falling in love, but deep down we would like to not give up on that experience and go deeper into it. Fear of love is something that limits our freedom.

So, how to stop being afraid of love? It is not an easy task, since these kinds of psychological problems and conflicts are based on emotions that are deeply rooted in preconceived beliefs about both the environment and ourselves. However, it is possible to “train” in other ways of thinking and feeling that do serve our interests and improve our quality of life.

Stop being afraid of love: what to do?

Falling in love is one of the phenomena that marks a before and after in our lives. The torrent of emotions that love produces fills practically every facet of daily life , to the point where recurring ideas and mental images can appear.

But, just as it happens in many other experiences, in love it also carries certain costs. Some of them have to do with the investment in time, effort and resources needed to maintain a functional love relationship, and therefore it is already known in advance that these kinds of sacrifices are going to have to be addressed. But others are of a probabilistic nature: they may or may not occur. Lack of love is an example of the latter.

As a result, many people develop a fear of love or falling in love, so that they deny themselves the possibility of being with someone on a regular basis while retaining that kind of bond.

But sometimes the same person can have conflicting interests. That is why the concept of fear of love makes sense: wherever it appears, what happens is not that after reasoning it is concluded that starting a relationship with a partner does not compensate taking into account the objective situation in which one lives, but that, independently of the moment and the context, one fears the possibility of falling in love or of living love with another person , whatever that person may be.

We will now review a series of tips on how to stop being afraid of love, in steps that we must try to adapt to each case.

1. Make concrete what you fear

A fear can be broken down into a series of experiences or more concrete consequences which are those we really want to avoid. To begin to stop being afraid of love, it is necessary to try to be very aware of the true causes of this phenomenon .

To do this, one must go through an initial stage of self-discovery. In this case, we have to analyse what are the forecasts and mental images that we associate with what would happen if we did not renounce love, and write them down in a document that we will only use ourselves and that we do not have to share with anyone.

Once this is done, try to group these fears according to whether they meet these criteria.

  • Does it have to do with your self-esteem or self-concept?
  • Does it have to do with the fear of losing that person?
  • Does it have to do with what they’ll say?
  • Does it have to do with sex?

Once this is done, you will have a directory or “map” of the problem. Possibly one of the above categories will be much more suitable than the others for our case, or at most two. With that, we will know where to direct our efforts : if you think the problem is sexual, the best thing to do is to attend therapy with sexologists; if the problem is in what they will say, the problem will be based on your relationship with the people around you or on how you interpret those relationships.

We will now focus on the cases in which the fear of love arises from problems of self-esteem, self-concept or fear of loss, which are the most common.

2. Review your idea of love

It is quite possible that, although it sounds paradoxical, you have idealized the experience of love. The image given by other couples is usually positive , since under social pressure they try not to show their imperfections, and in the same way the world of cinema has been trying for years to normalise a type of love relationship that fits in with the romantic ideal according to which even after going through serious problems caused by external circumstances, two people in love come to fit in perfectly.

Thus, self-esteem problems are capable of facilitating the emergence of the thought that we are not ready to embark on a lifestyle so sublime and perfect that only fully self-realized people can afford it.

But this is a mistake, since the most common thing is that there is a certain degree of conflict in all couples , just because they are two individuals with different interests and points of view. Identical twins do not go through life without arguing with each other even once, so in relationships where intimacy is more common in adult life, these tensions are more likely to be there.

In this sense, to solve this we must modify our beliefs about love relationships as well as what we are and what we are capable of. Relationships, in the end, only require very basic ingredients and are governed by intuition: empathy, love, and a willingness to strive to live well with the other person and learn all the daily routines to do so.

3. Get perspective on past experiences

It is very frequent that having gone through bad experiences in love generates a rejection of falling in love. When this happens, starting to feel those emotions for someone is seen as a problem that comes to obsess us, because there is no clear way to prevent the feelings from taking their course, unless we try to avoid that person , completely altering our quality of life and giving reasons for anxiety and a certain paranoia to appear in case we are going to meet her.

But it must be clear that the problems that occurred in previous loves are not “the essence” of love itself, but rather problems that occurred in a relational dynamic . Every relationship is to some extent unique, and if an ex-boyfriend has given you problems, that does not mean that the next one will also give you problems. Sometimes we forget that life is not so long that we have a realistic picture of what love relationships with most people are like.

4. Think of waiver as also a cost

Losing someone you feel love for is a cost, but so is avoiding giving love a chance by avoiding those experiences. Even if there are no key moments, the discomfort generated by that renunciation is stretched out in time , and it is something that is paid for every day. Stopping the self-imposed prohibition of having a love life leads to instant triumph, even if at that moment there is no one to love and start a life as a couple.

5. If you need it, go to a psychologist

If the problem is so serious that it’s a constant concern for you, consider seeing a psychologist. Through therapy it is possible to make great advances by having a person who, from a professional and healthy perspective, can help us to “train” a new philosophy of life.