How do you deal when someone doesn't like you back?

The feelings never truly go away. It is discouraging but I just smile and move on though, it means they aren't the person I'm going to spend the rest of my life with.

And no, plenty of people hold things like this close. Myself included.

 

I just move on and continue being friends. One crush said he apologizes for being straight, so maybe we could've dated.

 

well, I've had a few of those that I just never really get over. but I continue being friends, and learn to enjoy their friendship. and I sigh from time to time, but life goes on. (&&&)

 

There is no point in dwelling on something that you cannot change. It is not easy to avoid letting such situations get close to you, to hurt you on a deeper level. The quicker you manage to pull away from the idea of what could have been, the sooner you will be able to move forward and leave all this behind.

 

I just sit there and pretend that it doesn't hurt when I'm with the person.

 

I was in this situation not so long ago (in fact i probably still am).The best thing to do is try and move on but thats easier said than done.I often end up dwelling on it but you dont do yourself any favours.

 

My motto is simply this: my whole self-worth is not dependent on whether someone I like likes me back. I recognize that the chances of that happening are not zero, but often close to zero.

If you know the odds and keep your expectations in line with those odds, you begin to realize it's a numbers game (emphasis on the word game). If you treat it as a game, it makes "losing" just part of said game...and so on to the next.

This may appear callous, but it is an important way to protect the psyche from too much self-inflicted abuse. If, on the other hand, someone likes you back, they are essentially giving you permission to be vulnerable, which is an entirely different matter.

 

I once asked someone who worked as a telemarketer if he got tired of people yelling at him and slamming the phones down (back in the days when most people had phones that involved a handpiece that set in a receiver). He said that typically one call at of one hundred would get you someone who would actually listen to you. So where my limited tolerance for rejection would tend to dwell on 99 rejections, for him that one positive call would be the highlight of his day, and in fact would be what he (and his employer) considered a successful day. Imagine if we approached relationships like that. Fact is, we probably would find way more than one out of a hundred would give us a positive response. Of course, we're probably more selective in who we approach than just going after 100 consecutive names out of a phone book, but the lesson is still that if we focus on the positive instead of dwelling on the negative, we would probably find that we really have a lot more success in this area of our lives! :icon_bigg

 

I don't think I have ever been really hurt by someone not liking me back, I would try to maintain friendship and move on. There will be more girls.. it's trial and error. You can't help how someone feels.

 

I've only ever liked two guys in my life, both were straight and went on to date my best friends at the time (lol...).

The first time I coped by keeping busy and avoided him when I could help it. I would tell myself "it's his loss" over and over until I almost believed it. Like all things, I eventually got over it.

The second time I knew the probability that the guy would like me back was infinitesimally small, so I moved on relatively quickly.

Greatwhale's post pretty much sums up how I feel about the topic of discussion.

 

I usually just drop them until I'm over it...or somewhat over it lol...then I can be around them again without feeling like dying

 

I would say that is this the best option and believe it or not, if you start dating someone else or say you fancy someone else they will get jealous 9/10 times lol...

To be honest I haven't really been in this situation though but still, there are plenty more people out there that will like you, you just have to try and take it on the chin, I know that it can be hard but it is just apart of life. I'm sure that there are people out there that like you and you aren't into them, you may not know that they do but there are people out there. Try to move on and not think about it too much.

 

Try my hardest to get over it. Eventually I'll distance myself from them. It starts to feel more destructive being around them st a certain point.

 

I remember myself that I would want anyone I really, really like, to be happy.
This means that if they don't want to be with me, it would make them unhappy.
Ergo I'd rather see them hook up with someone who can make them happy.

 

I try to accept my feelings and, as another person here said, to maintain my confidence. Lots of frustration comes from battling your own emotions as well as feeling unwanted (if it's the right word). I'd say, don't try to hide your feelings and don't be awkward about them, like they're something to be ashamed about, just express them in a way that doesn't make the other person uncomfortable. You can tell them a warm "good morning" or wish them for new year's day, or be interested if they are alright, but don't appear (and don't be) desperate. Accept and move on.

 

So far I've never seen being rejected as a self-confidence issue.
To me it just means I'm not their type, not that there's something objectively wrong with me.

 

For me neither, but it makes me feel ashamed for expressing myself.

 

I sometimes write my thoughts down about it, like a diary entry. Sometimes I do a Q and A thing, pretending that I'm interviewing myself to get the ball rolling. I can get pages of insights that way.

Today I was thinking about a recent heart-breaker of mine, who just won't f**k off out of my head. A classic case of them not being attracted, but also failing to give 100% clear signals about it. So, AS USUAL, they string me along with a 5 to 15% "maybe" signal, giving me a glimmer of hope and motivating me into somehow going after their heart. Doesn't that sound familiar?

So I ask myself, why the hell would they do that? Do they even realise what they're doing?

I learnt that it's classic seduction: a person with a fragile ego plays the role of "mysterious aloof temptress". By half-heartedly pushing people away only 90%, everyone who falls for the trap ends up chasing and giving her a lot of attention. She's probably also getting frustrated, wondering why all these wrong and unattractive people are chasing after her. But the flip side is her ego is getting VALIDATED and REWARDED by all that attention, which encourages them to keep doing that aloof thing they do.

Another option is they doubted my ability to handle a blunt rejection. But it's still part of the same issue. By belittling others, they give their own fragile ego a boost.


Some open questions:
How many times have you blamed yourself after getting mad at someone who was behaving in an odd, seductively aloof, partly unavailable "sorry but I'll be busy flirting with people this weekend" kind of way?
Do you end up hating yourself, feeling pathetic, and maybe even reduced to embarrassing grovelling on social media?

Exactly.

Taking it a step further, do you ever feel like there's a weird disconnect between how you behave in everyday life, and how you're "driven to" behave with matters of the heart?
Does it feel like a level playing field?

I'm calling manipulation on that shit. It's 100% deniable of course, but just because people do it instinctively does not mean it's not real.

 

I do tell myself that he/she is not worth it. And I try to imagine myself living with him/her and we are not getting together very well and leaving him/her is such a good decision.