Crushing vs. Connecting: Do You Really Like Them?
We’ve all had it: that one soul-crushing, heart-stopping, seemingly earth-shattering crush. When their name comes up in conversation your heart skips a beat; you try to avoid them in case you embarrass yourself in front of them; you get all tongue-tied when you do finally have the chance to talk to them. But, honey, do you even really like them?
Looking back, every crush I’ve had, which is just about a handful, was a total asshole. They fit this bad boy “I hate everyone but you” template. It’s kind of unoriginal now that I think about it: a good girl falls for a bad boy who is only good for her. One friend once hit the nail right on the head, telling me I can’t seem to leave “little men with big egos” alone. Of course, it never actually turned out that way. What I found each and every time that I had one of these crushes, based solely on the image I had on said person in my head, is that they were just a shitty person. The person I thought I had feelings for didn’t exist but was rather a figment of my imagination- nothing more than the person I wanted them so badly for them to be. We wouldn’t even be compatible as friends, let alone lovers.
In my middle school and early high school years, these crushes came easily to me. Anyone I deemed too cool to have, I wanted, and once I came close, I quickly recoiled at the revelation of their true character. Now, I rarely get crushes, not because my “type” has necessarily changed, but because I know what I want in a partner on a human level, not an imaginary one.
As humans, we act in irrational ways when we decide that we like someone. We overthink simple text messages for far too long, show up to events that we know they’ll attend, and, in my case, avoid their presence altogether when I feel like I do not look my best. But the truth is, for the right person, you won’t feel the need to do any of this. To me, crushes attract games- games that I refuse to play.
But I have a secret for you: emotionally mature people don’t crush, they connect. So if you want to avoid a game, one in which you’ll inevitably lose, keep reading.
After retiring from crushing for good, I realized that I never really knew the people I was so infatuated with- or their character at the very least. Sure, I knew their siblings’ names, their favorite color, and perhaps the price of their home with some light snooping on Zillow (for legal reasons that’s a joke), but I did not know their values, goals, or dreams- the necessities. Next time you find yourself liking someone, ask yourself if you really even know anything about them to like. Do you like them, or the idea of them that you’ve conjured in your head? The best relationship advice that anyone has ever given me is that when people show you who they are, believe them. Don't make excuses for them. Don’t try to change them. See them for who they are and decide if they deserve access to you and your heart.
Real connections are present when you have gotten to know who a person is, taking into consideration both the good and the bad. A connection can be considered the more sophisticated version of a crush and is only valid when you take off those rose-tinted glasses and see people for their authentic selves. Genuine feelings bloom from understanding both the positive and negative parts of a person, ultimately deciding that the good outweighs the bad. Crushes arise from a surface-level understanding of a person, not from genuine admiration of their character.
A good tool for deciphering both good and bad characteristics in a love interest is one that I found on TikTok. Get a piece of paper and a few of your favorite colored highlighters. Draw a pink heart in the center of the page with your crush’s name in the middle. Then, draw lines to little blurbs of everything you are looking for in an ideal partner. Highlight the characteristics with one color that you are certain the person that you have your eye on has, and use another color to highlight the traits that you do not see. This exercise will help you see this connection more clearly by identifying whether this is truly a person that is right for you and can meet your needs.
When you find that person that you genuinely connect with, I can almost guarantee that they will feel the same way about you. When you feel a genuine connection with someone, more times than not they will feel the same way. It is when you create a false narrative of a person’s true character in your head that you end up miles away from being with them. A crush is an easy way to get hurt: you put someone on a pedestal and therefore conceptualize the fact that they are out of your league. With this mindset, you would never stand a chance of being together, which, honestly, could be a blessing in disguise.