How mirages of love are born

Smile, look – some women take the slightest hint and selflessly surrender to fictitious passion. Why in love we so often fall as captive to our own fantasies?

“For five years I was in love with my colleague and had no doubt that she was not indifferent to him. He looked for me with his eyes, smiled at me with a special smile, touched, as if by chance, to my clothes … When the authorities decided to transfer him to another unit, I was afraid that I would lose it, and dared to recognize. With a sinking heart, I invited him to visit her. But he did not come. In the following days, he avoided me, and I felt humiliated, crushed. But this disaster opened my eyes: our “great love” existed only in my imagination!”-the 27-year-old Elena will annoy.

She is not alone in her disappointment: similar one -sided novels are not uncommon. Many women in dreams create their own “cinema”, appointing a man who experiences only friendly sympathy or polite indifference to them for the role of a beautiful prince. And sincerely believe in the power of this invented love.

(Not) safe distance

Some prefer to keep the ideal passion for years, which they themselves created, as they actually fear the intensity of feelings at a real meeting, are afraid to be absorbed, destroyed by their desire. The invented novel protects from the need to act, from reality, which can be too frightening. Some of us perceive a reduction

in the distance with each other and a potential partner as a danger, and imaginary love allows you to keep the object of our feelings at a distance.

“Elena, inviting a colleague to her home, too sharply reduced the distance between them,” explains Gestalt therapist Marina Baskakova. – From views and smiles immediately into the intimate space – house. For a man, her offer most likely looked like a sudden and unmotivated. And Elena herself did not prepare for such a transition: she was very opened and was not protected, hence such a painful experience of refusal “.

Love – a kind of training of feelings. In reality, almost nothing happens, all events unfold in the inner world

Set the distance between ourselves and others in childhood. “The girl sits on her father’s knees, he wears her in her arms, she tries: either closer, then further,” continues Marina Baskakova. – Later, in adolescence, when she has female forms, the distance changes, new communication rules are established. Thanks to this experience, becoming an adult, a woman intuitively feels at what distance it is convenient for her to communicate with a man when to reduce her and when to increase “.

However, not everyone has such an opportunity. If the girl does not know her father, does not see him or her father is alienated and does not take part in the life of the family, she does not manage to gain experience of “approaching and removing”. Having matured, she can feel uncertain and unprotected in communication with men, and the place of real relationships may take invented love.

Raising feelings

“I was twenty -five, I studied in scenario courses and fell in love with my teacher. We met to discuss my work, it was unusually interesting with him. I dreamed that he kissed me, but she did not dare to take the first step. We rarely met for a few more years and in the case – and I carefully composed all these “affairs”. He never gave me a reason to think that he was experiencing something except friendly sympathy for me. But it took me 9 years to understand this. I could have married and give birth to children for a long time, if not for my “immortal passion,” 35-year-old Galina regrets the lost time.

Jungian analyst Lev Hegai admits that this time was not spent in vain: “Love is a kind of training of feelings. In reality, almost nothing happens, all events unfold in the inner world. Without taking any actions, we delve into the shades of our experiences. By building a relationship with our ideal in dreams, we build our own personality. In adolescence, almost everyone experiences such a platonic love, this is a necessary stage in self -knowledge and formation. That is why a romantic hobby often arises during a middle -aged crisis, indicating a new direction of personality development ”.

The question is to distinguish the line that separates the imagination from self -deception, so that dreams enrich reality, and not obscure it.