Ask yourself these important questions and find out the truth

You want a relationship, that’s for sure. And now you have met a guy who ticks all the boxes. He is sweet, caring and he seems to be totally smitten with you. But as the relationship progresses, you feel stressed and uneasy, rather than happy. You start wondering if you love the idea of him rather than the man himself.

I’m here to help, let’s figure out what’s going on. The answer to this question lies within you.

Is it him?

He might simply not be the right guy for you.

When someone comes along and offers you their love, it is easy to overlook how you feel. Instead, you are grateful to have found someone. Especially if he, on a surface level, has a lot of the qualities you have been looking for.

Finally, you have a boyfriend.

You want a relationship

You love the idea of being in a relationship. But you do wish he wasn’t as annoying.

Let’s just say, there is a couple of things you want him to change.

And if you are honest with yourself, you don’t feel as deeply about him as you would which you would do.

If this is the case, yes, you love the idea of him rather than him.

Is it you?

But before you decide that he is just not the right guy for you, take a moment and question yourself.

You might be too dismissive.

What I mean by this is that you often find faults in your dates and in your boyfriend. It is always their fault, never yours.

you always find faults

For you, this is a pattern. No one seems to be good enough for you.

You generally have a hard time developing feelings for nice available men. He loves you, but you feel like he doesn’t have the ability to stir the depths of your soul. You blame it on him, but, in fact, it’s about you.

You have a strong fear of intimacy.

Here are the top 7 signs that you don’t love him, but rather love the idea of him. See if they match your experience and you will have your answer.

1. You are not keen to spend time with him

How we spend our time is the most telltale sign of how we really feel about something. Do you often tell him that you are busy? Do you feel bored and restless when the two of you hang out? If this is the case, you don’t love him, you love the idea of him.

When we love someone, we like to share our everyday existence with them.

Are you excited about him?

Do you look forward to spending time with him?

It all comes down to the answer to that very simple question.

Because we both know, that the thing you love deeply, you always find time for. Your biggest passion you always have the energy to pursue.

2. You don’t like being single

To have a meaningful satisfying relationship, you first need to be comfortable with the idea of being alone. It’s a cliché, but it is true (that’s how it ended up becoming a cliché) you need to love yourself before you can love someone else.

You might question if you love him or just the idea of him because you rushed into the relationship. Grateful over the fact that someone would pick you. You never took the time to listen to your own feelings. You just wanted to escape another night alone, eating a takeaway pizza in front of Friends.

Are you comfortable being alone?

Do you move from one relationship to the next, without taking much time for yourself?

When we don’t like our own company, we are simply not picky enough.

If this sounds like you, it might be time to take 6 months without starting a relationship and without falling in love. Learn to be at peace with yourself and when the right man comes along, you will be happy in that relationship.

3. You are afraid of intimacy

It could be that you are not comfortable being alone, but it can also be the polar opposite.

You are too comfortable being alone. Getting close to another human scares you.

These things can be hard to admit.

We want it to be the other person that is the problem. But if you recognize yourself in this, your subconscious is sabotaging your desire to be in a healthy, loving relationship.

Your subconscious is telling you to run. Run!

Deep down, you are fearful

You are conflicted about the relationship because despite him giving him what you logically would want, you cannot rest in the relationship. You are afraid of abandonment.

To find out if this matches you think back to your previous relationship. Were you happy?

People who have this problem also have a tendency to have an ex or fling from the past, that they romanticize and dream about.

Do you?

A ghost from the past?

Is there someone from your past that keeps you from being fully present in this relationship?

If you are indifferent in the relationships you do have, this might be a defense mechanism. You protect yourself by not falling in love.

Does this sound familiar? If this is the case, you could actually love him. He could be the right man for you. To help yourself see more clearly and be able to open up to love, read How to be more emotionally available.

4. You don’t have a clear direction

People who end up in unsatisfying relationships might do so because they lack drive in other areas of their life.

If you have a lot of goals and passions, your time automatically becomes valuable so that you wouldn’t waste it on the wrong person.

But if you just drift along, without knowing what you want, you might just latch on to another person to keep yourself occupied.

The relationship just happened

You are not crazy about him, but since you anyway don’t have things going on in your life, you end up spending a lot of time with him.

He becomes your boyfriend, he seems happy. But since you didn’t actively choose him, you are not as enthusiastic about the relationship.

Do you have goals?

What do you want to achieve this next year? Where do you want to be in 5 years?

Having goals is also about having a clear plan to achieve those goals.

Being passionate is about knowing how you want to spend your time and how to give yourself happiness.

5. You have a problem accepting him the way he is

This is one of the biggest signs that you love the idea of him, rather than the man himself. The beginning of a romance is like an avalanche of positive emotions. The act of falling in love (or convincing yourself you are falling in love), is in itself seductive.

You might overlook all kinds of things.

After a couple of months, when the love-drug wears off, you start seeing the real him.

Sometimes the wake-up is just too jarring, you discover all kinds of things that you don’t like.

He shows his real self

Maybe you are in the middle of this process. I know it can be hard. You discover that he had a gambling addiction, that he spends hours every day playing video games, that your conversations don’t flow as easily anymore, and that he complains about you.

The list is endless, and as you correctly guessed, this is a make-it-or-break-it moment. This is when the masks come off, the facçde crackles and you get to see the real person and decide if you love him.

Do you?

If this is your situation, time will tell.

You either learn to accept his shortcomings or move on.

5. You settled

Some people would tell you; never ever settle.

I wouldn’t go that far. You can absolutely become very happy by going for someone calm and stable.

At the end of the day, you don’t want a bad boy to be the father of your children.

So, you settled down with someone kind. That’s a grown-up decision.

But here you are, googling “Do I love him or the idea of him.” That tells me that you made a choice and now you are having second thoughts. Maybe you were not as ready as you thought?

Are you wondering if there is something better out there?

If you feel this rings true, ask yourself why you settled?

Remind yourself of the reasons.

Are those reasons still valid?

Did you hope your feelings would grow stronger? But now it seems like the opposite is happening? Check out my article Is it Ok to break up with someone to find yourself?

6. You have a history of falling for the wrong man

We all have patterns, and some of those patterns are not how we logically would want to live our life.

Think about charged choices such as your weight and eating habits or your bank account and spending habits.

We all know, logically, how to make good decisions. But when our emotions rule the show, we make all kinds of bad decisions.  

A relationship is the same way. Maybe you are in this relationship because you were not brave enough to go for a man that you were super-attracted to. You probably thought you were being smart. But, in fact, you played your hand too safe.

Self-sabotage

Or maybe you always are attracted to the bad boys? The guys who you know are not boyfriend material.

Scrutinizes your ability to pick men and you will understand why you are in this situation. Also, ask yourself why you develop strong feelings for some men and not for others.

The thing is if you are at the point where you have to ask, “Do I love him or the idea of him?” Things are already not good, basically, you are already up schitt’s creek without a paddle.

In most cases, the best thing to do is to break up with the man in question and sign up for therapy.

To be sure how you feel, ask yourself these 5 questions and find out if you love him or the idea of him.

1. Do you like him as a person?

Let’s put the focus back on the man in question. Do you think he is a good person? Is he caring and considerate?

Would you want to be friends with him if the two of you met under other circumstances?

This is a good question to ask yourself because it also tells you how much the two of you have in common.

If your best friend dated him and was totally in love with him, would you be happy for her?

2. Do you walk on eggshells around him?

Maybe he is not the right person for you because he doesn’t appreciate you the way you want to be appreciated.

Does he make you feel at ease?

Can you share all the quirky parts of yourself with him?

Do you often feel judged by him?

If he evokes negative feelings in you, you like the potential of what he could be, rather than him. That’s Ok, you don’t have to like him just because he tells you he likes you.

3. Is he in your corner?

For a relationship to be successful, you have to support each other. There is no way around this simple point.

If he is the right man for you, you will feel that he genuinely cares for you and wishes you well. He should feel this way regardless if the relationship works out or not.

4. Are you in his corner?

It’s not enough that he is sweet and supportive. You also have to have those feelings in regard to him?

Are you rooting for him? Are his well-being and success important to you? Do you like his goal, and are you supportive of him achieving them?

5. Do you want a relationship?

At the beginning of this article, I assumed that you want a relationship. But even this statement should be up for debate. In today’s society, we get brainwashed with the notion of romantic love and couple happiness.

But the truth is that relationships take a huge amount of work. Maybe you rather put your focus on your career or your passions?

Or, you might be busy and you feel like your relationship takes too much time and energy. You never seem to get enough time for yourself.

The reason you wonder if you love him or the idea of him might have to do with you. Maybe a relationship is simply not the right choice for you at this time in your life.

Check out my article Relationships are overrated, and find out more.

A Final Note

He deserves someone who loves him. If you feel like the things I described above fit you, you have to take time and be with yourself and work on yourself. You can do this while staying in the relationship. But you can also find yourself and your truth by being single. In the end, the choice is up to you.