It’s not uncommon for INFJs to experience one-sided love or unrequited love. Since we spend a lot of time in our head, picturing beautiful scenarios with our crush, we can become so consumed with those pictures that we forget they may not actually match the reality of our situation. But then we act on the feelings and emotions we get based on this alternate reality and end up in situations where our love is one-sided.

As someone who has experienced a lot of unrequited love, I would like to give you some advice on how you can avoid it.

But before I get into that, I wanted to let you know that if you’re an INFJ who’s dealing with one-sided love and looking for a refuge where you’re free to feel all your intense feelings while also getting advice on how to handle them, you might want to check out INFJ Crush Corner. Click here to learn more.

4 Tips to Help INFJs Avoid One-Sided Love

Tip #1: Awareness

Awareness is essential for making any lasting change. But as I said above, sometimes we INFJs can be so lost in our own fantasy world that we forget reality doesn’t match the beautiful picture in our mind.

For example, we might have a crush on someone and see every interaction with our crush as meaningful. Meanwhile, our crush may see our interactions as nothing other than friendly. But that thought doesn’t enter our mind. And if it does, it’s only rarely. And so we remain unaware of the reality of what’s going on, holding onto an image of this beautiful relationship we’re sharing.

To help you better see the reality of your crush situation, here are some signs you want to watch out for that might indicate that your love is one-sided:

• You often initiate conversations with your crush, but they rarely initiate conversations with you.

• They only come to you when they need something.

• They don’t call, text, or communicate with you often.

• They feel comfortable sharing personal things with you, but you don’t feel comfortable sharing personal things with them.

• You share personal things with them, but they rarely share personal things with you.

• They only spend time with you when it’s convenient for them.

• They take a long time to respond to your messages.

Just making yourself aware of the possibility that what may seem to be a wonderful love story for you might just be a nice friendship for your crush can help you avoid one-sided love relationships.

Tip #2: Ask Yourself Why

If you do find that you have a tendency to choose or even prefer one-sided relationships, it’s a good idea to ask yourself why you choose them. Or better yet, ask yourself why you settle for them. Ask what these relationships are doing for you.

Is it that you feel a deep connection to this person even if they’re not actually helping you fulfill your relationship needs? Is it that you don’t feel worthy of reciprocal love?

Is it that these people you fall in love with have issues you feel you would like to help them solve by becoming romantically involved with them?

Are you being drawn to them for reasons that are inauthentic to you? Could it be possible that you’re drawn to them because of values from society or from your family that don’t actually match your own values?

Do you just feel a desire to have romantic love in your life even though you’re not yet ready for a real relationship?

I do believe that being your most authentic self can put you in a better position to find someone who’s compatible with you. But it’s not enough to just be yourself. You also have to be mindful of any insecurities or lack of self-esteem or sense of self-worth that may be affecting your ability to find suitable partners—that is, partners who can actually fulfill your relationship needs.

If you find you’re drawn to people who you don’t think can do that—when you consider the situation objectively, not from the fantasy in your head—it’s a good idea to ask yourself why. And you also might want to ask yourself whether you’re really ready for a relationship or whether you would actually like to spend some time getting to know yourself better first (more on that in #4).

Tip #3: Ask What You’re Really Looking For

Sometimes we’re willing to settle for things because we’re, again, not aware that we even want something else. In fact, we can become so used to settling for something we don’t actually want because we don’t think there’s anything else out there.

But to even begin to explore the possibility that there might be something else out there—like, say, a partner you can enjoy reciprocal love with—you have to first know what you want.

So, ask yourself. What do you really want?

Do you want a relationship where you’re doing most or all of the giving and reaching out? Or do you want a relationship where you and your crush or partner are both giving and reaching out about the same? Do you want a relationship where the other person only cares about what you can do for them? Or do you want a relationship where the other person loves you for who you are?

Do you want reciprocal love? Or do you enjoy being the only one on the loving side of the one-sided love equation?

Figuring out what you want is the first step to being able to go after it, or welcome it when it comes. And if you find yourself falling back into the habit of settling for unrequited feelings, knowing what you want can help you remind yourself to pull away before you get too many emotions involved.

Tip #4: Focus on You

Because we INFJs have people-pleasing tendencies, it’s very easy for us to get caught up in helping other people meet their needs while neglecting our own. We can also be so focused on making other people happy that we forget to take time to do things that make us happy.

Sometimes we can let these tendencies make us so focused on our crush that we forget to focus on ourselves. But we should be focusing more on ourselves. We should be making ourselves a priority.

And in fact, when looking for reciprocal love, it’s necessary for us to love ourselves first. Otherwise it’s like we’re having a one-sided love relationship with ourselves. We expect someone else to love us, when we’re not showing ourselves the kind of love we would like to receive.

So, how do we love ourselves? We can do things that make us happy. Or, if we’ve even forgotten what those are, we can take time to find out.

We can explore our interests. We can dive deep into the subjects that fascinate us. We can make efforts to take care of ourselves and work on improving our own lives.

And as we do all of this, it will allow us to fall in love or deeper in love with ourselves. And when we do that, we’ll be much less willing to settle for or accept unrequited love when we find it. We’ll have become so accustomed to experiencing love a certain way that we won’t settle for anything less.

Final Thoughts

It’s very easy for us to do things that don’t satisfy us or settle for less than what we want or deserve because we’re not aware of what we’re doing or why we’re doing it. Sometimes we have to take a step back from our situation and look at it objectively to figure out what our patterns are so that we can change them.

If you’re an INFJ or someone who loves deeply and you’re used to settling for unrequited love, even being aware of this tendency might not make you stop seeking out these relationships. But over time, if you apply enough awareness to your situation and continually make efforts to change your behavior, you’ll be on the path to never settling for one-sided love again.

Now it’s your turn. How do you think INFJs and other deep lovers can avoid one-sided love?

~ Ashley C.

P.S. If you’re an INFJ or someone who loves deeply and you would like tips and advice about crushes, unrequited love, and the search for a romantic partner, feel free to join “The INFJ Search for Love” newsletter!

Last updated: December 13, 2024