Should I develop a friendship with the girl I have a crush on?

Home - Quora Link

One of the things I learned about guys and girls is that a guy tends to feel about 10x more strongly about these types of interactions than girls do. You’ve met the love of your life, she’s met a nice, interesting guy that she could see herself dating if she wasn’t already attached.

Infatuation is a harsh mistress, one you have to learn how to put in its place before you can ever learn what love is. You have this perfect life with this other person and that perfect life can only last so long. Once the infatuation fades, then you have to deal with the real person and have a real relationship with that person. Before it was just a picture in your mind that you were interacting with.

Ladies, because they’re more often on the receiving side of affection rather than the giving side, tend to learn this quicker than guys do. They simply go through the cycle more often. And they see the limitations of puppy love more clearly. By the end of high school, many of them see infatuated guys like you would an anchor attached to your leg. They look for guys with more self-control. Infatuation is nice, but it’s like poking someone with a sharp stick. You want to be surrounded with the glow of love, a warm blanket that presses in all directions and not just one.

You should absolutely become friends with this lady that you are currently infatuated with. Yes, your immediate desires will be denied because she’s currently attached. But this is a good thing for your friendship and possible romance. Your ardor will mix with the need for you to respect her and her relationship and if you do it right, you’ll be supportive of her in ways she simply won’t be able to find in this guy she’s seeing.

She’ll give you the validation you need to feel from other people that, yes, you are a worthy person and yes, you can be there for someone no matter what. It’s a very important quality to develop and you can’t do it if there’s always something you are looking to get out of it.

Once the infatuation starts to fade, once you can start allowing other people to share your head space, then you can start dating other people too. And you can tell her about them, and she’ll give you advice and support the same way you are with her and her current guy.

If it’s meant to be, you guys will find each other single at the right time. And nothing will separate you ever again. If it’s not, then you’ll support each other while you navigate the hellish terrain of dating to eventually find someone you can be friends with and be romantic with and everything else that goes with a strong, healthy, loving marriage.