hurtful

I'm waking up this morning feeling hurt, and I have no reason to be.

One of the biggest mistakes someone can make is attaching themselves to someone whose does not reciprocate the feelings you have for them. You set yourself up to be hurt. If the attraction is not mutual, just walk away. You can keep the friendship, but it must be up to the other person to keep it alive if she wants to. Setting yourself up for heartache, especially in times of stress is not a wise thing to do.

The worst part of this kind of anguish, the person causing is unaware of the agony they are causing. A normal social rearrangement which would be laughed off in any other circumstance becomes a powerful blow to the gut. A routine passing comment, "I'm seeing a great new guy" becomes a nail through the chest.

This is unfair to both parties, should one side have to censor their conversations because the other person has feelings for them? Perhaps the other side is unaware of the feelings felt for them. In this case, is there anything one can do, other than being perceived as a jerk and cutting one's self off.

There's an old saying "better to have loved and lost, than to have never loved at all". I've loved, the first girl I dated for 4 years killed herself, that led to a stint in the armed forces, trying to extinguish any emotions I had left. I fell in love again with a woman who manipulated me, and still does. That's been followed by the ordinary anguish of dating a series of women who were completely wrong for me, through no fault of their own.

Can I stop loving now, it's killing me.