“Am I in love?” If you’re asking this, you just might be. Find out if you’re really in love or if it’s just an infatuation.
Love is a beautiful thing, but it’s not something everyone can identify. Feelings can be confusing when you meet someone you are excited about. When your heart is pounding and you can’t get this person off your mind, you might think you are in love, but are you really in love or are you just infatuated? Join SpiritualBlossom to learn all about the signs of being in love. Find out what it means to truly be in love with someone, and what some of the signs you are. Find out about that thing we call infatuation and how to tell if you aren’t actually in love , but just infatuated. Then, find out what to do when the worst possible thing happens- when you’re in love and they don’t love you!
What is Being in Love?
Being in love might be the most wonderful thing in the world. That's when you really have loving, caring feelings for someone. Being in love can feel very intense and it means that you're deeply involved with their lives. Your emotions will be very powerful if you're in love with someone, but your emotions won't change. Some people think that new love is more powerful than love you have somewhat over time, but if you're truly in love with them, the love remains constant no matter how long you know each other. When you are in love with someone, you might want to tell them, but when can you tell someone you love them? Find out here: When Should I Tell Him I Love Him?
Some people say that being in love with someone is different from just loving them. They say that being in love can fade over time, especially once you get to know people. However, love is love. Love is not temporary, it is not conditional, and it is not something that you feel only when you're happy or in a good mood. Love is forever. If the feelings of adoration and affection for somebody start to dampen over time you might not be in love. Loving a narcissist can have you questioning if it is worth it, but how do you know if someone you love is one? Find out here: Loving a Narcissist
Signs You Are in Love
You would think that it would be easy to tell if you were in love, but some people get confused. There are a lot of different signs that you're in love with someone, but there's a few that will be easy to spot early on. If you put somebody first and help them with things, you love them. If you want to be close to someone, and can envision a future with them, you love them. Most of all, if you want them around for more than just fun or what you can get from them, that's love.
You Put Them First
What comes first in life? The people who you care about, of course! When you love someone, you put their needs and concerns above anything else. You won't disregard their feelings or ignore it when they tell you what they need. You will even put them before yourself. So, if you're spending time with someone and they tell you that something hurts their feelings, but you don't care, that's a sure sign that you don't love them.
You Want to Be Near Them
When you're in love with someone, you want to spend time with them. Of course, we can't spend all of our time with people, but if you don't want to spend time with someone, are you really in love with them? Being actively in love with someone means that you want to be where they are, experience things with them, and have them be a part of your life. If you can't wait until someone leaves, and you can only handle them in very small doses, but would prefer not to see them at all, you're not in love with them. When you really love someone you can’t keep it a secret and you can read about secrets here: Is Keeping Secrets Bad?
You See a Future with them
When you're in love with somebody, not only do you want to spend time with them, but you can see them in your life when you think about your future. Surrounding yourself with the people who you love is a very important part of making plans. As you move forward in your career, places where you will live, and places where you will travel to, you think about who you want to take with you. If you can't imagine leaving someone behind, that means you love them. If you can't imagine taking somebody forward with you, and you don't even want to, then it's not love.
They Are More Than Just a Fun Time
One of the things that we do in our relationships is create memories with people. There are some people who only want people around when they're having fun, where they see relationships as a way to entertain themselves. If you're only spending time with people when they're making you laugh, and you don't want to be around when they've had a bad day and need a shoulder to cry on, obviously you don't care about them. When you're there to be that shoulder to cry on, and you're not concerned about what kind of fun things you're doing together, it's love. Of course, we have fun with the people who we are in love with, but there's more to relationships than just having a good time. Love of our friends is very powerful, and you can read about that here: All About the Love of Friends
You Help Them
When you're in love with someone, you want to make their life better. When they're hurting you want to make the pain stop. When they ask for advice, you want to give them the best advice. When they call you in the middle of the night and ask you to take them to the hospital, you want to do that and you want to stay with them to make sure they're ok. When you're in love with someone, you care about their physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being. If you don't care about helping them, you're not in love with them.
Being In Love vs Infatuation
If you don't put somebody's needs before your desires, want to spend time with them, want to take them forward into your future with you, have them around for more than just fun, or help them, it can be very confusing when you're excited about somebody's presence. You might feel butterflies when they're around and feel very happy when they come into the room. You may be very euphoric when they're around, and even lose sleep because you can't stop thinking about them. You might feel that you want them with you all the time and lose your appetite when they're not in the room with you. You may feel attraction to someone and call it the “Law of Attraction, which you can read about here: More About The Law of Attraction
Some people take those things as signs of love, but that's not love. It's infatuation. When you immediately become crazy about someone and you're very thrilled by them the first time you meet them, some people assume that it's love at first sight but a lot of times it's not. Infatuation is very intense but it is short lived admiration or passion for someone. It might happen the minute you meet someone, and you become fascinated with them. You may feel that instant connection with them that they don't feel for you. Infatuation will make you feel an irrational attachment to somebody, and it usually ends abruptly or with disappointment.
Signs of Infatuation
Infatuation might not be obvious immediately, but there are some obvious signs that it's just an infatuation instead of being in love. If you only want somebody in your life but you don't care about them, you don't love them, you're infatuated. If you don't listen to what they tell you and you don't make time for them, you're not in love with them, you're infatuated. If you obsess over them or idealize them without getting to know them, that's infatuation.
You Only Want Them
Wanting someone is different than loving them. Lust with no emotional attachment is a sure sign of infatuation. It is natural to be attracted to people, and sensuality is a big part of relationships, but just wanting someone for sex isn’t love. If all you want is what you can get from somebody, it isn't love. If you only want somebody around for things that they buy you or places that they take you, you don't love them, you want what they do for you. If you still want somebody around even if they're not doing anything for you, then you love them, but if not, you don't.
You Don’t Listen to Them
If you don't listen to the feelings or the thoughts of someone, but you expect them to listen to you, then you don't care about them. People are very good about expressing their needs, feelings, and desires. If you want to take those things into account, how can you say that you care about somebody? If you expect somebody to be in a relationship with you, and you're not listening to them, you don't love them, you're infatuated with them. Some people would say you're a selfish lover, but you're not a lover at all. Being a good listener will make someone feel so close they feel you are a soulmate. Read about finding your soulmate here: What’s a Soulmate/How Do You Find Them?
You Don’t Make Time for Them
You can say that you have passionate feelings for someone, but if you don't make it a point to spend time with them, or do things with them, that's not love. We spend our lives with the people who we have relationships with, and if you have no room in your life for someone because you feel like everything else is more important, you're infatuated, not in love. You will rearrange your schedule to make room in your life for someone who you are truly in love with. If you expect them to be the only one who makes accommodations, you don't care about them. So, if you really want someone to feel like you care for them, make room in your life for them.
You Obsess Over Them
There is a difference between wanting to spend time with someone and making time for them, and just obsessing over them. When you think about them constantly and you don't want them to have any time to themselves or with the other people that they also care about, that's obsession. When you're jealous of their best friend and the time they spend with family, that's infatuation, not love. Even the people who we spend the most time with need some time away from us, because we are separate people from one another and have to live our own lives. If you have to talk to somebody constantly, be in their presence constantly, or are constantly thinking about them, that's an obsession and it is not love.
You Idealize Them
When you first meet someone and you're attracted to them, do you take the time to get to know them, or do you immediately make exciting assumptions about them? If you're interested in somebody, take the time to get to know them instead of amplifying what you believe are positive qualities about them and believing that they have no imperfections. Idealization creates unrealistic expectations and disappointment.
What if They Don’t Love Me?
When you love someone and they don’t love you, it can be the most painful feeling there is. What can you do about it? Sadly, there is nothing you can do. We can’t make people fall in love with us. If you really love someone and they don’t love you, you will have to think of them instead of your feelings. You will have to let them go. Then what?
Then, you know you did the right thing. You release them so they can move forward to find love, and you release yourself as well. Being in a relationship with someone who doesn’t love you might just seem challenging at first, but over time, it hurts very badly. It hurts worse than realizing you are not loved because you are trapped in a loveless relationship. So, when you love someone and they don’t love you, do the most loving thing you can. Give both of you the freedom to leave and find love. You will find the people and places you belong with and you can find out how to do that here: Connecting to Where You Belong
When you’re in love, all the signs will be there. When it’s just an infatuation, the signs of that will be there too. Love means you put someone first, want to spend time with them, and you want them in your life for more than just fun times. Infatuation means you only want this person but don’t care about them, and you are too busy obsessing about them to listen to them. Even if you do love someone, there is a chance they won’t love you, and the only thing you can do is move on without them. Don’t worry if that happens, because the right person is out there, just waiting for you to come into their lives and love them. If you haven’t met them yet, you will meet them soon!
Would you like to hear what the future holds for your love life or how to meet people to share love with? Reach out to one of our psychics any time any day to find out!
About the Author: Lady Saoirse has studied magic and lore for most of her life but started walking her own Magical Path after being spiritually reborn in the desert. Today she is a High Priestess for The Temple of the Goddess, she is a psychic advisor and spiritual counselor, she shares her gifts as a Psychic and Content Writer for Mysticsense and SpiritualBlossom, and she writes for The Green Egg Magazine and PaganPages.Org emag.
