In love with being in love

Hi girl of 16,

For some people the teenage years are full of lots of romances, while other people don’t fall in love so easily. Being in love is a wonderful, all-consuming feeling, and when you’re in love your brain is so preoccupied with your thoughts and daydreaming about the right person, that you seem a bit distant to everyone else. That’s why, as you say, it can affect your concentration and school grades. Falling in love over and over again will disturb your development, your friendships and school grades. The feelings of being in love are actually hormones that create a sense of happiness, almost like being intoxicated. The feelings are so good that you can get dependent on them, just like you can become dependent on chocolate and sugar, but to an even greater degree. The older, more secure and more independent you are, the less you will fall in love. Real love is completely different from falling in love or having a crush on someone.

We don’t choose our feelings, but we can still affect them through what we spend time doing and what we think about. Perhaps you should start training your brain to think about other things. Our thoughts always create feelings, so it would help your feelings if you were able to have different thoughts about the boys you see. If you think of the guys you meet as if they were ‘brothers’, then it will be harder to have a crush on them. You don’t fall in love with a brother, regardless how handsome he is, but you can still like him a lot and be a good friend.

Try to stop your thoughts immediately every time you find yourself thinking of boys in the wrong way, and have another thought ready. You can also distract yourself by doing something else. Perhaps you can confide in a good female friend, someone who knows about your problem, and who you can call when you need to talk about something completely different.

Best wishes,

boyandgirl.info