Pearl Nash
It’s a classic scenario that we’ve all experienced.
Girl meets boy.
Girl likes boy.
Boy doesn’t like her back.
The nice guys who show you interest you just aren’t into. Meanwhile, the bad boys, cool guys, and hotties who you drool over never seem to notice you.
What’s going on?
If you’ve been wondering why do I like guys who don’t like me back? then this article has the answer.
Why am I attracted to guys who don’t give me attention? 15 real reasons
1) You like the image of him
Plenty of us when we fall for someone hasn’t fallen from them at all.
In reality, we’ve fallen for the idea of them. We get this image of who we think they are looking at them and their life from the outside.
When he doesn’t like you back there’s a good chance you’re never getting close enough to him to see the real him. If you did, you may realize that he’s not quite who you created him to be in your mind.
This happened to me not long ago. I fell for a guy I hardly knew. I liked the idea of him that I projected onto him. And the more I couldn’t have him, the more I wanted him.
Particularly when you want something you can’t have, it’s far easier to project your mind-made fantasies onto a person.
You cloud your perception with daydreams about a life you would have together if he only liked you back.
The more you think about him, the more your mind weaves these ideal images of him and you too together. Images that aren’t being spoiled by reality.
Do you know him? What do you really like about him? Or do you like the idea of him?
2) You’re mainly going for looks
It’s a cliche, but there may be at least some truth to it…
The really hot guys are often kind of jerks. Don’t take my word for it. That’s even what science says.
A study found that the better-looking someone is, the more selfish they are.
But the real point is that relationship compatibility and attraction are more complicated than looks alone.
It’s natural to go for looks. Research has shown that despite protests that personality is more important, women value a man’s physical attractiveness way more than they say they do.
If you’re only ever chasing after the best-looking guys, the reality is they have a lot of options and potentially a lot of girls always chasing after them.
But the danger is that crushes based largely on looks tend to be more shallow.
It may not be supported by a stronger or deeper connection based on shared values, beliefs, and compatible personalities.
You can’t help who you think of as physically attractive, but liking someone should run deeper than just their looks.
3) You think he’s too good for you
This one all comes down to mindset.
Deep down, you do not think you are enough for him, so you’re not. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
But there are no mystical forces at play. Your deeply ingrained beliefs about you and about him manifest themselves in so many ways.
They show in the way you talk, the body language you give off, and the actions that you take around him. It sends 1001, often unconscious, messages out.
Sadly those messages are:
“I think you are out of my league”.
“I doubt you’d ever be interested in a girl like me”.
If you’ve ever thought to yourself ‘why am I never the girl guys want?’ then self-esteem and confidence could be your problem.
Men respond well to confident women. When someone thinks of themselves as attractive, they seem more attractive to others.
First, you need to learn how to love yourself and see your own huge value. You can’t attract the right type of guy unless you stop thinking you’re not worth it.
4) You try too hard
When you think someone is super attractive, you obviously really want them to like you back too.
But that can mean you end up trying too hard. Your attempts to impress him may end up meaning that you stop being yourself around him.
It also explains why the ones you don’t like do like you — because you’re not overthinking it around them. You can relax and let your true self shine through around them.
When you like someone, the stakes are high. You try twice as hard. But it can come across as fake, forced, desperate, too keen, or even needy.
So if you find yourself wondering why you don’t get the attention you deserve, maybe it’s time to change your approach.
Ask yourself whether you act differently around a crush. Are you chasing them or coming on too strong and scaring them off?
5) You’re looking for a fairytale
I blame Hollywood and all those Disney stories we grew up on, but a lot of us have been raised with some pretty messed-up images of love.
Have you ever asked yourself why love is so hard?
Why can’t it be how you imagined growing up? Or at least make some sense…
When you’re dealing with guys you like never liking you back it’s easy to become frustrated and even feel helpless. You may even be tempted to throw in the towel and give up on love.
I want to suggest doing something different.
It’s something I learned from the world-renowned shaman Rudá Iandê. He taught me that the way to find love and intimacy is not what we have been culturally conditioned to believe.
In fact, many of us self-sabotage and trick ourselves for years, getting in the way of meeting a partner who can truly fulfill us.
As Rudá explains in this mind-blowing free video, many of us chase love in a toxic way that ends up stabbing us in the back.
We get stuck in awful relationships or empty encounters, never really finding what we’re looking for and continuing to feel horrible about things like always wanting the guys we can’t have.
We fall in love with an ideal version of someone instead of the real person.
We try to “fix” our partners and end up destroying relationships.
We try to find someone who “completes” us, only to fall apart with them next to us and feel twice as bad.
Rudá’s teachings showed me a whole new perspective.
While watching, I felt like someone understood my struggles to find and nurture a love for the first time – and finally offered an actual, practical solution to breaking the cycle of unrequited love.
If you’re done with unsatisfying dating, empty hookups, frustrating relationships, and having your hopes dashed over and over, then this is a message you need to hear.
I guarantee you will not be disappointed.
Click here to watch the free video.
6) You place a higher value on unattainable guys
Let’s dig deep into social psychology.
The more unavailable something (or in this case someone) is, the more social value we place on it. This phenomenon is called the scarcity effect.
If you can’t have him, he must be rare, special, and oh so much more desirable, right?
That can be what is psychologically going on in our heads when we want someone we cannot have.
In evolutionary terms, we are all looking for a mate who has the highest social value. It’s sort of imprinted into our DNA.
You might just be subconsciously sabotaging yourself by placing a high value on someone who doesn’t care enough to pursue you.
7) You’re neurologically addicted
If it’s ever felt like you just can’t stop thinking about a guy, even though he doesn’t like you back, it might start to feel almost like an addiction. And you wouldn’t be wrong.
A really fascinating study revealed we can get hooked on rejection and this deep yearning for wanting what we can’t have.
Human behavior researcher, Dr. Helen Fisher found that romantic rejection can feel addictive as it stimulates brain areas that are associated with addiction, motivation, reward, and cravings.
It turns the object of the unrequited love into a drug-like substance that we can’t seem to stop wanting.
Even though logically you know you cannot have this person, chemically you are still wanting him.
8) You want what you can’t have
It’s a commonly accepted truism that people always seem to want what they can’t have.
Going for guys who don’t want you back is perhaps the epitome of this.
There are plenty of reasons why we want what we can’t have.
Sometimes it is the stubbornness of wanting someone simply because you can’t have them.
You enjoy the chase. Your ego doesn’t want to be told “no”. You can’t help but want to win the prize of getting someone who you feel like you can’t have.
Perhaps if they had shown interest in you, you wouldn’t want them quite so much.
Why do I chase guys who don’t want me? Maybe part of the reason is simply that you are wired to want what you can’t have.
9) You have an anxious attachment style
We often think that we don’t get a say in who we’re attracted to, but is that totally true?
Our preferences and the people we go for have been subtly molded for many years — often since childhood.
The beliefs you have about love and relationships have been influenced by your experiences throughout life.
Our attachment styles are usually created during our younger years. Your family unit and caregivers hugely influence the types of guys you go for in later life.
If you have an anxious/dependent attachment style, as strange as it sounds, you might be more likely to seek out men and situations that end up in rejection and pain.
In a weird way, rejection feels familiar to you, and so it’s comfortable on some level. You may also be inadvertently trying to heal old wounds.
Let me give you an example from my life.
My dad is a very unemotional man. He never gave me any attention when I was growing up. As a consequence, I noticed a real pattern in adulthood of going after similar guys.
The ones who did give me attention scared me off. I wasn’t used to a man who acted like that. So I didn’t trust it and it freaked me out.
The guys that barely gave me the time of day, those I wanted. I felt “at home” around those kinds of men.
In some subconscious way, part of me felt like if I could “win” them over and get them to pay me attention, I could heal some of the pain of not getting my dad’s attention when I was young.
Why is it that we want the ones that don’t see us, instead of the ones that do? Sometimes we have been conditioned to.
10) It happens to us all at some point
Sometimes we read into things too much. Or as the saying goes “one swallow doesn’t make summer”.
Something happening once or twice isn’t conclusive proof that there’s something wrong with you and you always like the guys who don’t like you back.
The truth is that it happens to us all at some point, and it’s not strange for it to happen fairly frequently.
The very unromantic truth about love and romance is that it’s a numbers game. A lot of the time it’s not going to work out.
Attraction is complicated. It’s based on so many factors.
Their unique background and experiences that have shaped their preferences and personality is thrown together with your unique background and experiences that have shaped your preferences and personality.
Oh and then we have to throw timing into the mix too.
I know it always feels very personal when someone doesn’t like us back, but it’s not as simple as that.
We tend to fixate on the ones who don’t like us back and so it makes it into a huge deal. But every single person on the planet faces rejection.
As we’ve seen, there isn’t just one reason why you might be drawn to the guys who don’t like you back. It could be a combination of reasons.
The good news is that changing habits always starts with awareness.
