One question I often find both funny and contradictory is when clients ask me: “Do they love me?”
Before I can even attempt to answer that, another question naturally comes to mind:
What is your definition of love?
Because the truth is, most of us never really stop to examine that.
Our ideas about love don’t come from a neutral place. They are shaped by our family upbringing, our culture, the relationships we witnessed growing up, and the stories society tells us about romance.Over time, these influences quietly form our beliefs about what love is supposed to look like.
And sometimes, those beliefs are not just distorted — they can be unhealthy, even harmful.
Take obsession for example. Is obsession love?
The world certainly likes to think so. We see it everywhere in dramas and movies: the handsome, powerful CEO who becomes obsessively devoted to the innocent young girl. His jealousy is framed as passion. His possessiveness is portrayed as proof that he cares deeply.
The story is packaged as romance.
But if we pause for a moment and step outside the fantasy, we might ask ourselves a different question: Is being controlled really love?
Because obsession often comes with surveillance, restriction, and emotional pressure. It asks one person to shrink so the other can feel secure.
For me, that is not love.
Love should never require you to lose your freedom. It should not make you smaller, quieter, or more fearful of being yourself.
If anything, love should allow both people to remain fully themselves — to grow, to breathe, and to exist without the constant fear of losing the other.
Which brings us back to the original question.
Perhaps before asking, “Do they love me?”, a more important question to reflect on is:
What kind of love am I actually looking for?
Because once you become clear about what love truly means to you, many confusing relationships start revealing their answers on their own.
