A person realizing they've been deluding themselves will benefit no matter how much the realization may hurt or how much they've loved their delusion. The term “infatuation” tends to embody a somewhat derogatory connotation, partly by its very definition which incorporates descriptors such as “foolish” and “extravagant” for this particular type of passion or attraction, and partly by the contrast it creates to the elevated company it keeps - it is after all almost always haunted by a comparison to it's more sober-minded relative, love.
Others focus and reflect rather than source our passion
Although a feeling inferior to love and more so when looked at through long-term specs infatuation on its own is not an entirely harmful phenomenon: it does teach to the receptive that all those feelings of bliss and happiness triggered by the object of infatuation are within the mind of the beholder and can be achieved through less fleeting means.
Placing our happiness squarely onto the perceived flow of affections and attention in our direction or their lack off from another person practically guarantees that we won't have it for long, as well as that we'll live in fear of the day it is no longer there or anything that we believe might jeopardize it.
Thus the moment of anticipated disaster seems to reach back through time and diminish the present experience, but only because we allow it. We do not want to turn our happiness on and off according to the whims of another. The key to making this kind of bliss permanent is to rely on internal rather than external factors, to find what our passion in life is outside of any individual and pursue it.
What the state of infatuation gives us then is a glimpse into the kind of passion we can have for life as a whole, which can in fact be brought on by us. It IS brought on by us always - it's a response to whatever rouses our interest and excitement and it need not be another person – we just may not truly ever realize this.
Nothing could coax out the seeds out of a seedless watermelon and so too the infatuated could not be in the state of infatuation if they did not have the ability along with the prerequisites they've consciously or subconsciously decided upon to bring the state about. Attraction is subjective and the individual deemed attractive merely a trigger and not a mind-controlling virus.
Adopting the lessons
Infatuation can become quite disruptive when it becomes the person's sole focus and even dangerous in it's ability to blind us to the faults of the person toward which we're directing all this affection and idealization. This is when the set of feelings, thoughts and behaviors connected to the relationship take on a decidedly sickly tinge of obsession.
Ignore the reality of the beloved's personality and actions as well as your own and notice the glowing halo you've placed around them turn eery – that is the perceptual haze through which the reality of the situation is now slowly but inevitably emerging through. Luckily infatuation is by definition a short-lived passion. It however may not be for one of the people in the relationship.
It's unfortunate that it can leave one reeling and devastated and this is especially the case for those who have mistaken it for love and over-invested. The hidden benefit waiting to emerge under layers of stormy emotion is to learn to differentiate infatuation from love and reality of people and situations from what we desperately want them to be.
Ideally, one would now be equipped with a battle-sharpened discernment and be able to recognize in the future which state they or their love interest are in. No amount of compromising oneself or idolizing the other will turn a fling into a happily ever after, and truly knowing this will hopefully prevent the impassioned from rendering themselves unable and unwilling to let go when the time comes to digest the experience, assimilate the lessons it provided, and move on.
