I decided to write a post about the one that got away. From time to time I get comments from men who mention some girl they met (or just seen) on our site a while ago. They might have had some communication with her or just looked at her profile for months, and now she is gone. Usually they want to get her contact information.

I call these imaginary romances, “the one that got away”. This happens in normal life, too. You used to have a girlfriend or a boyfriend, who you really liked but for some reason didn’t stay together with, and you start wondering, what if… Or it may be a co-worker you had a crush on, or a barmaid at the coffee shop you used to frequent, who smiled at you so brightly that you were wondering, did she like you? Should you ask her out?

Thousands years ago a Greek philosopher said that you cannot walk into the same river twice. What it means that even if you walk into the stream at the same place, the water had already moved ahead, and you are not walking into the same river.

This pretty much sums it up. Trying to think “what if” or pining for someone we have lost contact with is pointless. It also expends tons of emotional energy, which you would be much smarter to spend on people who are here now. The one that got away didn’t happen, and that’s about all it is. Think what would you do differently if you knew back then what you know now, and remember to do it the next time you have a real chance!

I know a woman who keeps re-telling the story about a boyfriend she had in her youth, the one that got away, who she broke up with because she thought he fooled around with her girlfriend. That happened 40+ years ago! And the funny thing is, she was the one who sent them out together, as they had tickets to see a show and she got sick, and she didn’t want him to get sick from her, so she told him to go and asked her flatmate to accompany him. The flatmate returned home in the early hours of the morning, and she never again talked to either her girlfriend or boyfriend.

She doesn’t even know what happened between them! I guess, this may be why she is still fixated on that story, because she is unsure, whether she did the right thing or just punished herself for no reason. Since it happened in the times before mobile phones and email, the boy never had a chance to explain. It is that “not knowing” about the one that got away that keeps the story going.

The point being, anyone of us can actually think about some people they wish they haven’t lost along the way, the ones that got away, including myself. But there is no point pondering over it now! I don’t wear the same clothes as when I was that age, don’t drive the same car, or even eat the same food. I am looking at the woman who for years keeps re-telling the story about the boyfriend she lost 40+ years ago, and wonder what would actually happen if she let it go?

Read also:

• What to write in the first letter to a woman?
• What to do if a woman stopped writing?
• How to be romantic via online international dating
• 7 core beliefs of Slavic women in love and dating