How to know if it is fear of commitment or lack of love? 8 differences

Do you want to know if your partner’s love is real?

The fear of commitment is something very common in these times.

It is one thing to be afraid to commit to a person, for fear of getting hurt for example, and quite another is not to reciprocate the other’s love and being unable to express it honestly.

The ability to meet new people with just a swipe has deepened a false sense that we could always be missing out on something better.

How can you know if it’s really worth trying with your partner? Or is it better to move on?

Here I will tell you the 8 differences between the fear of commitment and the lack of love

1) The fear of commitment is an attitude that is lived in the head, love is felt in the heart

The truth is that the fear of commitment has nothing to do with an impossibility of loving.

Your boyfriend might love you, but still panic in his head at the thought of losing his freedom. He might have an unconscious fear of rejection or even low self-esteem.

If he really loves you, you will know it by the way he looks at you and how he feels about you, even though he is reluctant to fully commit to you.

He may not be very good at expressing his feelings, but he will definitely have loving gestures with you.

If love is not present, your partner will have a negative attitude towards you, there will be constant disagreements and they will feel that in general they would be better apart than together.

He may not have the courage to admit it, which is why he stays with you, even though he no longer loves you.

It is also possible that he values the relationship and appreciates many things about you, which makes it more difficult for him to make the decision to leave you.

He really might not know what he wants, honestly.

And you can’t blame him for that.

2) The attitude towards labels

A man who is afraid of commitment will not feel comfortable putting a title to his relationship.

But if he really loves you, you will know it, simply because he wants to spend time with you. He will propose to meet you and he will be excited to see you.

To know if your partner really loves you, you don’t need any label, or any title. You just have to feel like you care.

The lack of love manifests itself beyond the name they give to their relationship.

He might be fine with saying you’re dating, but he’ll be aloof towards you.

You will not be his priority and in general you will feel that you are always the one looking for him.

The way he talks to you or how he looks at you can reveal a lot about whether he’s tired of you and doesn’t love you anymore.

3) Future plans

A man with commitment issues will have some difficulty making future plans with you.

But if he really loves you, he can’t help but enjoy the time he spends with you.

Read Also: How is a loving woman? Psychological profile and characteristics

If he laughs a lot with you, smiles all the time, and is interested in knowing everything about you, you can trust that he loves you.

Plans will emerge more slowly, and he may not propose to plan a trip for next summer, but it will be clear that he wants you in his life.

A man who doesn’t truly love you will avoid making plans with you at all. In his mind he will be thinking of an imminent breakup, so he will have no intention of planning anything with you.

He will avoid any commitment that could bind him to you in the future. He could show inconsiderate attitudes towards you such as disappearing and reappearing without giving explanations.

Would you like to know what to do if this happens? Here is an article that will interest you: “How to act when a man reappears”

4) Things have to be the way he wants

If he is a person with commitment issues he may want to always do things his way.

It is implicit in the definition, you do not want to compromise or give away anything on your part.

But the truth is, if you’re important to him, there will be a point where he knows he needs to be more flexible.

He does not want to lose you, so even if it is difficult for him, at a certain point, he will seek to please you. Even if it means giving up what he prefers.

If it is a lack of love, selfishness will prevail, your desires will not be so important to him and he will simply do what he pleases. Many times without even considering you at all.

5) Communication

A man who truly values and loves you might be very afraid of commitment, but he will at least try to talk about it openly with you.

Let’s be honest, being afraid of commitment is not something pleasant, after all it is something that is in your mind and in your subconscious. It’s not something he chooses, but he just feels it.

The other side of the coin is when he has really lost interest and there is a lack of love.

In that case it is possible that he directly stops communicating with you.

And I don’t just mean sitting down and chatting, he’ll stop texting you and you might even feel like he’s avoiding you.

If he gets too extreme, he may even be irritable with you and get annoyed by everything about you.

6) Intimacy

A man afraid of commitment, who still loves you, will want intimacy with you.

He will show you how much he is attracted to you and his encounters will be passionate.

Even after a while of being together.

Although it is true that in the early stages of relationships this aspect is more intense, when there is love it continues to be something that the couple enjoys over the years.

The lack of love, over time will be translated into a lack of intimacy.

Intimacy is a fundamental aspect in relationships. If he doesn’t want to be intimate with you, that’s a big red flag.

Read Also: 15 signs when a young guy likes an older woman

Emotionless sex and lack of communication could destroy any bond.

7) The pace at which the relationship progresses

If he’s afraid of commitment, he may need to go at a different pace than you.

You might feel ready to take the next step, but he still has a lot of questions to solve on his mind.

People with a fear of commitment tend to see more what they lose by being in a relationship than its benefits.

Then he could find himself in an internal debate about whether or not to stay with you, mostly due to his fears. But if he has true feelings for you, they will continue to move forward in the relationship, albeit slowly.

Communication is always an important tool that will help you understand what is happening.

In the case of a lack of love, it will be more a matter of not being with the right person.

So the relationship might move fast or slow but there will come a point where it doesn’t feel right.

There will be something inside him (and probably inside you, even if you don’t want to admit it) that tells him that you’re not the one for him.

There are relationships that move too fast until they crash, and others that go so slowly that nothing seems to happen.

8) His past gives him away

Lack of commitment is probably not something your guy has woken up to with you.

But rather a condition that he has been dealing with forever, or at least for some time.

If he has told you about his repeated problems in previous relationships, due to this characteristic, you already know that he is someone with commitment problems.

Now, if he really cares about you, he’ll do his best not to repeat history. But surely this is a great challenge for him.

And if it is something that he wants to change, it could help to investigate the causes that generate these feelings in him. He could ask for professional help, it is not an unusual problem, so there are many specialists who could guide him.

The lack of love is not subject to the history of the person. Love is felt or not. It cannot be forced.

A man could have fallen in love in the past and yet not fall in love with you. Probably because they are not compatible.

You may also be emotionally unavailable, which will make you not open or willing to fall in love.

You can perceive it in the way he treats you. He will not go out of his way for you, he will not feel that there is anything wrong with him. Nor will he try to change the situation since everything is fine for him.

What is the origin of the fear of commitment?

As we mentioned before, behind the fear of commitment, there is a feeling of doubt for the person, whether they have chosen the right option or if they could be missing out on something better.

The causes of fear of commitment are diverse:

bad experiences in the past fear of rejection fear of abandonment or even suffering
a strong fear of loss of freedom misconceptions about love and relationships immaturity and insecurities

Read Also: Why does a man only want to sleep with you and not a serious relationship?

What can you do if you date a man afraid of commitment, before it’s too late?

1) You don’t want to change it

First of all it is important to mention that there will be nothing you can do if he does not want it.

Wanting to change a person is one of the biggest mistakes we can make. First, because true love is about accepting the other as it is. And at the same time, love each other enough to walk away, if the other does not do us good, nor can they offer us what we want.

Then there will only be possibilities to do something, if he wants it.

2) Fear of commitment or lack of it?

You should first make sure that his lack of commitment is not due to a personal choice to decline the commitment.

There are men who simply do not want exclusivity and that is their choice. They are simply single by conviction. It is a valid choice.

It is very likely that this is not what you are looking for (since you are reading about the fear of commitment) so, if you think that this is the case with this guy, it is best to walk away.

3) Invite him to reflect

If you are clear that he has a real interest in you but has shown characteristics of fear of commitment, you can accompany him to deepen his fear.

Some things you might suggest they consider to better understand what they are feeling:

Find the true origin of your fear of commitment (past, previous relationships, family, fear of abandonment, etc.) Focus on the things that the relationship brings you, instead of thinking about what you think you lose Evaluate what your life would be like with or without your partner in the present and the future Think objectively about the true consequences of assuming a commitment. Is there a real or imagined cost? Which is it?