I have loved her for six years but…

Dear Agatha, I have been in love with a girl for the past six years and haven’t been able to express my love to her due to fear, shyness as well as not wanting to suffer heartache in case she doesn’t want me in her life. Please tell me how to approach her or what to do. David. Dear David, Your problem is lack of confidence. Unfortunately, without it, there is nothing you can do successfully in life. You would be like a ship without a captain. Confidence is what gives character and definition to our aspirations in life. Life is like an ocean that gulps up anything that isn’t well defined or secured. You don’t need it simply because you want to have a relationship with a girl: no, you need it because life demands it of you. There will always be tough and challenging situations in your life when the amount of confidence you have in yourself will win the game for you. Don’t do it because you have a girl in mind; do it as a tool of self-development and actualization. Fear is one spirit you should never give accommodation to in your life as it has the ability to rob you of everything God has invested in you. It won’t allow you ever move beyond a point. Fear is like a restraining chain around your legs. Take for instance the issue of this girl you have wasted six years pining for. Consider what you could have done with those years you have invested in loving a woman you cannot even tell. If you were to value those years in terms of achievements, you will discover you have lost millions of Naira on wanting a woman you are afraid to approach. In terms of physical achievement, it is the time structure, a child spends in secondary school. Can you then imagine how destructive fear is and how it can rob one of precious dreams? What assurances do you have that someone else with confidence hasn’t told her already the things you want to tell her and is in her life now? Time and life do not wait for anyone. Life abhors vacuum; it will always find ways of filling whatever void is created. When a girl-child reaches a certain age, men will naturally ask for her hand in relationship. In a young woman’s life, six years are like a lifetime. If you remove six years from her reproductive life, what would she be left with? When a man wastes too much time dilly-dallying on whether to approach a woman for a relationship or not, he makes way for another man without inhibitions to win the battle of her heart. If your fear is that of rejection; six years are too long a time for you to get over your fears. Moreover, it is part of a woman’s physiology to reject a man for the first time. Even if she is madly in love with the man, the average girl is taught to price herself right by declining a man’s offer the first time. Therefore, if you are not ready to be rejected by a woman, suffer heartbreak, you are not ready for the serious things of life. This is because a woman’s heart is a very precious and priceless jewel which only the toughest of men win. As a man you must accept it as a vital part of your life. The best things in life are those things time and energy are invested into. For gold to emerge from stone, it has to go through a process of intense heat; just like the lump of clay has to endure difference processes; including heat to be beautiful and defined. I agree that you can be shy, but when it is lasting a lifetime, you need to do something fast about it. You must learn to conquer by going through various decrees of rejection by women to emerge a better and confident man. Life isn’t meant to be easy; it is a mix of pains and joys which demands the baby coming into the world to struggle to get out of the mother’s womb. It is either, you learn to be a man in the real sense of it or forever hide inside your shell by watching the world go by. You can be sure that for every woman that rejects you, there are two ready to accept you for what you are. Besides, women use the determined resilience of a man as barometer to judge his seriousness hence set impossible hurdles for men they really like. If you like this girl, the worst she can do is to turn you down. But it would be on record that you at least tried. There are no fast and hard rules about approaching a woman. A simple smile and hello can get both of you talking. If you don’t know what to say thereafter, tell her you are shy and would appreciate if she is your friend. Wooing a woman is all about taking one step at a time. If she finds something interesting in you, no matter the level of your shyness, she will engage in a meaningful discussion with you. And if she turns you down, at least be happy you were able to break the ice once and for all. That itself is something worth celebrating. Good luck.