Look for these signs he is fighting his feelings for you.
So… there’s a guy who you’re pretty sure likes you, but he’s never acted on it or taken the plunge and made a move on you.
Why not?!
Perhaps he’s fighting his feelings for you. Whether consciously or unconsciously, he’s holding back his emotions for one reason or another.
But how do you know if this is the case?
If you think he’s fighting his feelings for you but you’re not sure, we’ve put together a list of signs to keep an eye out for.
1. He gets nervous around you.
If the man in question is charming and confident around everyone else apart from you, it’s because there’s something else going on.
We all do this sometimes – we’re feeling sassy and funny, until our crush walks in and we instantly feel self-conscious and awkward. If he’s doing the same, it might be because he’s confused about his feelings for you, and it makes him feel a bit uncomfortable.
He might feel like he has to act more reserved around you, or he might just suddenly feel shy when you’re nearby.
When we like someone, we want them to accept us and like us, which makes us more aware of our behavior. This awareness can often lead to us shutting down a bit and trying to be on our ‘best behavior’ – a.k.a. sensible and quiet!
2. He avoids eye contact with you.
Him acting differently around you is one thing, but him outright avoiding looking into your eyes? A dead giveaway!
When we like someone, we want to look at them, check them out, get a bit flirty and show them we like them.
When we like someone but we’re trying to hide how we feel, we avoid looking at them because we’re worried they’ll be able to tell what’s going on in our minds.
Eye contact might not sound like much, but it can feel very intimate, especially when we like the person we’re looking at. Our eyes give a lot away, from our emotions to our desires, and we don’t always want people to know what those things truly are.
This guy might not be ready to let you see what he thinks about you, or he might be trying to deny his feelings for you because of a huge number of reasons!
Either way, if he’s doing his best to not catch your eye, it’s a pretty clear sign he’s into you and doesn’t want you to know.
3. He’s flirting but not following through.
On the other end of the spectrum, some guys go all out and get really flirty when they like you – but then don’t follow through with anything else.
If he’s complimenting you and finding excuses to be close to you, there’s a chance he has a crush on you.
The sign he’s denying his feelings? Nothing ever happens!
He might tell you how great you look, bump into you on purpose, and generally be charming around you, but he’s not asked you out or asked for your number yet.
If he’s halfway there, it’s because he’s holding back. This might be because he’s not totally sure how he feels about you, or because he doesn’t know how you feel.
Either way, it’s a sign he’s resisting his true feelings – after all, if he was being honest with himself about how he felt, he’d have asked you out by now!
4. He’s always showing off in front of you.
You might notice that he’s trying to impress you all the time, either by showing off fancy skills, talking about exciting things he gets up to, or by being his most charming self whenever you’re around.
This is a sign he might be fighting his feelings for you – he isn’t ready to actually commit to how he feels and ask you out, but he wants you to like him as much as he likes you.
He wants you to see how interesting, funny, and popular he is, or how compatible the two of you would be together.
This might be his way of testing the water to see how you react and if you’d be likely to say yes to him, or it might be his way of flirting with you and enjoying your company without having to actually put in much effort and commit to you – or risk being rejected!
5. He shows he cares in small ways.
If the man in question always remembers small details about you, or goes out of his way to surprise you with sweet things, he probably likes you.
He might not be doing it on purpose, but he just can’t help himself! He’s avoiding the grand gestures and deep conversations because he doesn’t want it to be obvious that he likes you, but he can’t quite stop himself from showing you attention and affection from time to time.
He’s trying to keep his real feelings for you hidden, but he slips up every so often by remembering a story you told him months ago, or making the effort to bring you coffee at work.
6. He finds an excuse to chat to you.
If a guy likes you, he’d be obvious and make an effort right? Wrong! Sometimes, guys deny their feelings for you, or don’t want you to know how they feel, so they have to find excuses to be around you.
You might notice that they walk past your office more than they have to, or that their route home has changed slightly so they can spend more time talking to you on the walk back.
Maybe they regularly have a problem that only you seem able to help with, or you’re the only person who can answer a very specific question.
If he’s unsure how he feels about you, he’s looking for excuses to get to know you more, by creating conversations that get the two of you chatting away.
By doing this, he can ‘safely’ discover how well you two get on, rather than just asking you out and worrying about being rejected or hurt.
7. He’s conveniently around a lot.
Maybe his friend who lives nearby always cancels last-minute, so he checks to see if you want to hang out instead – ‘just because you’re in the area.’
It might be that he always seems to be free when you’re looking for people to hang out with.
Either way, he seems to be available to spend time with you – all the time. He’s not asked you on a date, or shown that he likes you, but you seem to spend a lot of time with just him.
This shows that he likes you but he’s trying to fight it! Rather than actually asking you out, he can spend time with you by ‘coincidence’ and get to know you that way instead.
It takes some of the pressure off and he’s not risking rejection by actually just asking you out!
8. He’s all over your social media.
Most of us check out our crush online – we religiously watch their Instagram stories, we check their Facebook relationship status, and we click the tags of girls in his photos.
Well, there’s a pretty strong chance that guys do this back to us! If he’s always online when you are, or he likes your photos, reacts to your stories and is all over your online profiles, he’s interested in you but he’s trying to hold back how he really feels about you.
He’s not at the stage where he can be honest about how much he likes you, so he’s hiding behind his Instagram profile and interacting with you that way instead.
9. He’s vocal about being single.
It can be annoying when you know a guy likes you but he’s not made a move yet – is he denying his feelings, or is he waiting for the perfect time to ask you out?
Who knows, but it can be frustrating and confusing.
You might notice that he even goes as far as making sure you know he’s single. He might not talk about other girls in front of you, or he might loudly tell people he’s not dating anyone when he knows you’re around and might be listening.
He might even shut down rumors that he’s dating, or make sure everyone knows that the girl in his photos is his sister, or cousin.
Either way, if he’s not asking you out but he wants you to know that he’s available, he likes you but he’s keeping his feelings hidden.
10. He’s acting a bit ‘off.’
If he’s all over the place, and is blowing hot and cold, he is probably confused by his feelings for you and doesn’t know what to do.
Maybe he’s flirting one minute and then avoids you for a few days, or he can’t stop looking at you and then suddenly stops giving you any eye contact at all.
If he’s not sure how he feels about you, he’s trying to fight his feelings or make sense of them, and it’s throwing him off his game. It can be really hard when you like someone but don’t know what to do, so he might be acting very strangely.
11. He asks you hypothetical questions.
He might start by asking whether or not you’re single, just to gauge the vibe. Then, it might turn into ‘jokes’ about what would happen if you ended up together, or what things would be like if you got drunk and kissed each other.
Maybe he tries to act like a great friend and digs deep about your dream first date, or your ideal man.
If he’s snooping around and gathering intel, he likes you but isn’t ready to be honest about his feelings yet. He wants to know how you feel about the idea of him or a relationship with him, but he’s scared to come out and just ask you on an actual date.
This is him assessing the foundation of what is between you before he commits to being open about his feelings for you.
12. He gets jealous easily.
If he gets annoyed when you mention other guys, but he doesn’t actually show you he likes you himself, he’s confused about his feelings and he’s trying to hide them from you!
He might ask lots of questions when you talk about a guy you’ve been on a date with, or he might clam up completely if you even mention that you’re on dating apps.
When we like someone, we don’t want to think about them with someone else. We get jealous and sometimes territorial, even if we’ve not revealed how much we like the person yet.
This is likely to be what he’s doing, so take it as a sign he’s fighting his feelings for you and isn’t ready to share them yet.
