On category errors and delusions

We had a relationship of sorts. It was hard and brittle. It broke.

Obviously, I am deluded about something.

Not so clear is exactly what I am deluded about.

On the surface, at least, I accept that my relationship with her disintegrated long ago and there is no hope of repairing it.

Yet, even though I know that, I can't shake my desire for her.

Why? Why do I persist in desiring a person that has no desire for me?

Perhaps part of the reason is that I have been committing category errors - I have been attributing to her, qualities that were actually properties of our relationship.

So, for example, I loved her for responding to my desire. Instead of regarding that response as a property of our relationship, I regarded it as intrinsic to her.

In this mindset, when the relationship withered, nothing important disappeared because all the important things were intrinsic to either herself or me.

This undervaluing of the relationship probably explains why I was never able to accept her desire to be just friends. If I had placed more value on the relationship as distinct from the person at the other end of it, perhaps the relationship would have survived, or at least, been given a decent burial.