Aug 3, 2026 · 56 min · 11 segments
Why do we keep searching for the one thing that will finally make us feel complete? Inspired by David Whyte's essay *Unrequited Love*, Sheryl and Victoria explore the universal experience of longing…
Sheryl PaulHost
Victoria RussellHost
And I will just start by saying that the topic of longing, I think, is very close to the sensitive soul, the poetic soul.
There's a chapter in The Wisdom of Anxiety called, I believe it's called The Wisdom of Longing.
And it comes up, of course, all the time in my work around relationship anxiety and That sense of longing for the perfect partner that we've all been kind of indoctrinated and conditioned to believing exists.
And so we tend to equate longing with romantic love, which we'll talk a little bit more about in a bit.
But I also think, you know, I know you don't identify as a four on the Enneagram.
That sense of longing for the ideal or longing for some kind of artistic perfection is just very deep in the soul of, I think, a lot of people who find their way to us.
I've been hearing from different friends recently who are saying like, you know, okay, I have my spouse.
But I still kind of feel like something's missing, but I don't know what it is.
still i feel kind of restless or i feel this yes this sense of like but what else could it be you know so yes yeah i do feel like there's this fundamental well you well we're going to talk more about this so let's just get into it so so here are just a few sentences it's a it's a pretty short piece by david white and actually It's all online, so I will share a link to the full text of this piece in the show notes.
He says, unrequited love is the love human beings experience most of the time.
For what affection is ever returned over time in the same measure or quality with which it is given? What other human being could ever love us as we need to be loved? And whom could we know so well and so intimately through all the twists and turns of a given life that we could show them exactly the continuous and appropriate form of affection they need? Human beings live in disappointment and a self-appointed imprisonment when they refuse to love unless they are loved the same way in return.
The great discipline seems to be to give up wanting to control the manner in which we are requited and to forego the natural disappointment that flows from expecting an exact and measured reciprocation from a partner, from a child, from our hopes for a loving God.
Those are a few sentences plucked from throughout the piece, but I think that gives us you know, the
And I will just start by saying that the topic of longing, I think, is very close to the sensitive soul, the poetic soul.
There's a chapter in The Wisdom of Anxiety called, I believe it's called The Wisdom of Longing.
And it comes up, of course, all the time in my work around relationship anxiety and That sense of longing for the perfect partner that we've all been kind of indoctrinated and conditioned to believing exists.
And so we tend to equate longing with romantic love, which we'll talk a little bit more about in a bit.
But I also think, you know, I know you don't identify as a four on the Enneagram.
That sense of longing for the ideal or longing for some kind of artistic perfection is just very deep in the soul of, I think, a lot of people who find their way to us.
I've been hearing from different friends recently who are saying like, you know, okay, I have my spouse.
But I still kind of feel like something's missing, but I don't know what it is.
still i feel kind of restless or i feel this yes this sense of like but what else could it be you know so yes yeah i do feel like there's this fundamental well you well we're going to talk more about this so let's just get into it so so here are just a few sentences it's a it's a pretty short piece by david white and actually It's all online, so I will share a link to the full text of this piece in the show notes.
He says, unrequited love is the love human beings experience most of the time.
For what affection is ever returned over time in the same measure or quality with which it is given? What other human being could ever love us as we need to be loved? And whom could we know so well and so intimately through all the twists and turns of a given life that we could show them exactly the continuous and appropriate form of affection they need? Human beings live in disappointment and a self-appointed imprisonment when they refuse to love unless they are loved the same way in return.
The great discipline seems to be to give up wanting to control the manner in which we are requited and to forego the natural disappointment that flows from expecting an exact and measured reciprocation from a partner, from a child, from our hopes for a loving God.
Those are a few sentences plucked from throughout the piece, but I think that gives us you know, the
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