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I Want My Beloved To Be Happy
God: "Grace. You want her back?"
Bruce: "No. I want her to be happy, no matter what that means. I want her to find someone who will treat her with all the love she deserved from me. I want her to meet someone who will see her always as I do now, through Your eyes."
God: "Now that's a prayer."
Bruce Almighty

Rick: "Inside of us, we both know you belong with Victor. You're part of his work, the thing that keeps him going. If that plane leaves the ground and you're not with him, you'll regret it. Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life."
Ilsa: "But what about us? "
Rick: We'll always have Paris."
Casablanca

A character decides that he or she would do all they can to see the person they like be happy rather than doing their best to end up with that person. Thus, the character acts against his or her own interests, often supporting relationships between their beloved and another person. Especially annoying if the plot hasn't actually shown these two to be a couple yet.

If a straight guy chooses to do this, expect one of two things to occur: some variation of "If You Ever Do Anything To Hurt Her," or the girl to turn around and decide she wants to be with him anyway, as a reward for his virtue. Unfortunately, seeing as the latter reduces the woman to a prize to be won for good behavior, it doesn't always make the audience happy...

Also see The Paolo and Unlucky Childhood Friend.

Contrast Murder The Hypotenuse and Green Eyed Monster. Compare/contrast Love Makes You Evil.

Examples:

Anime
  • Maehara Shinobu and Otohime Mutsumi from Love Hina both like Urashima Keitaro; however, Shinobu actively tries to help Keitaro end up with Narusegawa Naru, while Mutsumi seems rather indifferent to whether or not she ends up with Keitaro. In the manga version, Mutsumi frequently makes a show of actively trying to get close to Keitaro; it is foreshadowed, and later explicitly revealed, that her motivation for doing this is in fact to ignite Naru's jealousy and make her work harder at her relationship with Keitaro. Mutsumi is perfectly happy for Naru and Keitaro to be together, and indeed, implies that she wouldn't mind being with ''both'' of them.
    • As well, despite her aggressive campaign for him, Kanako bows to this trope in the end in Love Hina Again.
  • Oogami Souma from Kannazuki No Miko supports the relationship between Himemiya Chikane and Kurusegawa Himeko despite being attracted to Himeko; meanwhile, Chikane supports the relationship between Souma and Himeko despite also being attracted to Himeko.
  • Video Girl Ai, especially towards the end, in spades. In fact, the reason why Youta gets Ai to help him is because he preferred to help Moemi get Takashi's love instead of sabotaging her plans, which he could've done very easily because he was both Takashi's best friend and Moemi's confident; his selflessness is what allowed him him see the Gokuraku club in the first place.
  • Daidouji Tomoyo and Li Meiling from Card Captor Sakura are both examples of this trope. Tomoyo channels her feelings for Kinomoto Sakura towards making Sakura happy, even going so far as to regularly help Sakura's relationship with whoever Tomoyo thinks Sakura would be happiest with. Meanwhile, Meiling had convinced Xiao Lang to become engaged to her when they were younger, but with the condition that the engagement would be broken if Xiao Lang found the one he truly loved.
  • Despite having nigh-superhuman physical and mental abilities, in addition to magical powers, Chanohata Tamami in Mahoraba does not take advantage of them to remove her rival for Aoba Kozue, Shiratori Ryuushi.
  • In an epic battle between the Forces of Darkness and a ballet-dancing duck, Ahiru of Princess Tutu dances her way to regain the lost pieces of Prince Mytho's heart... all the while knowing that he is fated to not love her, and in the end, telling him will result in her vanishing in a speck of light.
  • Hayato Ike, ordinary friend of the heroes in Shakugan No Shana, helps his classmate Kazumi Yoshida get closer to the male lead, even though he himself likes her. When said male lead Yuji Sakai has Selective Obliviousness over this, he breaks the usual rule and flat out tells Yuji that he's being rude and cruel.
  • In Gravitation, Ayaka Usami loves her fiance Yuki enough to come to see him by herself all the way from Kyoto, but breaks off their arranged marriage when she believes that he can be happy only with Shuichi. Ultimately, Shuichi's Unlucky Childhood Friend Hiro takes a liking to her and they start dating.
  • Nayuki in Kanon.
  • Hanon in Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch. The guy loses the person he wanted to be with in a few episodes anyway, but Hanon still doesn't end up with him afterwards, maybe because he's her teacher. Later, Michal enacts this with Kaito, despite spending most of the series as a Clingy Jealous Girl that would compromise anything she could think of to break up Kaito and Lucia.
  • The ending of Fate/Stay Night falls under this trope, with Shirou allowing Saber to fulfill her quest even if it means their separation.
  • Renji Abarai from Bleach on many occasions gives up chances to be with Rukia despite practically living and dying for her, wanting for her to survive and be happy.
  • The fourth episode of Jungle Wa Itsumo Hale Nochi Guu has Mari attempting to do this for Hale and Guu (complete with a "schoolgirl walking through the autumn leaves" scene), but, of course, that's not what Hale was trying to tell her at all. Naturally, when he tries explaining this, she assumes he's just trying not to hurt her feelings, and goes into Love Bubbles and sparkles mode.
  • To some degree, Yuki Nagato from Suzumiya Haruhi. She has loyalty to Kyon and Kyon alone up to and including in the novels usurping Haruhi's god-like power to destroy the Integrated Data Entity and create an Alternate Universe where everything is what Kyon has said he wanted things to be like ie. Brought Down To Normal. He gently tells her that he really does want the craziness that Haruhi creates, and to be with Haruhi; and Yuki accepts this and gives him the power to change everything back. Kyon does appreciate her, though, and trusts her the most out of anybody.
  • A really tragic case of both halves of a separated couple failing to try to reunite because they think the other would be happier without them forms the central conflict of the second half of Nana.
  • In the manga Yami No Matsuei, Tatsumi's alter-ego, Butler, tries to force the love of his life, Luka (Tsuzuki's alter-ego), into marriage with the rich His Lordship (despite the fact that she does not love His Lordship) so that she might be financially taken care of. This trope backfires, however, as at the end Luka escapes the marriage and confesses her love for Butler.
  • Paraietta in Simoun has been desperately in love with Neviril since childhood, but stands aside in favour of Aaeru once she's sure Aaeru is worthy of Neviril. Although, that said, she regrets it a couple of times, especially when Neviril seems on the verge of asking her to be her "pair" (flight partner); in reality she won't even let Neviril finish the question, but later she flashes back to the scene and re-imagines it as if she'd let Neviril ask her and had said "yes". Later still, she comes close to forcing herself on Neviril when she misinterprets something she says as meaning that she and Aaeru are lovers (they're not... at least, not yet.)
  • Mifuyu in Maria-sama Ga Miteru despite her obsession with Sachiko realizes that she is better off with Yumi.
  • Mamoru did a form of this in the second series of Sailor Moon in which he was receving rather disturbing messages that Usagi would die if they continued to be together and hence he forced himself appart from Usagi. However, seeing as Usagi wasn't too thriled at the idea (she didn't know the death messages part of this, since Mamoru didn't tell her that she wasn't the source of the problem ), it's more "I want my beloved to be alive" more than anything else.
  • In Kaleido Star, ex-magician/now businessman Kalos Eido has been in love with his right-hand and companion Sarah Dupont for years, but since Sarah ditched her singing career to work with him, he feels horribly guilty and doesn't dare to ask her out. When Sarah is offered by their common friend Andy, who is also interested in Sarah to become his companion so she can become an Idol Singer, Kalos attempts to pull a harsh version of "I Want..." by telling Sarah he doesn't need her anymore. However, Sora and her friends trick Kalos into revealing his love for Sarah, which she reciprocates. Then Andy pulls his "I want..." card, letting Kalos and Sarah hook up.
  • Much of the drama in the second season of Da Capo arises from one character refusing to accept this concept. It only makes the shipping wars worse.
  • In Blood Plus, use of this trope could be attributed to several characters, the most notable being Mao and Haji. After Mao finds out that her boyfriend has fallen for another woman, she spends the next episode making sure they get to spend some Quality Time together. Haji, meanwhile, spends the vast majority of the series doing whatever it is that will make Saya happy, and does his best to stay by the wayside (however, he also somewhat subverts the trope in later episodes, when Saya is nearly whisked off by the infatuated Solomon, and Haji makes it clear that he is Not Pleased).
  • Victorian Romance Emma has Eleanor and Hans falling in this category.
  • In Pretty Face it's the whole reason Randou decided to spend a year with Rina's face, since he actually gets a picture of his original appearance early on. He almost wound up in a permanent case of Mandys Law Of Anime Gender Bending over this, and only after accepting it did he realize he never even got his original appearance back in the first place.
  • Serial Experiments Lain toes the line between text and Subtext with a lot of Lain and Alice's relationship, but it's hard to read Lain deleting herself from existence for Alice's peace of mind, arranging things so that she can marry her high school crush, and spending eternity watching over her from the Wired in many other ways.

Manga
  • Nachi and Kaya in Mugen Densetsu Takamagahara: Dream Saga both concede to Yuuki.
  • Kurai of Angel Sanctuary more or less is this trope.
  • Madarame of the Genshiken manga has a secret and rather intense crush on Kasukabe Saki, the girlfriend of his friend and fellow otaku Kousaka. Not willing to risk his friendship with both, he keeps his feelings to himself. A shame, really, since it would have made the second half of the series a lot more interesting if he hadn't.
    • On the other hand, it was arguably a fairly realistic portrayal of what someone like Madarame would have done. No, seriously.
  • Itta in Girl X Girl X Boy flat-out says that this is his intention - he'd sure be happy if Fuuka fell for him, but if Riri was willing to be with her, he'd be totally fine with bowing to her.
  • Shigeru, Sakurako, Rui, Kazuya, and Umi in Hana Yori Dango give up their perusals of Tsukushi and Domyouji just so the two of them can stay together.
  • Axis Powers Hetalia has Spain letting Italy leave him during the War of the Austrian Succession.

Live Action TV
  • For the first five episodes of Pushing Daisies, Olive pursues Ned relentlessly, to the point of considering blackmailing Chuck, the girl he's actually interested in. By the sixth episode, though, she's decided that she just wants him to be happy—even though she's still hoping he'll wind up being happy with her.
  • In Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Tara tells Willow "you have to be with the one you love". Tara is convinced that Willow will go back to her ex-boyfriend Oz, and is astonished and happy when Willow's answer is "I am".
  • Rose Tyler does this in the Doctor Who episode "Boom Town". This decision appears to last for just two episodes. Her boyfriend, Mickey Smith, however, does it constantly.
    • The Doctor himself does this in "Journey's End," sort of.
  • For the first two seasons of The Office (American), Jim tries to be this with Pam, but ultimately fails due to Roy's poor treatment of Pam (i.e. he'd probably be happy that she's happy, except she isn't happy).
  • The Red Dwarf episode "Camille" ends with Kryten losing his love interest, the titular Camille, in a spoof of the Casablanca scene.
    • Played both straight AND subverted by Arnold J. Rimmer as he realizes that Nirvana Crane has willingly surrendered her existence on the hologram ship so that he may get a position in her place. He immediately turns in his resignation to return to the Red Dwarf, stating that "we won't be apart, we just won't be together" and in doing so quoting exactly a romantic movie he saw at the start of the episode. He instantly realizes this and adds "I can't believe I just said that!"
    • Averted by Lister, who pursues his dream girl Kachowski through a time hole after finding a picture of himself marrying her. When he finds her hotel room and he sees another man's shoes, he realizes that the groom in the photo is not himself, but the other guy. As he abandons the idea of getting together with her (and bemoaning the yuppie type of man she probably married), she opens the door and invites him to meet her new husband... who in fact DOES turn out to be himself, from several years in the future.
  • An interesting subversion occurs on In Plain Sight with one of the witness couples. They were a very unhappy but very devout Catholic couple when they see a priest murdered. Because of their faith they cannot get divorce even though it is quite obvious they hate each other at this point. To make a long story short she has found someone else that she likes and they both know this but she wouldn't dare cheat. He ends up faking his death so that she can move on. She not really his beloved but she is his wife and he admires her very much and in order for her to be happy she can't be tied to him. So he fakes his own death and gets witsec to help him get relocated again. At the end the man she really loves is comforting her as he sneaks out the back.

Literature
  • The e.e. cummings poem "it may not always be so".
  • In Gaston Leroux's The Phantom Of The Opera, Erik/The Phantom allows Christine to go off with Raoul and be happy. In the movie, he becomes a Stalker With A Crush and has to be brutalized.
  • This is the whole plot of Cyrano De Bergerac, and the inspiration of the imitators of his method.
  • In Lois Mc Master Bujold's novel The Curse of Chalion Cazaril, the protagonist, decides he's not young or rich enough to be a good match for Betriz, who's half his age, and tries to set her up with his friend Palli. She however is having none of it. It's Cazaril she wants, especially if she can persuade him to shave off his beard.
  • In The Brothers Karamazov, Dmitri Karamazov plans to commit suicide due to the circumstances immediately surrounding him and the disgrace he perceives is upon him, and decides that before he goes he's going to make her happy one last time. He ends up with her, but those aforementioned circumstances really bite him in the ass later.
  • In Anne Mc Caffrey's The Rowan, Designated Best Friend Afra Lyon pines away for the title character, only to wait too long and watch Marty Stu Jeff Raven swoop in and claim her. (Though, being a powerful telepath, The Rowan knew that nearly all along, but doesn't want to ruin their friendship, admitting that she would've turned to Afra eventually.) Made creepier by the fact that Afra's loyalty is "rewarded" by hooking up with The Rowan and Jeff's youngest daughter, Damia.
    • Seems to be a favorite trope of Dame McCaffrey. A similar situation develops in Pern's Harper Hall Trilogy: Masterharper Robinton starts to get intimate with prized pupil Menolly, despite Menolly being involved with his previous prized pupil, Sebell. Robinton nips it in the bud, citing their age, position, and her previous attachments. All this despite the fact that, as Menolly states "[She] loved [him] first". (And later we find that Sebell knew all about Menolly's feelings, but understood and accepted them and probably would not have adverse to going the Poly route.)
    • Let's face it, Anne Mc Caffrey hasn't got a goddamn clue how to write romance.
  • In the historical novel The Lady Royal by Molly Costain Haycraft, Princess Isabel of England (daughter of Edward III) is engaged to marry Bernard d'Albret, a young man with whom she is deeply smitten. However, she learns that Bernard has a strong religious vocation and wishes to become a monk, despite the wishes of his tyrannical mother. Isabel breaks off the engagement in such a way that it allows him to enter the monastery under the pretense of a broken heart.
  • Deconstructed in Pride And Prejudice: Elizabeth realizes that her happiness at Mr. Wickham's engagement to Miss King means that, while she cares about him, she was never in love with him. Were she in love with him, she would have nothing but contempt for him for choosing another girl.
  • One of the more classic examples occurs at the end of A Tale Of Two Cities when Sydney Carton, knowing his beloved Lucie will never love him as she loves Darnay uses his near identical likeness to Darnay to take his place on death row, allowing Lucie and Darnay to escape together while he is executed in Darnay's place.

Film
  • The climactic scene of Casablanca.
  • As well as the (far less) climactic scene of Bruce Almighty, as chronicled in the page quote.
  • The end of There's Something About Mary shows Ted redeem his earlier behaviour by going out of his way to ensure Mary's happiness by reuniting her with her ex-boyfriend, with the twist that Mary realizes that she'd ultimately be happiest with Ted
  • In Bedazzled (at least the 2000 remake), Elliot uses most of his wishes trying to make Alison fall in love with him. He uses his final wish to give her a happy life instead. He then asks her out normally, and she turns him down. However, he does wind up with someone else who looks identical to her.
  • This put the "bitter" in the Bittersweet Ending of Imagine Me & You.
  • This is done by Han Solo in Return of the Jedi of the Star Wars trilogy when he thinks that Leia is in love with Luke. However, it turns out that they are Like Brother And Sister, literally.
  • Norrington from Pirates of the Caribbean, gently admonishing Will to attend to Elizabeth with every ounce and then some of care and devotion that Will put into making Norringon's sword.
  • The main character of The Butterfly Effect spends the whole movie going back in time to try and end up with the girl, mucking things up more and more, before figuring out that I Want My Beloved To Be Happy is the only way to go. In fact, this Aesop is taken to an extreme, as in everyone in the world would be better off without knowing you at all.
  • At the end of the Disney film Beauty And The Beast, the Beast releases Belle from the castle so that she can help her father. Because the only way for him (and his entire castle) to return to their human forms is for the Beast and Belle to fall in love (to which she has not confessed), by allowing his beloved to be happy, he's [temporarily] doomed them all. Oh, irony.
  • Similarly at the end of the Disney adaptation of The Hunchback Of Notre Dame, where Quasimodo realizes Esmeralda would actually be happy with Phoebus, despite the longing he has for her and the rather petty dislike he has for Phoebus.
  • Played with in Strange Days: Mace is vocally dismissive of Lenny's pathetic pining for his ex-girlfriend Faith, and is quick to remind him that she doesn't love him any more and that he needs to move on, but ultimately ends up helping Lenny out with his attempts to protect (and win back) Faith because, ultimately, she's in love with him and wants him to be happy, and he so clearly isn't.
  • A particularly excellent example is in the film Witness. Even though Detective John Book has fallen in love with the Amish widow Rachel, he knows that he would never fit in with her people. He gives his blessing to her union with his rival Daniel (an Amish man who has loved Rachel long before Book even arrived), knowing that in the long run he is the man who would make a better husband for her. An example of how affecting this trope is if written well.

Webcomics
  • Rumy in Fans! exemplifies this trope, having seemingly made it her life's mission to ensure that Rikk is happy with Alisin as a way of dealing with the fact that she's been hopelessly in love with him since before Rikk even knew Alisin's name. At the end of the strip, however, Alisin and Rikk care too much about Rumy to let her sacrifice her own happiness for them, and they convince her to join them in a three-way relationship, which works out well for all of them.
  • In El Goonish Shive, gay Justin is in love with straight Elliot, and isn't quite sure what to do about it. One strip shows Justin, after an inevitable Gender Bender (this is EGS, after all) looking at Elliot's girlfriend Sarah and thinking "How dare you be someone I can't dislike..."
  • Happens to Ping in Megatokyo, as she is programmed to help lonely young men gain confidence with women and support them in forming relationships. She briefly attempts to 'protect Piro from being hurt' and tries to convince him that a relationship with an android programmed to provide emotional support would be much safer, in the end however she is forced to stand aside for Kimiko.
  • In Namir Deiter, Twofer (Hispanic lesbian) Gabby tries to fix her best friend, main character Tipper Namir, up with her Jerk With A Heart Of Gold cousin, partially to ease the tension developed after Gabby confessed her feelings for Tipper and Tipper gently put her down. Resolved later when Gabby hooks up with a fellow Twofer art student (to whom she'd confided the previous situation).
    • And Gabby proceeds to go through it again , when she endures Jacinda's Anything That Moves attitude, before finally getting fed up with being taken for granted and breaking things off herself.
  • Occurs fairly early on in Questionable Content: Faye finally explains to Marten why she's been putting out such drastically mixed signals towards his romantic overtures and why she can't have a relationship with anyone right then, especially the kind Marten wants. She agrees to seek help for her issues, but only on the condition that Marten doesn't try to wait for her.
  • Torg has had a crush on Zoe for most of Sluggy Freelance, but he never tells her how he feels, and at one point even resolves never to speak to her again, because he's worried that Oasis (a crazy jealous, immortal assassin) will kill Zoe for getting between her and Torg. Currently, Torg is actively searching for a way to permanently stop Oasis, in part so that he and Zoe can finally be together.

ComicBooks
  • Zhantee in Elf Quest is hopelessly in love with Leetah even though she already has a lifemate, Cutter. When Zhantee develops the power to generate a protective shield he uses it on a number of occasions to save Leetah from attacks. The irony here is that the elves have open marriages and both Leetah and Cutter would have been happy to allow Zhantee into their relationship. Zhantee was just too shy to ask. Zhantee later dies in Cutter's arms during a human-elf conflict, and as he dies he shows Cutter a vision of the child that he and Leetah could have had.
  • David Qin in Strangers In Paradise realizes that Kathoo loves Francine more than she could ever love him, that he retreats to Japan. When Tambi tries to confront David concerning why he hasn't gotten Katchoo pregnant (in order to produce a family heir), he proposes that Tambi could carry this heir, on the condition that she leave Katchoo alone with Francine.
    • Tambi then proceeds to fall in love with him herself, but still wants him to be with Katchoo since it's her that he loves.

Music
  • The Beatles song "Anna" could be an example of this, with an engaged man breaking it off with his fiance Anna because another man loves her more. However, it could simply be that he's used to every woman he loves leaving him.
  • "You're in Love" by Wilson Phillips is definitely an example of this, though.

Mythology
  • Many tellings of the legend of King Arthur have him tolerate the love affair between his wife Guineviere and champion knight Lancelot because he loves them both too much to see them suffer.
  • Going back further, Emer and Fand both loved Cu Chulainn so much that they BOTH were willing to give him to the other.

Video Games

Western Animation
  • In ''Bender's Big Score'', Fry acts at first to disrupt Leela and Lars' budding relationship, because he is desperately in love with Leela himself. He eventually learns the trope lesson to a T, and goes so far as to reunite the two even after they've broken up on their own. Complicated because it turns out that Lars is Fry, a duplicate created by time travel that lived in the past for twelve years before having his hair burned, voice changed and freezing himself again.
  • Danny Phantom in one episode where after much struggling to accept Danny and Valerie together, Sam slowly and silently lets the two pursue their relationship. Lucky for her, Valerie breaks up with Danny before the relationship could even start, giving Sam a lucky pass.
  • In the Teen Titans episode "Things Change", Beast Boy encounters a Schoolgirl bearing a striking resemblence to his once petrified former girlfriend Terra. Eager to resume the relationship, he is met with considerable resistance on the part of the Schoolgirl when she repeatedly explains to Beast Boy that she does not wish to be associated with Terra, or Terra's bad deeds. Ultimately, Beast Boy realizes the strain he has put The Schoolgirl through when she explains that, though he may enjoy being a Titan, she just wants to be normal, and he leaves the Schoolgirl to enjoy a normal life, and attend to his responsibilities.
  • AndrAIa in Re Boot couldn't leave her game world with the boy she fell for (that would be Enzo, in case you can't tell), so she created a copy of herself and hid her on him in icon form, making this a rare example of a character conceding their beloved to their self.

Theater
  • Cyrano de Bergerac is about the original Cyrano helping the handsome Christian win the heart of the woman they both love, Roxane. He does this because Roxane is already fond of Christian (who's genuinely a decent guy, just lacking in wit), and Cyrano himself believes he's too ugly to ever have a chance with her. Unfortunately for them both, Roxane does fall in love with Christian, but only because of the words Cyrano gave him to use... She eventually learns the truth, but only after Christian has died in battle, and while Cyrano is dying from a mortal wound, denying it all.

Real Life
  • Interpretations vary, but Søren Kierkegaard basically did this to his fianceé Regine when he abandoned her. He went as far as to destroy his own public reputation so that people would think that she had broken up with him, that he was the problem. In the time they lived in, a man breaking off an engagement with a woman reflected really badly on the woman, and could ruin her reputation for years. Kierkegaard didn't want to see this happen to Regine. The emotional fallout became the backdrop for his writings about philosophy and religion.
  • This is actually a pretty common (and fairly painful) example of Truth In Television.
    • Damn right it is.
Is That Cute Kid Yours
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Its Not You Its My Enemies
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