how do you know when someone like or love you?

There are many facets to love and love has many dimensions. Many of us here might have been in love at one point of time. There might be still some who are still in love. I completely agree with you when you say that love is a strange thing. Strange as it is, it is simple as well. Love does not need anything. There are no such hard and fast rules to tell about if you are in love or not. But as you said, you have experienced love, so have I. And I can say from my experience that there are some things that you perceive or feel like doing (almost for nothing). The world suddenly seems to be a beautiful place to live in. You just cannot point fingers to anything in this world. You feel that there is all goodliness in this world and nothing bad can happen. You feel that the world has a lot to offer and your mindset at such times is strange too. The ghost of sacrific is mounted on your back ages ago and you become a non-materialistic entity. I would love to talk about these things in greater details still, but what I have experienced is that nothing is like what you or me feel when in love with someone. All comes back to square one when the building of love comes crashing down. The time after that seems very cruel. The world seemed to come to eat us. Nevertheless, that was of no use as one has to live with the same hurt deep inside. The philosophy to see the love and world changes and we - at least I - come to the conclusion that, love is nothing but just an illusion, though love has been compared with god. So, love is god or love is an illusion - the argument simply continues.

As for me,I will know a person likes me when they make an effort with me.Like coming to see me,calling me for no apparent reason,having a major interest in what is going on with me and all.