I don't believe the term YF should be aspirational. I believe it should be descriptive. It should describe the kind of relationship you actually have and not the kind you wish you had. Relationships do not exist only in the emotional or intellectual realm, they are not something that exists only in the minds of those involved in it. Relationships have a clear exterior component that is manifested in the physical world. You do not call someone your wife because you love her as you would a wife; you call her your wife because you are living life together as a married couple. If you loved her, she loved you, and you both aspired to marry but something was preventing you from doing so, you would not call her your wife based on your feelings alone, you would need to physically act out the requirements of a marriage relationship before you could rightfully claim it to be one. Until you do live out your desire, you don't call the person you love your bride, you might call her "the woman I wish to marry". Granted, the line is much clearer in a marriage because of the legal steps involved, but the concept is the same and applies to all relationships. You do not call someone you admire your mentor based on the fact you view him as someone to look up to even if he also views you as a younger version of himself whom he would love to mentor; only if he is actually mentoring you do you call him your mentor. No matter how much I admire Yo-Yo Ma, even if we were good friends and he also wished he had the time to teach me, if time and distance keeps him from actually teaching me it is improper to call him my teacher. I could call him a musician I greatly admire, I could call him an inspiration, I could call him many things, but I cannot rightfully call him my teacher. The point is that relationships are not only in your mind, they also require a certain exterior reality to be present in order for them to qualify as a relationship of a certain type.

Thus, I find it improper to refer to a boy as your YF based only on the feelings you have for each other. You could say you love him as a YF or you wish he were your YF, but unless the external relationship actually exists, unless you are actually hanging out just the two of you apart from that program to some degree, I think it's improper to call him a YF. Unless your relationship exists outside of the confines of the structured program you know him through, then chances are he isn't really your YF, he is your: scout, youth group member, bowling team partner, sunday school student, baseball team member, or whatever, whom you love as you would a yf.

I don't think it is easy to come up with a solid definition that truly encompasses every possible YF scenario, thus I am not even going to try. But I believe that a worthwhile definition must be based on more than just feelings, it must also be based on actions. Even if the feelings between you were the epitome of what a BL/YF relationship is all about, if you are only able to see him in connection with a certain activity, I would still only go as far as to call that boy "a boy who could've been my yf if only things had been different".