You and your partner split up and, naturally, at first it seems like the end of the world. While some good relationships end for silly reasons, thus denying happiness to both parties, there is often good reason for a couple to go their separate ways. It is hard to see it when you are in the moment of heartbreak, but there are some important truths that you need to remember when a relationship goes south. This will ultimately help you get your life back together faster, and choose more wisely the next time around.
Breakups are sad, but inevitable. While it is easy to blame your ex, or even shoulder all the blame yourself, and mire yourself in a pit of misery, this does nothing to change reality or fix your future. There are important learning opportunities that arise when we experience emotional strife and turmoil, if we choose to take them.
Though it is not always easy to see when your heart is broken, read on for important truths that you need to hear after a breakup.
You Are Okay On Your Own
Even if you were with your partner for most of your life, you will be okay on your own. Your life will be different and different things may be required of you, but you will survive. This is a period of intense change and turmoil in your life and is an opportunity to show yourself just how strong you are.
You Might Have Been in a Destructive Relationship
We don’t often see things for what they are except in hindsight. This is also true about relationship choices. Often, after a breakup, you can look back and see that the relationship was doomed to failure as it was unhealthy. You may have been in an abusive relationship, or simply with someone you had little to nothing in common with.
Destructive relationships are not just physically abusive ones. Controlling partners, jealous partners, overly negative partners are just a few examples of people you are better off without.
You Need to Work On You
All relationship failures highlight areas of you that can stand to be worked on. In pretty much all cases, both parties are at least partially at fault for the failure of the relationship. Understanding what you did, how you acted, or might have contributed to the breakup can show you areas of your personality or life that could stand to be updated or otherwise improved.
None of us are perfect and there is always room for improvement. Failure to seize this is a missed development and learning opportunity that can help improve your chances for future happiness and relationship success.
It’s Going to Hurt, but You Don’t Have to Suffer
Even if the breakup was mutual, there is pain involved in the dissolution of a bond or relationship. It’s natural and okay to be sad about the end of a relationship. However, it must be stated that it is your choice to suffer as a result. There is a grieving process, but like any process it has a useful conclusion. Sometimes, we just enmesh ourselves in those feelings of grief and negativity. Rather than let them go and move on, we begin to define ourselves by the pain that we feel from a breakup. You do not have to let this happen. While it might not seem like it, you can choose not to.
Your Side of the Story is Just One Side
This is one of the hardest truths for us to see after a breakup. Yes, we have our side of the story – the way we see the relationship having been and how the breakup came to be – but it is important to see that this is just our side. No matter what led to the breakup, your ex has their own understanding of the relationship and what ultimately caused it to end. Their reality is valid too. Your version of the story is not the whole truth, it cannot be, it is clouded by emotion and the fact that you are not, well, you aren’t the other person too – you don’t control how they view the world or feel and likely, their picture of events will be different, even if just slightly.
Sure, at first it seems like you will never be happy again and that the world as you know it is ending, but that is not the case. Breakups are painful and hard, but they are part of the process of finding that person that we are truly meant to be with. In all reality, we can learn a lot about ourselves and others from breakups, if we choose to look for the lesson in such a situation.
Though it is hard to accept at first, you will be okay on your own. Your survival and sense of self should not be dependent on a significant other. When you are able to look at your relationship from the “outside” you might see a very different story than what you say when you were part of a couple. You might see that you were in an abuse, manipulative, or otherwise unhealthy relationship.
Even if the breakup wasn’t your fault, there is always room for self-improvement. Chances are, the breakup was not entirely the other person’s fault, regardless of what caused the split. Understanding your role in the problems and subsequent breakup can show you areas of your life that you can improve upon.
Yes, it hurts to experience a breakup, but you only have to suffer if you want to. It is okay to be sad, it is entirely different, however, to become defined by your sadness over a breakup. And finally, even though it is really tough to accept, you have to understand that your way of seeing the relationship and what led to the breakup is just one side. Your ex has a different side that is just as real and valid to them. It’s important that we keep this in mind.
