Breakups are usually sad, even when you know they’re for the best. Leaving someone you’ve invested your time, love, and energy into for months or even years can be heartbreaking, but you don’t have to let it destroy you. While it might seem easier to focus on the sad parts, with a little effort, here’s you can find the upsides of your new-found single status too:
- Remember that you’re not the first person to ever break up with someone. Not that you’re average or anything, but breaking up sort of is. Everyone who’s ever dated has gone through a breakup, and life tends to keep moving anyway, so you might as well keep moving with it.
- Commit the crappy parts of your relationship to memory. There’s no use trying to pretend that there weren’t serious issues in your relationship. If there weren’t, you’d still be together. Accept those issues for what they were: dealbreakers. Identifying them that way will help ensure that you don’t repeat the same mistakes in the future (or at least that’s the idea).
- Admit that he wasn’t right for you. Sure, there were plenty of things that were awesome about him — it’s not like he was a monster. But instead of clinging to his good qualities that reeled you in and made you fall for him in the first place, release the fear that you’ll never find another tall, funny, financially stable guy and think about the things about him that were just all wrong for you.
- Read as many cheesy self-help books and inspirational quotes as you need. How many times have you heard the quote, “Time heals all wounds” and maybe even rolled your eyes? Cheesy or not, it’s actually true. If you find something that speaks to your soul, by all means devour it, and then apply it over and over again until it works.
- Use your breakup to redefine what you want. Once you’ve determined what wasn’t working in the relationship, it’s time to celebrate the fact that those issues are actually glaring and very helpful clues about what you actually want from love. When you’re ready to get back out there, you’ll be better equipped to find guys who meet your standards.
- Get excited about the future. In the midst of a breakup, meeting someone new is probably the last thing on your mind, and that makes sense — you should definitely take time to process your last relationship before hopping into a new one. The upside, however, is that you will eventually meet someone new, someone that’s way better for you than the last guy, and you’ll get to experience all those wonderful firsts with him. Isn’t that something to look forward to?
