“What they have now they can never have back again. But for her the pain of loneliness will be nothing to the pain she used to feel, of being unworthy. He brought her goodness like a gift and now it belongs to her.”
When you go through a breakup, no matter how easy you think it would be to remove the love you have for the other person, that will not happen. It never will. And you know this, you know that is not something you would ever want — all you want is to stop feeling like this.
The love will always be there. Despite the ache, despite the hurt, despite it all, it will always be there. And what a beautiful thing it is, to know you have such love. To love and have felt love will never be a waste.
The love goes within yourself, too. You have to put it inside you. You have to learn to forgive yourself, forgive them, for everything that did not happen. For everything that did happen.
The absence of love is not loss. Nothing is lost.
Love can be letting go, even when you try to fight it at first. Ultimate love is letting go. The only thing you can control is yourself — especially your thoughts and your actions. You cannot control the other person, and why would you want to?
So, let go. To let go, you have to feel. You have to feel the way your heart is reeling at the absence of them, you have to let the emotions pass, and you will get to the point of understanding. This is not a punishment, not a lesson, but a reflection.
Time really does heal, which is the worst thing to hear after a breakup. But, you really do have to give yourself time to process. You have to use this time for you. If you put your mental energy toward wondering — wondering when did it go wrong, how did this happen, what could I have done differently, don’t leave me, don’t leave me, am I that easy to leave? You say you love me still, so why aren’t you here? — you will be right back where they left you. All those thoughts are just coping mechanisms because you don’t want to face anything else. You know better. Those thoughts are superficial.
The past does not necessarily define the present. You can decide how you let it affect you. The past exists inside your mind — inside their mind — so please give it justice and understand that you both did what was right at the time. It could’ve been different, but it wasn’t, and all there is left to do is to keep growing. Do not get stuck in the past. Dwelling on the negatives is a cyclical curse that you should never go through again. Even reflecting on beautiful memories can be painful, but you know nothing can take that away from you. Let it be beautiful, still. Everything from this point on can be just as good, and yes we will never be there again, but thank god we will never be there again because that means there is growth, there is something better that is forming. That means it meant something.
Have boundaries, for your own sake. When you go on their social media accounts, what do you hope to see? Have you ever been close to finding it? You know the answer.
Nothing will change if you don’t change. You are allowed to feel hurt, while still acknowledging where you hurt them. It’d be easy to blame them fully, but that’s not how this works. Sometimes there is no blame. Sometimes the blame is shared. This is how you know it is love: you know you two are so much better than petty emotions. You may still be hurt by some things even now — you are still human, after all — but that does not negate any progress you make. Multiple things can exist at once.
In this situation, you have to understand you are not a victim waiting to be saved. Victimhood isn’t a good look on you. You are so much more than that — the relationship was so much more than that. You have to fight the urge to keep thinking: I was good but it wasn’t enough, don’t look at me like I’m you friend, look at me like I’m fucking worth more. Yes, you are so much more. It was enough. They don’t see you as a friend. Did they tell you that? Stop believing the lies you feed yourself — you know this isn’t so black and white. Sometimes it just can’t be. Right now or never again, that is not up to solely you. You gave them so much love just as they gave it back equally. By the end of the relationship, you knew something had to change, and yes they made that decision for you, but you can see why now and you are so grateful for that. You are not a lesson, the one that got away, or anything of the like — you are a person. Just that.
You will be so much better than you could ever believe. This is your first relationship, and way before you got into a relationship, you deemed yourself unlovable and repressed, and you were so tired of yourself and frankly you were so lost inside your head that you forgot how to live. You now know the opposite through this relationship and through your own personal growth. All that love is pure.
People do change because you have changed.
“They’ve done a lot good for each other. Really, she thinks, really. People can really change one another.”
XOXO
