By Clayton Olson
Learning how to move on after a breakup is hard.
How long does it take to get over a breakup, anyway? If getting over someone was as easy as getting under someone else, we’d be fine. Instead, it’s time-consuming and enough to make us wonder if asexual creatures actually have the right idea.
Still, getting over a breakup isn’t impossible. Millions of people do it every day (and perhaps you’ve done it before as well). Yet realizing a few truths helps make the process not only easier but more productive, too.
First of all, learning how to move on is more than learning how to stop pining for your lost love.
It’s also about learning what you may unconsciously be holding onto, and how this grip is stopping you from becoming complete — something you must be, in order to 1) fully move on or 2) reconcile with your ex-flame.
Many times, when we are stuck in a state of suffering, we’re stuck in a place of feeling sorry for ourselves or feeling helpless and hopeless.
That’s because we possess a set of foundational beliefs that guide us. And often they guide us in the wrong direction.
But when you change these beliefs, you arm yourself with the power to change yourself, as well. You discard these beliefs for the truths that lie beneath them.
So, exactly what are these beliefs that are worthy of re-examining? They include the following.
Here are 3 lies we tell ourselves after a breakup that makes the pain even worse:
1. “I can’t afford to take another 30 or 45 years to find another person who is just as good. I don’t have it in me.”
On the surface, this belief already seems like an exaggeration. Odds are, it didn’t take you 30 years to find your first love — unless you started dating in utero.
Instead, it took you that long to gain the emotional maturity to be ready for a relationship. Now that you’ve gained it, it’s not going anywhere.
Creating a new relationship that is better than the old one is going to be much easier because you’ll be standing on the shoulders of the previous ones.
2. “My ex must not have ever really loved me, this relationship must not have meant anything to them.”
Another common belief among those hoping to learn how to get over a breakup is that their relationship was a farce.
But, odds are, anyone who stayed with you did, in fact, love you; why would they have stuck around, otherwise?
Rarely does a relationship end because there was no love involved; instead, it ends because there was a mismatch in values or a deep breakdown in communication. On the off chance that the relationship truly didn’t mean anything to them, then that’s their loss.
Better to know it meant something to you and that the time was not wasted.
3. “We had the perfect relationship.”
If the relationship was perfect, it’d still exist and you wouldn’t be reading this article.
It’s not that it was perfect, it’s that now that it’s gone, you’re only remembering the most wonderful parts of it. In short, you’re not seeing the full picture, just the highlight reel.
This isn’t worth holding onto because it can set you up to only pursue “perfect” relationships in the future when, in reality, there’s no such thing.
Realize that if the relationship ended, it had to end. If one person is miserable enough in the relationship to end it, they’re doing both parties a favor in the long run.
Clayton Olson is an International Relationship Coach, Master NLP Practitioner, and Facilitator who delivers private virtual coaching sessions and leads online group workshops.
This article was originally published at The Mind’s Journal. Reprinted with permission from the author.
