Heartbreak is a trauma for the system. The body and the system must go through a healing process in order to return to a state of wholeness. Trying to rush the process of healing after you experienced a breakup does not work.
BUT the heartache does not have to last forever - does not even have to last for a long time. The more proactive you are with your healing process, the faster it will go.
Why is it so painful to separate?
To love someone means to unite that person with oneself and enter into a state of emotional oneness. When you or the other person separate, you lose a part of yourself.
It is the death of something that is a part of you.
I will share with you what you can do when you experience heartbreak:
💛 TAKE IT SLOW
If the breakup was recent, if you are still in shock, take it slow. Live your life from minute to minute, from hour to hour, and take it day by day. You can extend that as time goes on and you feel capable.
When life collapses and we are in the midst of severe trauma, we should only live our lives in short increments.
Ask yourself:
〰 What would make me feel better for the next 5 minutes?
〰 What would feel like a relief to do within the next hour?
💛 TURN YOUR ATTENTION INWARD TO BECOME WHOLE AGAIN
Heartache is all-consuming and it's okay to let it be.
To get to the other side of something, sometimes we have to go right through it. We have to take the steps to feel ourselves again because we have lost ourselves. Part of becoming whole is to come back to yourself, to find yourself.
Ask yourself:
✔ Who am I?
✔ What do I want?
✔ What do I need?
✔ What changes do I want to make to my life?
Think back to a time when you were truly happy in an autonomous way in your life.
What things were you doing then?
Bring some of those things back into your life.
💛 CHANGE YOUR LIFE TO MAKE IT FEEL NEW. PUT AWAY, PACK AWAY, OR THROW AWAY MEMORIES
Often breakups also call for a fresh new start. It can be as drastic as moving to a new city, getting a new job - starting a whole new life. But it can also be something as simple as buying new furniture, redecorating, trying new recipes, or changing something about your appearance.
Change things that remind you of your loss (it's okay to remove gifts and any reminders). You don't have to throw them out, put them in a box and store them somewhere.
〰 Remove the things that remind you of the pain of the loss 〰
💛 CHANGE NEGATIVE BELIEFS
Constrained core beliefs may emerge as a result of this pain.
Things like:
I will never be able to trust again.
I can't make relationships work.
You have the power to control your thoughts.
Do not let limiting thoughts control you.
Byron Katie:
“I discovered that when I believed my thoughts I suffered,
but when I didn’t believe them I didn’t suffer and this is true for every human being. Freedom is as simple as that. I found that suffering is optional. I found a joy within me that has never disappeared, not for a single moment. That joy is in everyone, always. To question what you believe is an amazing gift to give yourself, and you can have it all the days of your life.“
〰 Don't believe everything you think 〰
Learn more about Byron Katie’s Method
💛 PEOPLE COME IN AND OUT OF OUR LIVES FOR A REASON
Stay open to the idea that they gave you some parts of the puzzle - your 'life puzzle', to understand and learn more about yourself, to get closer to who you are.
It is precisely the negative experiences that hold so many gifts for personal development. Allow yourself to open up to see what you have learned from this experience.
Looking for the positive things in your past relationship is a great way to understand the bigger picture.
Ask yourself:
〰 What is the lesson?
〰 What did they teach me?
〰 What is the growth for me behind this?
〰 What did they show me in this experience?
〰 Can I recognize a common thread from past relationships?
〰 What am I taking with me?
💛 ASK WHY?
Don't avoid asking why.
Don't be afraid to ask yourself why it happened.
It is actually crucial to ask why something happened. The understanding in fact will set us free. It is also important that we learn from each and every experience we have so that we do not repeat the same patterns and the same mistakes.
It is critical that we develop an awareness of the big picture. Even when we say we don't know why something happened, we almost always know why. We just don't admit it to ourselves because it's too painful.
An external person like a life & relationship coach, psychologist, or counselor can help identify the why.
💛 FIND COMMUNITY
Feel the support and the connection with other people in your life.
A breakup is so painful because it means the loss of a connection.
- Find connections in other ways
- Find a community
This is the perfect time to work on receiving energy. That will also help feel you are not alone, so anxiety is less likely to be triggered. You may not feel capable of connecting with people in a state of pain, but it will help you because you are suffering from the absence of someone. Having the presence of someone will help improve the situation.
When we experience a breakup, our self-esteem is usually extremely weakened.
We start telling ourselves the story:
There must be something wrong with us. If something wasn’t wrong with us this wouldn't have happened.
We need to focus on our strengths and the things that are worth connecting with.
The community/friends/family around us can help us realize that there is nothing wrong with us.
💛 VISUALIZE
Think about the best-case scenario!
When we experience a breakup we instantly spiral into the worst-case scenario because our lives are enduring a complete collapse.
Instead, we need to think about the best-case scenario. What would we be doing in our lives, say half a year or a year from now, who would we be with, and what new aspects would we see in our lives?
One door closes, and another will open.
Perhaps the door that has now opened will let in what you have actually always wanted.
NEW opportunities are coming your way.
〰 What do I want to attract into my life?
〰 How does that look like, how does it feel?
💛 FEEL YOUR FEELINGS - FEEL ALL OF THEM
A breakup can also be a precious time to learn to be more in touch with your feelings and to become more aware of yourself. If you don't unconsciously distract yourself (conscious distraction, on the other hand, can be used positively) the deep pain of a breakup can help you get more in touch with yourself.
It comes and goes in waves until it’s flushed out.
〰 Let yourself cry when you feel the urge to cry.
〰 Let yourself be angry when you feel angry.
Feel the feelings, feel all of them. They need to be noticed.
Once you allowed them to be there without pushing them away, they will vanish. If you don't allow them to be felt, they won't disappear, they will always loiter.
Crying is a detoxification of pent-up emotional energy.
Suppression is the opposite of healing.
Crying may feel embarrassing but it is important to get over the social stigma and let it out.
After a good cry, you will feel a shift within yourself, it helps to release pain. Perhaps a powerful scream or boxing all your frustrations in a pillow can release some of the intensity that needs to be felt.
💛 RELAX YOUR BODY
Relaxing the body relaxes the mind and relaxing the mind relaxes the body.
We can use this to our advantage because when we're in the middle of a breakup, we often can't relax our minds no matter what we try to do. So instead, we can try to relax our bodies.
Take the steps you can to put your body in a state of ease:
- Listen to relaxing music
- Get a massage
- Do yoga or exercise
- Meditate
- Paint or sculpt
- Do breathing exercises
- Take a bath, etc.
What can I do to make myself feel better, to uplift myself?
💛 MEDITATE DAILY
Meditation enables us to release our thoughts .. to let go of our thoughts so that our thoughts can stop. It gives us an extreme amount of relief. This is very important during a breakup.
It also allows us to connect with our source aspect and that allows us to see a larger perspective. The larger perspective, of course, is very important when we are living in a painful subjective reality.
When we meditate, we also come into a state of allowing, which is the most healing of all states.
💛 GRATITUDE JOURNAL
When we experience a breakup, the world turns black for us. We cannot see anything positive and fall into a spiral that throws us off balance. When we are in emotional pain it’s best to think small because the big things in our lives are not going so well right now.
✔ Force yourself first thing in the morning and last thing at night to write a full page of things you are grateful for.
We need to focus on the very little things that cause positive feelings in us.
Be honest, only write down things on your list that genuinely feel good to write down - not things you think you should put down because you think they should feel good right now.
If we do this before we go to bed, we will sleep better and wake up with the same vibration that we went to sleep with. When we wake up and do this, we set the stage for the rest of the day.
This is especially important when we are heartbroken because when we wake up, the heartbreak hits us and we spend the rest of the day trying to stay alive instead of living.
Write down:
〰 What are you grateful for?
〰 What brings you joy?
〰 What do you appreciate in this moment?
💛 WE NEED TO ALLOW OURSELVES TO GAIN CLOSURE
Write down and ask yourself:
〰 What do I need to find closure?
〰 What loose ends are preventing you from moving forward in your life?
Maybe you feel like you need to apologize.
Maybe you need to ask why.
Maybe you need to figure out how to avoid making the same mistake in the future.
Maybe you need to give away something you've been holding on to.
Maybe you need to hold a symbolic ceremony to cut the cords between you and your loss.
Rituals can help, they can be truly powerful.
Write a letter to the person you lost:
Write down ANYTHING you want to tell this person:
your pain, your feelings, your anger, experiences, what you have learned, what you have noticed/realized, etc. Let it all out, don't hold back!
Burn the letter, and let go of everything that was still holding you back from moving on.
Let go in LOVE and Gratitude.
There is always something we have learned from a connection.
💛 BE PATIENT
Recovering from a breakup takes time. It is ok to take your time.
Do not compare yourself with others. The time it takes is individual.
Allow yourself to go through all the stages of griefing. Rushing it will only backfire.
It's important to rest, relax, and go easy during this time. Meditate, go deep into yourself. Cocoon, rest, and go slow. Honor your feelings.
As the saying goes, 'if you're feeling it, you're healing it.
💛 KNOW YOU ARE ENOUGH
Every time you feel yourself looking outside your center, call yourself back. Remind yourself that you *know* you are enough. That you choose yourself, now and in every moment. That your worth does not depend on the attention or approval of others. That you are absolutely your own favorite person on earth.
💛 S M I L E
Going through a breakup is hard, exhausting, and tiring.
Even if you do not feel it all, give yourself a little smile.
Even if it is a fake smile, just do it and smile.
Our brain cannot distinguish between an authentic and an inauthentic smile.
A smile is a natural mood elevator. It will lift your mood.
〰 It's worth trying 〰
💛 PAY ATTENTION WHERE YOU PUT YOUR FOCUS
Focus on the positive things in your life!
Energy Flows Where Attention Goes!
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