How to Move on From an Ex After a Breakup in Seven Steps

Love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation. ~ Khalil Gibran

How to Move on From an Ex After a Breakup in Seven Steps

You are probably wondering why you can’t move on from your ex after you have the breakup. Well, you really cannot really measure how much you love a person until it is time to say goodbye. Virtually everyone who has entered a relationship must have had the fear of separating, the fear of letting the bond go and starting all over without that person’s constant presence, without the touch, the words of assurance and the butterflies. This is when it is most hurting. But then, separation is unavoidable in any love affair, and by extension partnership. If a breakup doesn’t happen, death will surely sever the ties—cold but true. However, I will try to focus on the intentional withdrawal of affection, not death.

Ever broken a heart or been heartbroken? I am sure you must have gone through a terrible phase just after that moment. At least, one of you must have been in a really bad place. Waking up to the reality that the person that once gave you so much colours has moved that you are left with only black and white can really send your heart shattering like glass splinters. Sometimes, you find yourself shuttling between denial and acceptance. At some point, you accept the reality that the whole love affair has come to an end. At another point, you find yourself unconsciously denying the reality. You want to pick up your phone and call your ex, or text or just do anything to re-establish a contact. You delete their number and save it again. Sometimes, you catch yourself unconsciously stalking them. Everything ceases to make sense to you. You feel your whole life is crumbling, your head imploding, your eyes falling and heart cracking. Trust me, it’s a long dark alley. One you don’t wish to walk twice.

Well, you really do not have to stay hurting over a broken relationship. It does no good in the end. So, in this article, I will show you seven practical steps to move on from your ex after a heartbreak. Like I said earlier, it’s a long journey but this post serves to shorten it so that you can return to your glow as soon as possible.

[At this point, I should state that there is no universal formula to moving on from your ex but this post will help if you take it to heart. Oops! They just broke the heart. 😎]

1. ACCEPT THE REALITY OF WHAT JUST HAPPENED 

AS with grief, the first stage of every breakup is usually denial. Typically, it is easier for the person ending the relationship because they must have had enough time to process it and deal with the grief. However, for the person who is being broken up with, there is usually and overwhelming feeling of emptiness that comes as a rush. But first, you go through the stage of denial. Here, you do everything to fight the reality that has just set in. You feel it’s a joke coming off as a loop. This loop becomes longer and gradually, you begin to realise that it was all real from the beginning. This is when heartbreak takes its root. This is the point you make moving on difficult because you usually, at this time, device many means to re-establish contact and when your ex fills every space in your subconscious, you may spend the next few months or years trying to remove them.
Don’t deny it. Accept it. Deal with it. The longer it takes for you to agree that a breakup or divorce has happened, the longer it will take for you to go through the other stages of grief until the point of acceptance.
“He’s probably pulling my leg. He’ll come back tomorrow.”
“I guess she’s just having a rough day. When she’s calm, she’ll call and our love with be stronger.”
Avoid comments like these. They’ll make your denial phase much longer.

2. DON’T HOLD BACK THE SADNESS

Grieving after a breakup is very normal. You have just lost an important aspect of your life. If you ever feel the need to grieve, don’t hold back. Denying yourself of grief is lying to yourself. You will find healing later but just let the whole grief take its space. Holding back may be self-denial. It’ll always find its way back. So, do it now.

3. LOVE YOURSELF; BUILD MEMORIES AROUND YOURSELF AND OTHERS

You will most likely feel empty immediately and even long after a heartbreak. This is because, when people are in love, they tend to embrace the we-ness. They shut out a lot of other people to be with themselves. They have conversations together and do all the fun stuff couples do. This way, they are building memories. Research shows that memories are basically what sustain relationships. So, when there is a breakup, everything crashes and one begins to yearn for beautiful moments like one had in the past. This is a real thing.
So, one sure way of moving fast from an ex is creating memories outside of them. Before now, they’d usually profess love to you and validate your being. They’d discredit your self doubt and make you feel loved. When they go, they go with these. So, what should you do? Step in that space and do it better than they ever did. Take yourself out to fun sites. Go out with friends too. Tell yourself good things. Remind yourself of how beautiful you are and how you don’t need a partner to feel complete. If you’re at peace and in love with yourself, you’ll heal faster.
You can also recite some words of affirmationYou can also recite some words of affirmation.

4. AVOID REBOUND RELATIONSHIP

 

WHILE the goal is to move on within the shortest possible time, it is important that one knows that being too fast could be dangerous. Yes, there is no exact duration for healing. Some people take weeks, others years but one must do all to avoid getting into rebound relationships. It can make you continually dissatisfied and eventually bring you back to the spot you were running from, that way, you’ll be forced to start from scratch. But what is rebound relationship? It is a relationship one enters immediately after the end of a romantic relationship with a partner with whom one shared so much bond. Sometimes, people enter rebound relationships to fill voids but truthfully, these voids only need to be managed, not filled in a hurry. You may end up comparing your current partner to your ex and widening the void in your heart. Click to learn more about rebounds.

5. GET BUSY

Hit the gym. Go out more. Read books, watch films, engage in more activities. Remember you’re trying to fight emptiness. You need loads of activities to fill up the spaces and suppress those depressing thoughts

6. TALK ABOUT IT; DON’T SHUT IT UP

Hiding a breakup is usually an indication of false hope that your partner would return. That’s sheer denial. Sometimes, it is a result of fear of what people will say. You may be making a mistake by sucking it all up. First, it makes people assume that all is well and this conditions you to act accordingly, thereby retaining some behavioural patterns of someone still in a romantic relationship. This makes healing really slow and I’m sure you don’t want this. Hiding it will mean always trying to get back and the constant refusal from them may drive you insane. Please, talk.

7. CONSIDER YOUR SELF-WORTH

If your breakup is definite, you may not stand any chance of resurrecting it. Constantly going back may trigger a drop in your esteem. If they keep saying no, you’ll begin to feel incomplete. This could trigger a lot of mental health issues. No, that isn’t good for you. If you truly value your mental health, take a break. Don’t even try to keep being friends. Burn all the bridges. Maybe in the future, you’ll get back as just friends but in the meantime, burn the bridges and save yourself of self-sabotage.
Before your partner came, you were living just fine.

In conclusion, I must say that there is no magic that can make you move faster or thrust healing on you. There is also no timeline for healing. But if you desire to make it happen in the shortest possible time, you should try these steps. They will surely help. Remember, I love you. 

If you want to have any further conversation, reach me on [email protected]