Things To Know When Moving On From an Ex That Broke Your Heart.
If you’re fresh out of a relationship with someone who broke your heart, the process of moving on can feel daunting and impossible.
You might even be tempted to try to get back together with your ex.
But no matter how tempted you are to rekindle that lost love, you shouldn’t do it.
If you take time to understand why your relationship ended, it will make it easier for you to move on.
While many people stay friends with their exes, it’s complicated and requires a certain maturity level that some people don’t have.
Being friends with an ex is only possible if both people are equally as invested in the friendship as they were in the relationship.
Whether you want to be friends or not, moving on is a necessary step if they broke your heart.
So how do you move on? Here are 12 tips to help you recover from a breakup and heal a broken heart:
Table of Contents
12 Things To Know When Moving On From an Ex That Broke Your Heart.
1. Give yourself some time to heal.
Getting over a broken heart doesn’t have to be the hardest thing ever. Moving on when you’re still in love can be tough, but there are steps you can take to become whole again.
Give yourself some time to heal.
Don’t try to get over your ex right away; it takes time.
Try new things and focus on improving yourself, not just for your ex, but for you.
This will also help you feel better about yourself and give you more confidence.
Don’t mope around all the time; enjoy life!
Doing things that make you happy can distract your mind from thinking about your ex and the breakup — this is known as the “distraction method”.
Going out with friends, playing video games or going to the gym will keep your mind off of them for a little while.
If nothing seems fun anymore and you feel like everything reminds you of them, it might be a good idea to talk with someone who knows how.
2. Let out the pain and anger.
Everything has its time and place, including grief.
Your heart needs to feel the pain in order to move on from it.
“When you are angry, sad, or hurt, that is a message from yourself to yourself that something is not right. It’s a healthy emotion,” says Dr. Ramani Durvasula, PhD, licensed clinical psychologist and professor of psychology at California State University, Los Angeles.
Allow yourself to cry if you need to. “The pain will not kill you,” she says.
“Try not to suppress your emotions,” advises Dr Helen Odessky, PsyD, licensed clinical psychologist and author of Stop Anxiety From Stopping You.
“It’s OK to be sad or angry after a breakup.”
She says many people try to numb those feelings with alcohol or other substances or by trying to easily distract themselves with constant activity.
But that only keeps you stuck in the past and prevents you from healing and moving forward.
When you’re in pain, it’s good to let it out. It’s cathartic. Your brain gets a bit of a break from processing the emotion because it is being expelled from your body.
Here are a few ways to do that:
Talk to a friend or family member who understands your situation and will listen without judgment (and maybe even offer some comforting advice).
Head to a boxing gym and beat the crap out of a punching bag.
Scream into your pillow.
Write about it in a journal.
Get counselling, either on your own or with your partner (if you choose to try and work things out).
4. Don’t ignore the negativity.
When you’re thinking about the good times, it’s easy to only see what you want to see, right? Maybe you even convince yourself that everything was perfect.
But the truth is your ex probably wasn’t all that great of a person. Why else would the two of you have broken up?
It can really help you move on if you can remember that. Did he not want to commit to you? Did she cheat on you? Did they lie to you? Did they make promises they never fulfilled? There are many reasons why relationships end, but one thing is common: It’s not because we do something wrong.
Sure, maybe we could have been better or done things differently.
But no matter what, our exes did us wrong too. Don’t ignore the negativity.
It will help in the long run when your ex becomes a distant memory and no longer has any effect on your life.
5. Take care of yourself.
You need to take care of yourself because you’re probably pretty low on self-esteem after being dumped.
Your body and soul need nourishment, so take care of both.
Eat well, get a little exercise (even if it’s just walking to the store or taking the stairs instead of the elevator), get enough sleep, go to the doctor and dentist regularly, drink plenty of water, and engage in regular hygiene routines. Looking and feeling good is important to raising your self-esteem.
The problem is that heartbreak can be so overwhelming.
It’s not just about getting over the person you loved, but also about getting over the dreams you had for your future.
Your dreams of a happily ever after with this person are shattered.
You have to grieve the loss of your relationship and all those hopes and dreams before you can move on.
You have to get to a place where the pain no longer feels like it’s going to kill you and where you can think clearly again.
This can take time — time that is best-spent healing, not rushing into another relationship or trying to forget the past by partying or acting out.
The more self-care you do right now, the healthier and more resilient you’ll be when you start dating again. So don’t skimp on this part.
Someday, when you’re ready to date again, remember that there is plenty of fish in the sea.
There are people out there who are much more compatible with you than your ex was and will treat you much better.
You deserve to be happy and find someone who truly appreciates what an amazing catch you are!
6. Distract your mind from thinking about them.
Getting over someone you love can be so hard that you may need to do things to distract your mind from thinking about them every single day.
You may be thinking, “Hey, I’m a big girl, I should be able to handle this.” And you’re right!
But let’s be honest with ourselves, when you love someone enough to consider them your forever person, it hurts like hell when they’re gone.
It hurts like hell when you have to get used to living without the person who was such a huge part of your life for so long.
You have to learn how to get over someone you love.
But getting over someone you love doesn’t happen overnight.
And it isn’t as easy as going out every weekend, meeting someone new and then suddenly forgetting all about them.
No matter how many drinks you have or how many times you go home with a new guy, nothing will change the fact that the one person who matters most is still not there.
If you’re having trouble getting over someone you love, try these things to distract yourself from thinking about them.
- Get busy.
If you like having a lot of time on your hands, then it’s time to change that.
Whether it’s doing more work or taking up a new hobby, do things that will keep you busy so that you don’t have the time to think about your ex.
- Change your routine.
Changing your routine is another way to forget about them as it will help prevent you from being reminded of them every day.
If they were part of your daily routine before, try changing the times and places where you do certain things so that being reminded of them becomes less frequent.
For example, if you always watch TV at home after work, try watching it in a coffee shop instead so that being at home won’t remind you of them.
If they used to be someone you hang out with every weekend, make plans with friends on weekends so that you won’t have time to be alone with your thoughts and miss them.
- Spend time with friends and family members who love and care about you.
It may be tempting to wallow in self-pity for a bit, but this is the time to surround yourself with friends and loved ones.
Do something fun and take a vacation.
Face your fears and try new things to rebuild your confidence.
And get back out there if you can: the dating scene really makes you see what you’re worth, and having options will reignite that fire that got you here in the first place.
If you aren’t ready to date, that’s totally ok.
There are lots of other ways you can find happiness again after a breakup.
Do something you’ve always wanted to do but were afraid of, like skydiving.
See a movie with your best friend or go on a road trip and explore a new city.
8. Make a list of things you love about yourself.
The first step is to make a list of things you love about yourself. If you have trouble thinking of anything, get your friends and family involved. What are the things that you like about yourself? Don’t just focus on your physical appearance. Think about the traits that describe who you are as a person!
For example, I love my sense of humour. My friends tell me that I’m funny and quick-witted, and it’s always nice to make someone laugh or smile!
Once you have your list, refer back to it whenever you’re feeling down, or maybe even post it in your room somewhere where you can see it every day!
Your mom is right.
You should love yourself just the way you are!
Start by remembering the best parts of you and what you love most about yourself.
Even though you might not have heard it in a while, there are lots of things to love!
You’re funny, smart, kind, and beautiful. Maybe even talented at dancing or playing an instrument.
Use the list you made to remember those things, and focus on positive thoughts during the day.
If your friends or family joined in, ask them for support when things are tough. Positive affirmations and reminders from people who love you can make a huge difference!
9. Be committed to yourself and your own happiness.
Do not waste your time trying to change someone else. You cannot change anyone but yourself.
The first thing to know is that time truly does heal all wounds.
Be committed to yourself and your own happiness and you will find your way through it.
The next thing to know is that there is no one size fits all answer for getting over a heartbreak, everyone has their own process, but here are a few things I put into practice to help me move on from a broken heart.
Get out there and do the things that make you happy as often as possible.
Do things that put you in the company of other people and see how good life can be without the person who broke your heart.
Do not wallow in sadness; you will get stuck there if you do so.
It can be hard not to, but I would encourage you to try not to isolate yourself and focus on the positive aspects of being single instead of the negative, because focusing on the positive will ultimately help you feel better faster, whereas focusing on the negative will keep you stuck in sadness longer than necessary.
Do not waste your time trying to change someone else. You cannot change anyone but yourself.
Learn what lessons you can from this experience and do not repeat them moving forward.
Try not to replay it over in your mind, but if you do, try to remember that
10. Note the mistakes that ended the relationship.
Take a good hard look at why things ended and make an effort to understand what happened, so you don’t repeat the same mistakes in future relationships.
It’s never easy to get over an ex who broke your heart. I’ve been there, and it’s a long, painful process. But what gets me through?
Take a good hard look at why things ended and make an effort to understand what happened, so I don’t repeat the same mistakes in future relationships.
I’m not saying you have to learn every lesson right away, or that you have to do it all on your own. After all, we are human—we make mistakes.
And while you can’t change the past, you can use it as a tool to make better choices in the future.
11. Accept that loving someone cannot change them.
Accept that there are some people you can’t love enough to keep them, no matter how much you want to or have tried to.
Life is rarely fair, but the sooner you accept that the sooner you’ll be able to move on from the person who broke your heart.
So what does it mean to accept that? It means knowing that there is no magic formula for keeping a relationship together, and believing for sure that it’s not your fault when a relationship ends.
If someone tells you otherwise, they are flat-out lying. How do I know this? Because I’ve been there.
When my boyfriend of two years dumped me in college, I took it as a personal failure.
I racked my brain to figure out what I did wrong and how I could have done better.
That led me to believe that if I had just tried harder, he would have stayed.
I was so wrong.
The truth is, you can never love someone enough to make them stay.
That’s a decision they have to make on their own, and if they don’t choose you, then there is nothing more you can do except move on with your life (and with your heart intact).
12. Let go of the Past.
Let go of the past, it’s over and done with now, do not dwell on it every single day, use the past as a lesson and move on with your life.
Sometimes it can be hard to know what to do when you’ve been through a breakup.
You may feel like you’re not going to be able to move on, or that your heart will never heal.
It’s important to know that you’re going to get through this! People all over the world survive breakups every single day, and you will too.
The first thing you should do is stop dwelling on what happened in the past.
The past has happened already and it cannot be changed, so don’t spend your days feeling sad about it.
Instead, use the past as a lesson and take away any lessons you learned from it.
Doing this will allow you to move on with your life instead of staying stuck in the past.
Once you have chosen to let go of the past and moved on with your life, it’s time to focus on improving yourself as a person.
Think about what qualities you admire in yourself and other people, then work on becoming more like those qualities yourself.
For example, if you admire someone who is kind to others then make an effort to be more kind in your everyday life.
Stop looking back all the time, what is over is over and looking back will not help you move forwards, it will only make you feel bad about yourself and this will stop you from moving on with your life in a positive way.
You spend most of your time looking over your shoulder. You can’t stop thinking about your ex.
What they’re doing, what they’re thinking, and why they left you.
You may not realize it, but this mindset is keeping you from moving on with your life. It’s keeping you from being happy again.
Takeaway:
You won’t forget the relationship, but you will be able to move on from it and feel better in the process.
While you’re healing from this breakup, you may want to check out these posts:
How To Overcome Low Self Esteem
7 Habits of Highly Smart Women
Don’t forget to follow me on Instagram or send me an email here if there’s anything you’d like to talk about.