Maybe you just went through a devastating breakup. Maybe you just got rejected by someone that you really care for. Maybe you just saw that special someone on Tinder and realized that they’re looking for people that aren’t you. Whatever it is, you’ve got a broken heart, and you can feel it withering away inside of you. You can feel the pain daily, knowing that there is a disconnect between you and the other person, one that you wish so much wasn’t there. And just when you feel like you’re recovering, that you’ve got some sense of balance in your life, something (a song, a name) reminds you of that broken thing inside of you: Your wild, loving heart. Some people, it seems, are just not wired the way you are. Love, emotions, and rejections: those things just don’t seem to faze them. You might envy those people. You might swear to yourself that you’re gonna be more cold, more heartless in the future. “Love, I don’t need it.” You repeat. Yet you dream about love when you lay in your bed. You long to be held, to be cherished by someone. You admit to yourself that there is no feeling like being loved. How do you live with this broken thing, this heart that wants so desperately to love and be loved? The first step is affirming that it’s okay to feel how you feel. No matter what your status or role in this world is, you have a right to your feelings. It’s not stupid or foolish to love another person. It happens all the time, and it’s beautiful even if they don’t return your love. Admit to yourself that you feel something that is completely natural and wonderful, and then let yourself cry about it. Just because you feel pain about this relationship doesn’t make you a weaker person, or a loser. In fact, feelings are in many ways what makes us human. The second step is to find an outlet. There’s a reason that many emotional people are also artistically inclined. Art is a great way to redirect your feelings towards something productive. Even if you don’t have any skills, you can draw a picture, write a poem, or make a necklace. There are all sorts of way to practice art or build a skill. Just do something that will get your hands moving and your mind working. That could even consist of doing a crossword in a coffee shop or taking a pottery class once a week. Personally, I play my guitar and try to let my emotions spill out into the song. The process can be quite messy and chaotic, but it feels cathartic, like something locked up inside of me is being released out into the world. It’s not a fix-all, but it helps. The third step is to realize that we’re all struggling with some sort of broken heart. “Life is pain. Anyone who says differently is selling something.”
“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about.”
That means be kind to yourself as well. Be kind to yourself and others in equal measure. Life is a struggle. It always has been, for everyone. Once you recognize that, maybe you can build a little perspective on your own struggles in the midst of the world. It doesn’t make the pain any less real, but it can help put it a bigger context. That leads us to the fourth step for living with a broken heart. Find ways to mend your broken heart, little by little. Do we ever really get over a broken heart? Every time I think that my broken heart is finally healed, someone else comes to break it up all over again. It’s like there are little cracks in our heart, and some people know how to get inside and just burst into a thousand little pieces. Then we spend all this time piecing ourselves back together. We slowly stop obsessing. We get track of our thoughts and rediscover the joy we get out of life. We eat well again, laugh again, and find ways to lose in the moment. It makes you wonder, though: is this going to happen over and over again? Possibly. Maybe there is no getting over a broken heart. Life is heartbreaking in so many little ways that it’s impossible to know what’s going to get you down. It’s not a perfect road, but it’s one you can walk down with courage. It’s not that things won’t hurt you anymore. It’s that you’ll be prepared for the devastating, heartbreaking, wild experience that is being human. You’ll be prepared to risk it, because what’s the point of getting up in the morning if you’re not ready to give life your best try? None us get out of this without a broken heart. None of us get out of this alive. I’ll leave you with a few lines from Max Ehrmann’s Desiderata: You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Wesley OwensI write about love, life, and all the things in between. Archives
April 2022
Categories |