When what you never imagined, happens (How to take a bad break up / let it go)

Human relationships are so complex. And yet so simple. They can blossom with a word and be broken by another.

Even when there's a big hoo-ha about all the positivity and the goodness in the world, I find myself talking about the complexities. The sad stuff, sometimes the negative stuff. Some of my posts talk about how to deal with challenging situations, with difficulty, and still motivate us to move on. They talk about letting go of difficult relationships, moving on from breakups.
I was mulling over why I'm focusing on the not-so-flowery stuff in my writing when my sis told me that it's actually alright to talk about how to get to the other side of sorrow. Across.

Hmm.
We all experience it.
We deal with it by avoiding it and occupying ourselves with work and/or (unfortunately for some-) addiction.
Or by sinking into its depth and becoming incapable of being happy, but never really experiencing, learning and getting out of it.

Some of us are so unknowingly wounded by these demanding situations that we never grow out of it.
It becomes a painful part of our personality, changing the way we perceive relationships, marriages and love for the worse, when infact, everyone deserves the happiness of new love and new lovers.

Experiencing a personally challenging journey is adventurous. It prepares you for the best, because experience is such a good thing. Good and bad experiences both, count.

It's okay to make that mistake. 
It's really okay to be in a break up. A bad one. They happen all the time. It's okay to be in a relationship that falls apart, and have all your plans fail and just fall. Flat out on your face. Because nothing is more liberating than accepting that it's over and moving on.
It's okay to know what it's like to feel pain and heartbreak, and admit to it. You don't need to pretend like it didn't touch you, or you were the lesser hurt one out of the two. It's really okay if you don't have it together all the time. Many people do not know how to let their emotions out healthily. Crying, falling apart and arguing are absolutely healthy ways of letting out negative emotion, and it must come out because it exists. After all, where can a river flow from if there's no water at the source, and why should it stop flowing if there is ?

What people say or think, worries us.
On so many occasions.
If they say it's okay to laugh, smile and be happy, then you should be asking those people why they spurn so much at you when you don't have it together. Why do they pressure you so much to get a grip ?
The truth is, it doesn't matter. They don't matter. Those people who tell you how you should be, what your problem is, they don't even matter.

(picture credit : weheartit.com)

What really matters is you.
Your personal growth through a difficult situation is so, so important. You are you, and you have all the right to deal with your emotions the way you see fit for your betterment.
Don't be okay with people who take your feelings for granted, and at the same time don't regret it when things don't go your way. That, will make you a stronger person who will be with someone as complete and sorted as you are, and more capable of loving you and seeing the lovely person that you are. After all, they have to be and feel like they are worthy of your wonderful love too. Remember that.

It is impossible that only one person, a single situation or circumstance could make us happy, or be the love of our lives.
Babe, you're mortal. There must be many more ways, and there are. Know that if one road hasn't worked out for any reason, the other door that has always been open has been waiting for you and calling out to you. Just make sure your eyes are open to see that road that waited for you to turn up, so you could give it your first chance.

I've been in these shoes.
As much as I've experienced the beauty of being in love, doing and receiving nice things from the men I've been with, I really do know what it's like to be sad in it, to cry, to feel hurt, to feel let down, to have my expectations crash and be let go of, nowhere, on the middle of the road. I know how a bad, bad break up with someone you love feels. Awful.

As a teenager, I was in a bad break up. I didn't know if I'd ever be the same again, but I remember just distracting my way out of it. I went out with friends, watched movies, went dancing, took walks everyday, worked on my fitness and I was back to my happy self in no time. Yep, I was low and it felt like it would never end. But that's never the story.
It's all a matter of time before you realize your worth.

(Picture credit : simpleremiders.com)

I know, it doesn't feel alright, when what you're sharing with someone special is watered down to a "nothing" of sorts by someone who isn't prepared to take on the responsibility of what they got into. That's their choice.

Your choice is to let it go.
Your choice is NOT anger or resentment or hatred. Let it go. Just accepting that it's over makes it so so easy. (trust me on this one)

(Picture credit : Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love)

Just have plain love for yourself. I know, this sounds so, so irritating and wrong and impossible right now. But decide and know, that you were always worth the best and you need not ever settle for less. Your priority is you. It's just about peacefully letting go and finding your life back. It's really a part of the growth curve. The situations you attract into your life are always for your betterment if you seek them out.

You are not required to go about like everyone else, testing the waters and absolutely being sure that the other person is more invested than you, just so you feel safe and in control.
You are not required to play defensive and try to control a new relationship by being unwilling to invest emotions, just because your last relationship didn't go right.
Don't jump into a fling. Don't do any of these things. Just concentrate on yourself right now. You need yourself, your identity and your happiness.

You're very very precious, darling, and fully deserving of love as all human beings are, and when you build your walls to every new person and experience, you're only blocking out the good that is coming to you. Don't ever avoid a situation to feel good, you just get in again, but wiser, and more learned with the next new person. The correct relationship will respect you and give you what you deserve.

Eat well. Get some protein. Have fruit, plenty of water, get sunshine, exercise and rest. Go to a spa, get a pedicure or a foot rub. Dress well. Go out on walks. Make tea, make coffee. Read comic books. Talk to someone. Breathe. It's not the end, is it ? Look around you !

Human relationships are volatile. They require effort to stay grounded. Now it also matters that the other person makes that effort, not just you.
Be grounded. Be your own rock. Let go of the people who cannot love you the way you are. Open your palm, let go of them with peace. Take your passions along with you and in no time, you'll have your kickass life and the happiness you want. Just because you can't see the light at the end of the tunnel, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It exists and believe me, I've seen it so recently, and it's very easy if you trust it. You'll be there before you know it, and you've my promise.

Take therapy.
For those that do not stay around family or have friends close by, go see a counselor. It isn't glamourous, but this is so, so essential if you want to talk to someone and your family and friends aren't enough. It is not crazy, it's not weird. Everyone goes through stuff, and the idea is to get you back on solid ground, doesn't matter how.

I'm not joking about this for one second.

If you really, really need help and you feel like talking to someone or sharing how you feel with someone, you think you cannot find that help elsewhere, email me.

I mean it. Just click on the link and share with me whatever it is that bothers you about the breakup. I'm here to listen. And I will, I promise.

Much, much love and wishing you healing !

Aarthi

tea talk

pretty wired up i feel.

there are many people, who have come along in these 22 years

who have shown me who i am, what i'm capable of, who have changed my life for better, not for worse.

some i've grown up with, some i've disagreed with, some i've loved.. some great people and some, incompetent people.

stability is pretty much a dream. there is nothing such as stability since everything, i believe, is volatile. our thoughts, our actions and our desires.

this year, things have changed tremendously.

my closest friend and sister has found, in a friend, the man worth committing to, for a lifetime.

parents are preparing to see that little girl grow up and be in the shoes that they were in, 26 years ago.

i'm in my final move of completing the first step towards my dream.

one of my best friends and mentor, is changing job, experimentally. just like a kid. just because he fancies it.

my few close, precious people are branching out into different futures.

i've found a soul sister.

i've found love.

change is changing me.

now.

41° 39' 50" North / 83° 33' 19" West

her longing was his..
his wish, hers
he is the earth, and she is the sky
they're both infinite..
they were as far as up and down
but they met over the horizon

like a dew drop on a cold morning grass
as unique and separate as the dew drop and the leaf
and as together as anything could be
that's how they are.

in that space between them,
love emerged.

they're one.

the eyes of the beholder

I've come across just too many dramatic statements by famous authors and intellects, that don't really define beauty.
They just come along, one after another and confuse the heck out of you and me, till we drop this excellent idea of wanting to pursue the real meaning of beauty.

Marie Stopes said : ''You can take no credit for beauty at sixteen. But if you are beautiful at sixty, it will be your soul's own doing''
Awestruck.
what truth !

but then Jean Kerr popped up and slipped another quote in : "I'm tired of all this nonsense about beauty being only skin-deep. That's deep enough. What do you want - an adorable pancreas?"
Laughter. No arguments.
What truth, again.

And of course, like you, i too have come across a lot of scoop on how beauty is brain and vice-versa. That concept has never failed to impress me or make me think. Yet, i wonder why that connecting word 'is' is actually there between two words like beauty and brain which can be independently appreciated. It's an extraneous connection.
I personally have always been of the opinion that beauty is of little importance without intellect.
But bad genes, my dear, are bad genes. Intellect is no consolation for that.

Einstein wasn't the best looking man on the planet, but he was definitely one of the most intelligent. Point noted, Your Honour. We all want to be the smart ones.
Yet, in this world where people are criticizing external beauty so ruthlessly and so many of us seem to disregard it with apparent unimportance....
why does each one of us, no matter how minimally, still want to contribute to better physical appearance and grooming ? here's the truth : beauty may be skin deep, but it bothers us to the core.

Beauty is skin deep. YES. is there a problem ?
Alright, let it be skin deep. However deep it is, it's only the skin that shows it.
So wouldn't it be rather stupid to have that beauty all the way down to your flesh?

And then, for those of us who go around arguing about whether beauty is inner beauty or is it just limited to what we look like...
let's make things simpler for ourselves. there are different kinds of beauty.
physical beauty is what pleases our superficial senses, vision and touch.
inner beauty, as we call it, is what pleases our deep sense, feeling.

Sharon stone is beautiful. Mother Teresa is beautiful. Princess Diana is beautiful. Mahatma Gandhi is beautiful. George Clooney is beautiful. Abdul Kalam is beautiful.With due respects to each person, all of us have our own, special charm. It would be unfair to run either down, be it outer or inner beauty.

Let's not console ourselves for things that we do not have, and instead spend more time learning to love ourselves for the lovely things that we have. Loving oneself makes one beautiful more than anything ever can..

the first breeze that blew across the bay..

you've wanted your early relationships to start as smooth as the love between Prince Charming and Cinderella...and thereafter work out as ''happily ever after'' ? but you finding yourself living in a twist. One month passes and you love them beyond the earth. Two months, and you love them beyond the ocean. Six months, and their quirks just bother you a bit, but a few years, and boom !

welcome home !

you're not the only one
it's just that all of us hope for the easy way out, though just a few know how difficult it is to find that person.
although we hope we can like and overcome, rather than tolerate each other's shortcomings..
although we feel we can cross over and ignore incompatibilities..
it's all easier said than done.

people who are...well, more practical, can I say, or more experienced about relationships...don't really care about how many relationships it takes to find the right one. Life is anything but a coincidence.
and out of the 2 billion people of the opposite sex, what chance have we of finding the so-called right one ?

fortunately or not so, life isn't that easy. Then first many relationships are the ones that demand a special attachment and memory. As much as people may dream to want to be together forever, in the very first go, things have a fair chance of not working out.

let's get real.
i totally admire people who found their lifelong loves first, are happy and still live with them. this is a matter of pure coincidence, congrats. I'm done talking about you.
with due respects to these exceptions, i can boldly tell you that the world is made up of people who've mostly been in more than a single serious relationship.
that's solely because of the fact that it's all a gamble.

first relationships are generally due to sparks, attraction, and elementary feelings. most people tend to make a mistake here, by thinking it's that mad love. (not to mention that we learn from our mistakes) their physical needs cloud their emotional needs, the needs to satisfy ego, self-respect etc.
the sparks are anyway extinguished in a few months or a year.
that's when all the small things you liked about the other person start to irritate you.
that's when the things they do seem to target your 'ego'
that's when you realize you made the biggest mistake in the whole darned world.
that's when you realize you're sad about the wrong person

there are a few people whom i know...who happen to be prolonging lifeless, meaningless first-time relationships.
for the sake of the world-just to show the world that they've achieved a big deal by being with each other for half-a-decade.. little realizing that they're not happy, that they're cheating themselves..(the world doesn't give two hoots about what you do....it's all about yourself. be yourself. like what you like. do what you want.Who cares that your friends saw you together ? What your friends think or saw isn't life at all ! )
for the sake of the habit that the other person has become in their life.. it's all a matter of habit. the phone conversations at half past 2 (a.m.), the shoulder, the couple lunches, the dinners, the movies..
for the sake of their 'i-am-feeling-lonely-and-depressed' phase that they fear after breaking up..

So..
who is the right one ?
how do you know it's the right one ?
does our opinion of the 'right one for me' change over time ?

'who is the right one ?'...is a question that cannot be answered to the point.
of course you know, that only you can answer it most closely.
- we do give descriptions of what we want in our ideal match...but little do we realise that none of us really know what we want even when we see a manifestation of it. It could pass us by and we wouldn't know.
we prefer laying our eyes on someone whom we've already met and mould our 'wants' according to what they are and then we realise we're thinking, ''ohh wow..you're the one i'm looking for....'', but it's so momentary that it's only when you grow out of someone that you realize they WERE the one but they are not the one.

it's easier for a girl to MEET a warm, charming, intelligent guy and LIKE him, rather than picture someone completely IMAGINARY having all these qualities and like Mr.I-exist-in-wonderland.
something similar applies to guys.

how do you know if he/she is the right one ?The irony is, you may not know it instantly. You could cross paths over and over and nothing might work out till it does. You might tear each other down to the floor or just remotely have existed in each other's lives forever and never even notice each other as potential till once fine day you feel deep down, what if they're the one ?
It's all a matter of time. It takes time to peel out their petals and see what they have to offer you inside..see if they're really what you wanted. See their worst, show them your worst, give each other a chance to see your best, and then a relationship slowly figures.
And to all those who want to argue saying , ''no, no. not at all. I'll just know my right person when I see him/her..'' please, get your feet back on the ground.

does our opinion of the right one for me change, with time ?yes it does. it really does.
I'm not talking about something drastic...basic ideas do not change.
you might start liking people of a different profession at another given time. you might start appreciating people who are settled in a different country, though you'd once thought that you never might.
you may want a partner who drinks 6 vodkas bottoms-up now, but three years down the lane, you might want a teetotaler.
it's all a question of time.
of how your likes and dislikes change.
of what your life demands out of you.

never give up hope. love happens after a long journey, after many, many lovers, all of whom are just many different beautiful flavors of "wrong".
Don't live for others.
Don't live hanging on to anything because you had put effort into that relationship and love into that relationship for so many years, and now they're just out there, with someone else.
Don't hang on to your ego..it makes you self-destructive without your knowledge.
Don't live to show the world anything. If at all life has taught you anything, it has taught you that if a beautiful girl is no more in your life, a more beautiful, intelligent, lovable girl will come along, and you've to just keep your eyes open. If a guy who you love doesn't see it in you, a more wonderful amazing guy who is far more capable of understanding your goodness will come along.
Don't compromise on your needs in the beginning or you'll regret it later.
and if you can help it, don't fall in love

after all, it's not just about the first breeze that blows across the bay...

and definitely read this small article...go : andrew boyd's 'loving the wrong person'

-aarthi kannan