How to forgive an ex who hurt you: Moving on

Many of us have faced heart-break at least once or twice in our lives. Some of us have faced it even more times than that. Heart break is a sad part of life and the dating / love world that is often unavoidable.

We can’t always avoid heartbreak (unless we cut ourselves off or guard ourselves so deeply that we avoid relationships or the idea of love or relationships all together) but we can try and limit the hurt or accelerate the healing process.

A break-up, especially if you are not the one who initiated it and you had / still have strong feelings for your ex, can be extremely hard.

The following tips may help you forgive / move on from an ex who hurt you:

1.       Acknowledge.
Stop being in denial about the situation. Stop trying to sugarcoat the reality to yourself, to make excuses or justifications for your ex or to make it seem like he had no choice in ending things.
- There is always a choice and evidently your ex DID NOT chose you!

2.       Use selective memory appropriately.
Stop using selective memory to erase the bad times and conveniently remember the good in your ex. don’t let yourself get caught in a dream of blissful memories because you selectively decide to choose what your ex did during the good times. Use your selective memory to remember the “bad”. Remember the fights, the hurt, and the negative things your ex did or said. Remember the things your ex did to hurt you or that worked on your nerves.
- Most importantly, REMEMBER that your ex left you!

3.       Better yourself

Don’t give up on life or love because someone walked away. You are better than that. Use this as a learning experience. Use this relationship as a lesson. Take from it what you can and use it to make you stronger. Become bEtter and not bItter.

4.       Scream into a pillow

You don’t need to literally do this (although literally helps sometimes too) but you need to avoid suppressing your feelings and emotions and let it out! Sometimes it helps to speak to a best friend, write about it in a diary, shout it out loud or just speak to God about it. No matter what you chose to do GET IT OFF YOUR CHEST. Don’t deny it. Look at yourself and don’t deny how you feel.

-          It’s okay to feel mad and angry!
E.g.: I feel mad at my ex for being so stupid that he couldn’t see how much I loved him. I feel like I wish I could just grab hold of him and shake him and say “What are you doing!!!!! You’re messing up YOUR life (not only mine). I’m the person you need! I’m the one who loves you more then you could ever know! I love you for you!!! I want to be with you!!! You’re going to lose 80% chasing 20%! Wake up!!!!

-          It’s okay to feel sad and hurt.
E.g.: I’m sad that my ex clearly didn’t love me as much as I loved him. He didn’t care for me or need me as much as he said he did. He didn’t want me as badly as he let on. I feel sad that everything was probably a lie or he would still be with me. I’m hurt that he chose someone else over me. I feel like my self-control has taken a major dip because I put everything into the relationship. I told him how I felt and I didn’t lie about it to him. I told him how appreciative I was for all of him and how much I loved him. I let him know how much he meant to me. I did everything I possible could in the relationship and for it to work and it wasn’t good enough.

I’m sad that I was not good enough.

-          It’s okay to miss him
Healing and getting over someone takes time. It’s okay that you loved and you got hurt. IT’S OKAY.

5.       Remember: Everything happens for a reason!!!
Don’t feel like it’s your fault. Like you did something wrong. Like you’re worthless. Like you aren’t good enough. Like you’re cursed or doomed or hard to love. Don’t feel like you aren’t pretty enough or skinny enough or tall enough or attractive enough. Like you’re too boring or too loud or too proud. It has nothing to do with you. Everything happens for a reason and everything that happens is part of a bigger plan for you.
Don’t spend forever moping over someone who left you. Crying over someone who made a decision to leave. Or being depressed over someone who’s already moved on with his life.

Remember (taken from a TD Jakes sermon –please see video!!!), “There are people that can walk away from you… When people can walk away from you – LET THEM GO. No more begging someone to love you, to need you, to miss you, to call you, to talk to you. When people can leave you; LET THEM GO! Because your destiny was never tied to the person who left! People leave because they are not joint to you. And if they are not joint to you, you can get super glue and you can’t make them stay – Let them go! It doesn’t mean the other person is a bad person it just means that their part in your story is over. You have gotta know when peoples part in your story is over so that you don’t keep trying to raise the dead! You’ve got to know when it’s dead. When its dead pick yourself up, wash your face and go on. It doesn’t mean that you’re hateful it means that you are faithful. When God wants you to have something (or someone) he will give it to you and if it takes too much stress you don’t need it! STOP BEGGING PEOPLE TO STAY – LET THEM GO!

Everything happens for a reason: Let It Go!!

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Posted by Jade