Keep going. Keep moving. Keep walking. Don’t look back.
You’re going to be okay.
You’re going to get through this.
You’ve got this!
Whatever our mantra happens to be, they all say the same thing.
Let go. Leave it in the past. Don’t keep holding on so tightly to what you should have said or done.
But the problem is that for all our well-intentioned words of inspiration and support, nothing cuts to the heart of how we actually feel.
As in trapped.
As in hung up. As in hopeless, helpless, desperate and completely lacking in the get-up and go determination to actually get through this moment in time!
And how can it be any other way?
When you feel so much when you’re with someone, of course you’re going to feel so much when you’re not with him. It doesn’t matter whether he ended it or you ended it because you had to; the truth is this was never the way you hoped it would end and nothing anybody can do or say can make this easier on you.
Especially when the one thing that haunts you more than anything else is everything you could have done instead!
What do you do with that?
Here’s what you do.
You recognize something that most of us don’t readily have on our radar.
You’re not perfect.
No, not perfect at all. And this person you’re having so many regrets over how you lost him - and what you lost him over - he isn’t perfect either. In fact, the less he’s able to tolerate your imperfections, the more this speaks about how far from perfect he is!
Read that again.
The less he’s able to tolerate your imperfections, the more imperfect he is. And the more it reveals the only type of relationship he's able to tolerate; one that's based more on an image of perfection than on anything to do with a real, honest, imperfect definition of love.
This matters so much in how it contributes to your narrative around how or why this relationship ends or why it seems like it was so cruelly taken away from you. There is no place we bring more of our issues than to our love relationships because we all have such a deep innate desire to be loved.
And because we all also bring our definitions of love, our programming and responses to love and what it means to us, this is where our vulnerable selves come out.
Love is vulnerable. Relationships need to be a place where we can be vulnerable. If you can’t be yourself (your true self) then what are our relationships for?
This is the perspective I want you to have. I’ve been in every kind of surface relationship where you have to be on your best behavior to make it work. Where you have to remember every day to check yourself at the door lest you let something get out of place.
Where you have to reign yourself in to make sure you’re not too much or not enough of something in order to maintain the status quo and not rock the boat.
You know where these lead?
Just ask any of the heartbroken women on here and they’ll tell you. It leads to smiling on the outside while you cry far too much on the inside. It leads to where you pretend everything is fine on the outside, while on the inside, a little more of you feels like it dies every single day.
Looking at the past in this light is how you leave yesterday behind.
You're so much more than who you were yesterday. You're who you are right now, today. You’ve learned so much. It doesn't matter that you learned them the hard way; it only matters that you see now. You’ve come so far and gone through so much already.
Now you’re ready to see something real, to create something real. Today.
Love of the perfect kind, with two people wearing masks of perfection or whatever other masks they may be, doesn’t work. The more we demand of someone else, the less tolerance we have for ourselves. The less compassion. The less understanding.
The less everything.
When you’re with someone who holds you to an image, a standard, an idea, that you – the real you – will never be able to live up to in the long term, it doesn’t work. You simply can’t take someone who isn’t capable of being what you want him to be and make him into what you want him to be. No matter how much you’ve been told you can, you can’t.
This is what it means to let go of yesterday.
You see this. You wake up to this. You see that this is essentially the underlying reason that this wasn’t working, that it hasn’t worked in the past, and you see the way this was a thread woven through every one of your yesterdays.
You can't take nothing and produce something, much less any kind of something worthwhile that you’ve been waiting for your whole life. No matter how much this is precisely what we've been told to do, in the context of a real relationship with two real people, this isn't how that someday becomes today.
You're ready for something new because it's time. You're done with believing what everyone else keeps trying to tell you, because it's time.
You can't keep moving forward when you've still got one eye on the past, on yesterday and what you're still regretting you didn't do or say. None of us can!
So now, while there's still a little time left before you say goodbye to another year that didn't turn out the way you wanted it to, you let it go.
Goodbye yesterday.
No more looking back. Thank you for the lessons, yesterday. You're moving forward from here.
Love,
Jane
And you, Beautiful? What do you need to let go of from yesterday? It's time! You're moving on now. Tell us all about your journey in the comments below!
Jane,
Certainly needed to read this today. I ended a 17 year relationship a few days ago. A relationship with many flaws most specifically trust. A man who has an insatiable appetite for women....two times that he cheated where I found out; several other women that I could never quite put my finger on. I've prayed to have the truth come to me and nothing was happening until a few days ago when I decided to check his phone. Certainly read a lot about not doing that but I needed to seek the truth. And I found it...confronted him and he lied to me at first but came back to me a few days later and said he was lying. Also came "clean" about another situation that he recently was in but claims nothing happened..only drinks with a woman that he met outside his health club...Wow! And he sat there and expected me to forgive him...LOL
I can go on and on but the moral of this story is to all women out there who struggle with infidelity...and to be clear cheating is not necessarily sex but other forms...text messages, etc., please trust your heart and your instincts. They will never steer you wrong! I'm so glad that I found the strength to finally do so and I hope to be able to look forward in finding that special someone who will give me the love and respect that I deserve.
Melanie
Thanks for this Jane. I lots a relationship 5 months ago when my fiancé cancelled our wedding and called it quits . Since then , I have been living with so many regrets;I had wanted to work things out and work on the things I felt I did wrong, but he didn’t want to give me a chance and instead , left me to deal with all the things and even dumped his trash on me, calling me names . Despite that I have managed to forgive him for all that he has done, but why can’t I offer the same kindness and forgiveness for myself. I have forgiven him not because he deserved it , but because I want to be free from the ties that tie me to him. I look back at the past and continuously beat myself up and now I realize, That beating myself up won’t help. Instead being kinder to myself and acknowledging my imperfections and shortcomings in the relationship without being harsh Ron me are what I need to do. It is easier said than done , living in a society that thinks something is utterly wrong with being single and 40. I know Im NOT a loser iFM IM 40 and single. Maybe I just need to believe that God isn’t done with my story yet. Thank you for your inspiring words. It keeps me sane and helps me move forward. Merry Christmas to all the single women like me .
Oh Lumina, your story is far from done yet. Don't beat yourself up for what he obviously couldn't be. There is nothing wrong with you; there is only something so very wrong with a culture that dictates far too many of our internalized messages around worthiness and love. You deserve every bit of that same kindness and forgiveness for yourself. Find that place inside you that knows that true and don't stop until you've found it. When we've traveled so far from where we used to be, it can be the hardest thing to find our way back home. But it matters so much that we do!
Hi, Jane,
You know something? Of all the relationship website advisors I've read columns from, you are the one who really shows the most understanding, gives the best advice, yet also makes us women who've suffered heartbreaks feel the least guilty. I appreciate your support, and yes, we have the tendency to blame ourselves repeatedly, like it's been us doing or saying something wrong all the time. But, after all I've read from you and can relate so strongly to, I see that I should free myself of guilt. Yes, all of us, male/female, make mistakes, but we women tend to take on too much guilt, when in many of our cases, it really wasn't anything we specifically did to turn a guy away other than be who we really are. And, oftentimes, that doesn't mean anything bad, but rather, more of what the guy resisted or backed away from on his own. In essence, my preference is to believe, "his loss, my awakening." A lot of us ignore "red flags," thinking we might simply be imagining things, but our intuition tells us otherwise.
Early in my longer "past" relationship, I told my "ex-boyfriend" to not do anything for me that he was uncomfortable with. He wanted to try so hard to please me, being what he thought I wanted from a man, but most of that went against his previous way of life. He started missing that as he was trying to relate to me with all the "changing of his old ways." I never forced it, and in fact, warned against doing anything he felt uncomfortable doing. In the end, I was the one hurt, because he simply could not force the change on himself any longer and literally, exploded, then left me hanging.
Almost a year later, he kept trying to re-connect with me on a very slow progression, only by phone, where he could control the conversation and the length of conversation. Well, I felt deep inside that I should "let go," and protect my heart from further pain, so, I avoided most of his calls, then they simply stopped. Yes, it hurt me to believe that or try to see things that way, but I felt it was best for "ME."
BTW, I must admit that I feel like such a novice at dating, yet I was married for 31 yrs to the best man I could have ever met, and I lost him to cancer in 2012. Today's dating life is unlike any experience I've had before, and in all honesty, I don't like, nor do I agree with, today's trend in male/female dating attitudes. I honestly don't know if I'll ever meet someone I can relate to or who can relate to me. I deserve respect for my morals, commitment, and loyalty, and several guys I've met don't believe in that. My late husband had strong sensitivity for my feelings from the moment he met me. Most men I've met the last couple of years want the freedom to get what they want from a woman, and walk away any time they feel like it. They don't care about deeply hurting someone.
Thanks so much for all the support you offer us.
Delores
Thank you, Delores. For sharing your own story and for your kind words. I'm so glad mine resonated with you. I would add one thing here and that is to keep following what you feel is best for you. No matter what that is, it won't steer you wrong. Yes, you are so right that we all need to raise the bar together if we are to make any lasting change to the current dating culture where it's all too easy for a man to get off on such poor behavior. But I believe we are getting closer to that in the revelations we're seeing being uncovered on an almost daily basis of what's been wrong for a very long time. Don't lose sight of what you know in your heart of hearts you deserve. This strong sensitivity for your feelings is your guidepost. Only proceed if it's there. You have suffered a heartbreaking loss of one of the good ones, but I can assure you, there are more of them. Don't settle for anything less than one of them. Your guidepost is there for a reason! Much love to you.