How to End a Relationship & Other Realizations
Breaking up with someone you love can be one of the toughest emotional
struggles you’ll go through. How have you handled breakups in the past? What
can you do to minimize pain for the other person and yourself?
Sometimes when we have strong connections with people, we instantly relate
it to a romantic relationship, and end up jumping into one with them. You can
love people without being in a romantic relationship. I think we are socially
conditioned to believe that love for someone equals romance.
Truth is, the love we feel for others comes from a beautiful place within ourselves, that infinite feeling of love is an expression of our true nature, it has nothing to do with other people. Instead of jumping into romance, we can cultivate a harmonious friendship with that person.
Here is an example of such a thought, “What would my friends think? What would my readers think? I am a horrible person.” I got out of this state by gaining clarity and recognizing that I needed to be honest with myself.
I’ve been on quite an emotional ride
recently. What has been weighing heavily on my heart and mind involves a slice
from my personal life. Without going into details, Adam, my partner for the
past year, and I have decided to part ways. We will remain good friends.
The past three weeks have been a tremendously
painful period, feelings of empathy mixed with remorse and guilt. The impulse
to burst into tears would hit me sporadically throughout the day.
When I first wrote about the art of
keeping a relationship, my friend Pete Forde suggested that perhaps people
could also benefit from an article on how to end a relationship.
I noted his
brilliant suggestion without further thought. Little did I know, this would
become the center of my experience a month later. This being a sensitive topic, I had
a tough time finding genuine and in-depth resources online. My goal here is to
capture the understanding and wisdom I’ve gained from going through this event,
and to perhaps be of help or a point of clarity for your life story.
Feel free to add points that I’ve
missed in the comment section. I look forward to hearing your thoughts.
Why
Relationships End & Other Realizations
As painful as a relationship can be
as it’s ending, the experience can be a source of profound learning and
personal growth. I’ve learned as the years goes by, just when you are getting
comfortable, life will throw something at you which challenges that comfort.
Don’t big life shifts always appear this way?
Instead of looking at these
challenges with frustration, treat them as an opportunity for change in the
life direction you were meant to lead and benefit from. The following are some
realizations I’ve learned with regards to relationships and the ending of them.
1.
The Failure Misconception
Socially, we tend to correlate the
ending of a relationship with failure. We even articulate it as such; we say,
“I’ve failed in this relationship”. By framing as such, we leave a negative
impression in our minds and an association with relationships in general.
The ending of a relationship is not
a failure, but rather the ending of a life situation in our story. We were
meant to experience the relationship for its joyful moments and we were meant
to learn from its challenges. New life and death are all around us. Every
inhale we take is a birth and each exhale is the death of that breath; and life
continues.
2.
Being Honest to Your Needs
It’s important to clearly understand
our needs in a relationship and qualities in a mate. Be absolutely honest with
yourself and don’t compromising the qualities that are essential to you. What
typically happens when we find a quality, which deeply matters to us, is
missing in our partner, we think that they can be changed.
Truth is, we can’t make people
change we can only change ourselves. Small things will magnify with time. Be
conscious of these small things and be honest with yourself. Understand
your needs and be true to yourself. We only have a set amount of time in this
life, make it matter.
3.
Fear and Guilt
We stay in relationships that we
know aren’t necessarily right for us because we are afraid. We fear loneliness,
we fear hurting our partner, and we fear having to deal with uncomfortable
situations. The guilt comes in when we recognize that we are not being honest with
ourselves and thus being unfair to our partners.
4.
‘Borrowed’ Desires
Sometimes in the presence of someone
who is completely focused in getting what they want (ie. Your love), it
influences your desires when in their presence. You pick up their strong vibe
and their desire transfers to you.
In a relationship, if one partner
feels significantly stronger than the other, sometimes this strong desire rubs
off on the other person. In the presence of the more interested partner, the
less interested partner will feel that “This is the right thing for me. This
feels right.” When separated from the partner with the strong desire, the less
interested partner will feel less intense or indifferent about the
relationship.
5.
Love and Romance Can Be Mutually Exclusive
Truth is, the love we feel for others comes from a beautiful place within ourselves, that infinite feeling of love is an expression of our true nature, it has nothing to do with other people. Instead of jumping into romance, we can cultivate a harmonious friendship with that person.
6. Social Pressure
I felt the social pressure when considering my options. But at the end of the day, that pressure comes from my ego out of fear that I would look bad. I have a public image and on some level, I was afraid what people might think of me afterwards. That can turn into negative self talk.Here is an example of such a thought, “What would my friends think? What would my readers think? I am a horrible person.” I got out of this state by gaining clarity and recognizing that I needed to be honest with myself.
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