It’s a day after you broke up.
You still can’t believe it.
When the hands in which you place your heart rip it to pieces, you wish you could take physical pain over THIS.
Should you leave your bed now? Maybe if you call him, the sound of your voice will remind him that he loves you.
I once stood at that one-day mark just like you, wondering if calling my partner was what she was waiting for to come back ‘home’.
Of the things I learned, the one thing I don’t want you to learn the hard way is that your breakup could not be final yet, but everything you say and do at this point could make it so.
And if you have already placed that call and learned that your ship has sailed, then these simple actions will help you reduce the time you need to heal.
Do These 5 Things NOW To Mend Your Broken Heart Faster
1. Be Around People
Would you recommend a drug addict to heal from his addiction alone, with no one around? And you, would it make sense for you to heal from this broken heart by yourself?
Right after a breakup, nothing matters as much as trying to get a lover to come back. That’s why the worst calls and the stupidest promises are usually made around that time.
But more than stupid things, it’s also when the most dangerous things have their greatest appeal. Suicide. Vengeance. And God forbid, crime. Ok that’s too much.
- Being around people right after a break up will help
- Provide a space where you can let your frustrations out
- Provide advice you may not have thought of by yourself
- Provide a human heat pack in a time where you need human connection the most
- Provide voices to question the ideas that you think are good now, but which you could regret later
It goes without saying, this works best with people you trust.
If there is no one close enough whom you can talk to, 7Cups.com will connect you right now to someone willing to listen. Someone who cares. They charge nothing, it’s completely free.
2. Start A Journal
Mental noise rarely survives the journey from mind to paper. The words and thoughts that are not cornerstone to the stories we go through tend to slip away once we start writing.
The brain does that to save energy.
And when what you have on paper is mostly the essential part of what you’re experiencing, it becomes much easier to understand how your breakup is affecting you.
Here are 3 more ways in which starting a journal could help you:
1. Journaling brings clarity to your thoughts
- It draws a link between the things that happened to you and why they happened.
- It makes obvious your ideas that went wrong and the possible ways forward.
- It helps track your winning resolutions.
2. Journaling prevents you from acting out in anger
A journal is like the glass into which a snake bites to release its venom. The bite is real but there are no victims.
When you empty on paper all the anger and frustration you feel, you desire to hurt people in real life diminishes. It is a good vaccine against frustration outbursts.
3. Journaling provides you with information to help others
Most of what I am telling you today is taken from my personal journal. I can show you “the way” because I once mapped my own way out this hole.
As you write about your frustrations and your journey to healing, you will be helping someone who will go down this same path tomorrow.
If making a buck tickles your fancy, you could also use this material in books, blog posts or courses in the future.
How To Start A Journal
The following articles do a decent job at answering the question.
3. Start A Routine Exercise
Thoughtless, repetitive tasks set your subconscious mind into high gear. That’s why so many of your ideas came during baths, silent walks or just tidying your room.
Your subconscious mind made a note of everything that happened when you got rejected and all the signs that led to it.
To access all that information and make sense of your best way forward, it’s important that you let your mind talk.
During my healing, I took up a cleaning job. It wasn’t the prettiest position, but the calm repetitive tasks I had to do everyday made room for me to make sense of where my life was.
With every scrub my mistakes became clearer, with every wipe I uncovered the signs I had missed before our breakup and with every push of the scrubber, I planned the life ahead of me.
Am I asking you to be a cleaner so you can heal? No. I’m asking you to
- Pick an exercise
- Diligently pursue it for a set amount of time (I suggest 66 days)
- And take advantage of the space it creates to be honest with yourself
The act of finishing what you started especially if it’s a sports exercise, will give you a better image of yourself.
And you know what often follows a better image of one’s self? Emotional healing.
4. Hold Off On Communication With Your Ex
Whether you 2 will get back together or stay forever apart, one thing is certain: You don’t want to be who you were when your ex left.
You want to be better.
This relationship tied you 2 in ways few people would ever understand. As much as it took time and activities together to make that happen, it will take time and activities far apart to break it.
Put differently, to write a new story of yourself, you’ll need new information about that self. To get that,
- Take yourself on adventures
- Try the things you’ve been postponing
- Start new hobbies or pick up the ones you left
- Conquer 1 fear
As you develop a new personality based on your experience with yourself, what you ex thinks or has to say will matter less. Self confidence based on others’ opinion of you will never last.
“What if I only want to talk to my ex for closure?”
What you think you want and what you may get could be dangerously different. Placed at the wrong time, that phone call could be the opportunity for your ex to bruise you.
Without the input of an ex who may refuse to help you get there, closure is still possible.
But it is impossible without your own input.
So before seeking your ex’s apologies, look inside. Listen to everything you feel about this ordeal and lay it on a letter.
Address it to your ex, write for as long as you want, take breaks if need be, withhold no emotion. The more you write, the lighter you will feel.
Finally, accept to let go of those emotions, and burn that letter.
Your future is brighter than you know.
5. Seek God
Of all the things I did to heal from my heartbreak, nothing produced more fruit than looking to God.
I had always heard from people that He loved me more than I did myself, but it it took one fateful night for it to finally make sense:
On the cold floor of my narrow room, with my face in my palms and a pain I desperately tried to cry away, I said the only thing my broken heart could think of.
“God, help me”.
No, He didn’t appear and wipe my tears, but during the days after that He led me to verses that described what He thinks and says of me. If you believe God to be your designer, then you best believe only He knows with perfection what your true identity is.
Not a prey to fear, but a powerful lover (2 Tim 1:7); Not a 5, but his incredible work of art (Eph 2:10).
If you get closer to God during this period, He will mend your heart.
In Closing,
If you should leave with only 1 point from this post, leave with the last. Who God says you are is different from the heartbroken person in the mirror.
You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book. (Psalm 56:8)
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See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. ( Isaiah 43:19)
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and provide for those who grieve in Zion– to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. (Isaiah 61:3)
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He heals the broken heartened, binding up their wounds. (Psalm 147:3)
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He will cover you with his feathers. He will shelter you with his wings. His faithful promises are your armor and protection. (Psalm 91:4)
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but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint
. (Isaiah 40:31)
