How long will it be before you can get through your daily routine without feeling the wave of pain sweep over you, without sensing that knot in the pit of your stomach, without dwelling on what went wrong? If these are some of the questions you are asking yourself, you are not alone.

A broken heart can cause such an intense reaction that many of us feel our lives have been completely stripped of meaning. Jobs, hobbies, and friends no longer hold any joy for us. In fact, some even experience physical pain with a tight chest, nervous stomach, or terrible insomnia. Time heals all wounds is what we have all heard over the years, but do you really have to wait for time to heal these wounds? Absolutely not. There are exercises that you can do to experience remarkable relief to your pain. They were developed by people who have been in this pain and sought a better way to heal.

Whether you are 22 or 62, the first step is to determine from which type of broken heart you currently suffer. That’s right – there are actually 4 different types of broken hearts. Several factors determine the type broken heart from which you may suffer including your relationship history, the type of relationship, the reasons for the break-up, and many more. Once we know where your heart stands, we can give you customized healing advice.

Ok, so where should you start? Start with the first healing step – the survey – to see where you stand. There are 15-questions and the entire survey can be completed in about 2 minutes. If your ready to see which of the 4 types of broken heart you suffer from, then let’s go.

Ready? Take the survey.

For someone who writes about relationships, it is pretty risky to make the statement that age matters; however, I believe in speaking the truth. I also believe in voicing the concerns of the those that visit this site. From this vantage point and with respect to love and heartbreak, age definitely matters.

Here is the reason why: we each have a grand plan for our life based on age. It goes something like this:

•    In my teens, I’ll get into a good college or get a good job.
•    In my early twenties, my career will start to take off.
•    By my mid-twenties, I will meet the person of my dreams.
•    In my thirties, I will be married and have 2.2 beautiful children.
•    In my forties, I’ll be running the company for which I’ve been working.
•    In my fifties, I’ll reflect back on my life and my grown children and smile.
•    In my sixties, I’ll retire and travel the world.

Sound familiar? Give or take a few years and interchange a couple of details and these types of age confined dreams are quite universal. So what happens when things don’t go as expected? What happens when instead of two kids in our thirties, we end up with our heart in two pieces? We feel broken.

Not only is our heart shattered, so too is our self-perception.  It is critical to understand that the pain one feels after a break up is only partially due to the separation from our mate. What causes equal, if not greater, agony is dealing with our crushed dreams. Our dream to be a certain age and have accomplished certain things has been stolen. To overcome the challenge of heartbreak based on age related fears, we must face them head on.

Fear: I’m getting older and will be alone. So you are 35 or 45 or [insert your age] and you are alone. You are scared. This is natural. Many people have a fear of aging – period. Heck, the entire beauty industry thrives on our distaste for more age. When you mix the panic of being alone with an aversion of getting older, the combination results in a very potent fear.

Hope: On this website there are thousands of visitors (no exaggeration) in their 30s, 40s, 50s, and yes, 60s that are looking to get over an old love in order to find a new one. You are not alone. The times have changed and people are looking to be in a healthy, loving relationship. As such, there is no dearth of available men and women. After you have gone through the stepped process for recovery and you are ready, you will begin dating again. Regardless of your age or whether you have had it in the past, true love will find you.

Fear: I am damaged goods. Almost all of us have had experiences which have left us feeling less than perfect; however, they are experiences, not who you are. I have always been puzzled by the statement, “I am divorced.” If this is your situation, remember, it is not a I am statement, it is an I have gone thru statement. No one is fundamentally flawed – especially not those who work actively to heal their wounds.

Hope: Absorb the power provided by an example. Find someone around you who has triumphed over adversity in their life. Find someone who has been dealt an unexpected hand and turned it around to their benefit. Ask them to tell you their story. If you don’t see anyone that fits the bill in your immediate surroundings, pick up a Chicken Soup for the Soul book and read hundreds of inspiring stories. You will find that people do not become their bad experiences, rather they work through them and come out stronger. So will you.

Fear: This just was not supposed to happen to me at this age! This is a negative idea that races through the minds of many who endure a break up. The thought is rooted in the break from your grand life plan. Remember, you created that plan, but the universe has something better in store.

Hope: I have never, ever seen a case where someone who has embraced the changes in their life did not end up happier. You will too. Keep in mind that your past relationship(s) were not a waste of time. For many, they provided growth, sometimes beautiful children, and although it may not seem so, some good memories. Everything that has happened has made you who you are today and ahead awaits an even greater experience.

Remember: Please, please, please do not restrict your dreams. Your visions do not wish to be bound- especially to the confines of age. Paul Gaugin didn’t start painting til his mid-forties, Granda Moses in her seventies, Charles Darwin published his first book in his fifties, and Colonel Sanders founded KFC in his sixties. Age only matters if we allow it to matter. Dream bigger. Dream brighter. Set your dreams free today.

Has age played a role in your heartbreak? Find out how you can heal here.

From co-worker to lover to co-worker – do you fit into this scenario? Creating deliberate distance from your ex is a key ingredient in the prescription for recovery. So what do you do when you still have to see them everyday at work? You utilize the unique solutions to combat the unique complications presented when working with an ex. In order to understand the techniques we offer, let’s first address the specific problems.

Problems Unique To Working With An Ex:

Undercover Lovers. Romances that develop at the office are often not made public. For various reasons – company policy, unwritten rules, negative connotations, extramarital status – people keep office relationships under wraps. The issue with any clandestine romance is that the break up is also concealed. Not that you want to send out announcements about your broken heart, but keeping your relationship private denies you the support from friends and co-workers that help you through this difficult time.

Contact Overload. Office relationships often come with lots of emails, texts, ims, and hallway looks. You are in the presence of this person all day and are experiencing the effects of “in sight and in mind”. Going from constant correspondence to normal communication can be grueling.

That Little Something Extra. Regardless of your level of professionalism with one another, when you are dating in the office, you always get a little something extra in your exchanges. Whether it is a wink in the hallway, an email with a smiley, or a special lunch together, there are often veiled signs of affection. After the break up, the extras vanish and this can be difficult to bear.

Mixed Signals. Sometimes the little something extras do not actually disappear as quickly as they should setting in motion a state of confusion. You may still get that special email, but there is no other sign of a reconciliation to come. Mixed signals will keep you in limbo. This neither gets you the relationship you seek with your ex, nor does it allow you to move forward.

TMI. One of the reasons that distance is required for the healing process is that having all the information about your ex such as their reaction to the break up or new dating prospects does not help your recovery. When you work with an ex, you just have too much information about all aspects of their post break-up life.

Give us Hope, Hope, Hope!

There is hope. Many of the issues endured when working with an ex are based on expectations and habits that remain on auto-pilot. We wait for that email and expect the that little something extra. We can’t get them off our mind because they are sitting in front of us. Well, we are going to teach you some methods to get rid of those expectations and habits. Soon your constant thought of walking past his desk or incessant impulse to check for her email will fade. You will build strength and move forward.

Lean heavily. If you fall under the category of a private romance with a private break up, lean heavily on someone outside of work that you can trust. Tell them everything. Use the community here to help you. We are not here to judge, we are here to help.

Change. You’ve probably had the experience of scent or a song triggering a poignant memory of a person or point in time. This is because our mind is like a filing cabinet that efficiently stores memories with certain associations. We have yet to unravel the mystery of all of the triggers; however, we do know that even the most mundane detail can generate an association to your ex – the angle of your computer, the scent of your office, etc. With this in mind, it makes sense to change some details and create fresh associations.

•    Rearrange your work space.
•    Place your computer in a different spot.
•    Change your pictures and knick-knacks.
•    Spray an unfamiliar scent in your office.
•    Drive a different route to work.
•    Walk a different path to your workspace.
•    Wear new clothes.
•    Talk to different co-workers.
•    Mix up your lunch destinations.

Email and other correspondence. Write down how you feel while waiting for his email or after receiving a disappointing text from her. Write it in code (if you have to) and put it on a post-it next to your computer, phone etc. Every time you want to send your ex a message, reference your post-it. If your urge overwhelms you, try the following:

•    Write an email. Yes, open a document and each time you want to send them a message, type it into this document. Record the time and the date and write it. Do not send it, just keep the document as a running trail. Review the document after a few weeks – we promise your urges will reduce in quantity.
•    Get raisins. If you hit “F5” fifty times an hour to refresh your screen, get a bag of raisins. Each time you want to hit refresh, eat a raisin instead. What you are doing is exhibiting addictive behavior and this technique helps to break it. Don’t not feel bad about it or reinvent the wheel, there are plenty of techniques to kill addictive habits and this is one of them.

Count before answering. It is of utmost importance to maintain your professionalism with your ex during the recovery process. While there may be a fleeting moment of satisfaction from throwing your swinger stapler at his head, we promise you will not feel good in the morning. Before answering any direct or indirect question to your ex, count to ten and ask yourself how your co-worker would respond. Respond in that manner.

Quit. Not your job, the game. Quit the game of sending and receiving inappropriate signals to and from your ex at work. If he or she winks at you in the hall, it is in your control to deny this signal. It is in your control to take a different route to the bathroom and reduce run ins at the office.

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. You don’t need to discuss your personal life, nor do you need  find out about what your ex is up to. Do not fool yourself into thinking that finding out about his dating life or her weekend plans is providing you closure. Closure comes from within, from working through healing steps. Think of how you act with another colleague that you are not friends with at work – mimic this behavior with your ex.

You can do it. You were a working professional before this relationship and you can continue to be one. A unique challenge has been presented to you in this life. You will conquer it and when you come out on the other side, you will be better, brighter, and stronger.

Do you work with your ex? Perhaps you go to school with them or are still living with them- tell us why it’s hard for you to go cold turkey.

In this world, it is relationships that connect us with one another. A relationship bonded by deep love forms a connection of the heart, mind, and soul, and hence, the reason for its great might. Once we are connected in this fashion, is it possible to disconnect? Just because the words ‘break up’ have been used, does not mean the feelings have dissolved. The question this article tries to answer is if we cannot be in a loving relationship with someone, can we not at least be friends?

Releasing a love is a challenge for anyone, but the thought of losing the friendship can seem intolerable. Self-help or relationship advice books vary in content; however, one common theme seen across the board is the theory that no contact will help you heal faster. At healmybrokenheart.com, we also agree with this theory – to an extent. Here is our thorough explanation of the why and how it is necessary and possible to disconnect your friendship from your ex.

Why can’t I be friends with my ex?

1) Circular Reference: Your ex is someone to whom you turned to for advice and that type of dynamic generally doesn’t change when you try to remain friends. Unfortunately, the person giving you advice about something cannot be part of the advice that needs to be given. All of the qualities you seek in a advisor – objectivity, unbiased opinion, the truth – are lost in this scenario. She or he cannot help you get over her or him. And biting your tongue or holding back what you really want to talk about will just put you back into a place of pain.

2) The Pain Resurfaces: If you still have feelings for your ex, which you do after a break up, then every time you see them the pain resurfaces at the same intensity level. At Heal My Broken Heart, we are trying to provide you exercises to actively heal your heart; however, these exercises are diluted in their effectiveness each time you start from square one again.

3) Jealousy Multiplies: We all have thoughts of our ex with someone else, whether these are based reality or conjured in our minds. When you remain ‘friends’ with an ex, this feeling is exaggerated. You will be subconsciously looking for anything in his or her discussion that indicates they are still into you or into someone else. This can keep you up for nights at a time – even if it isn’t true. Bottom line, you are torturing yourself.

4) Emotional Space: Whether you are interested in dating again or not, staying friends with your ex fills up the space your heart reserves for emotional relationships. This will affect all of your interactions with friends, family, co-workers etc., because emotional availability is finite. You don’t have an unlimited amount of energy in this area and if you are giving a lot of it to your ex, you are giving less and less to everyone else. When you do feel you are ready to date again, you may not have a great result unless you are free from this emotional attachment with your ex.

5) Toxic Friendships: Remember, you want to be friends with this person. Think of someone else you are friends with – do you fight with them, are you hurt by them, are you jealous of what they are doing, do you have hidden agendas, do you want to sleep with them? Probably not. Pretending that you are just friends when you want more will always backfire.

It is so hard to do, so exactly how should you disconnect?

1) Do not be scared. You have strength that you were born with, that you have exhibited in the past, and that you will use now. The main fear is that if you stop being friends with your ex, they will disappear from your life and any hope of reconciliation will be gone. The other fear is that this is the person you turned to for everything and now you don’t have that touch stone. Both of these fears are not based in reality. Your ex is not going anywhere, you can rekindle the friendship in the future and you can find fulfillment in other friendships.  You can do this.

2) Use 15 – 30 Day chunks. Most people make a pact with themselves that they are never going to talk to their ex again. When they break down and call or text or email, it feels like a failure. Go cold turkey in 15 day or 30 day chunks. Make a promise to yourself right now to try one. If your ex contacts you, just let them know 1x only that you need some time on your own. Again, they are not going anywhere – it is going to be OK.

3) Cut out one electronic device at a time. If #2 is hard for you, then try cutting out one electronic device at a time. Eliminate texting, then eliminate emailing, then eliminate calling etc.. One thing at a time. You can do it.

4) Don’t Rationalize. This friendship is hindering your healing progress, and there is no valid reason for the friendship to continue at this point. You are strong and so is your ex. You can both do this.

When can you reconnect?

1) In time. When you can see your ex with someone else and will be okay with it, you can be friends again if there is a need. Ouch, this one hurts to just read. Don’t be afraid of this statement. It is just meant as a benchmark for when you can reconnect. Without the active healing that you practice in this community, this could take years, but don’t worry, you will be there soon.

2) When your heart is healed. You will know.

Are you still friends with your ex? Heal your broken heart here.

Heal My Broken Heart has always been about the obvious – healing broken hearts. We thought that people would come to this site and get real and practical advice to heal their hearts. We still believe this. However, we recently realized we are not serving a portion of the people that do visit us here.

Now, I need to warn you, if you have no intention of getting back together with your ex and simply want to heal your heart, ignore this article, take the survey to see where your heart stands, and follow the customized healing advice in order to move on.

If you are certain you want to try to get back together with your ex – very certain – then continue reading.

For the first time in our 12 year history, we are partnering with someone outside of our team to help heal hearts. His name is TW Jackson and he has written a book that gives you your best chances of getting your ex back. We realized that we were not serving you in any way by giving you the steps to move on with your life, if you were genuinely and sincerely interested in getting back your ex girlfriend, boyfriend, husband, or wife. Well, we are giving you that chance now.

In an industry filled with a lot of information that costs money and doesn’t have much substance, TW has broken the bar by providing a book that will really help you get your ex back and can change your whole life. We have read and worked through his system and it provides the quality, emotion, and practical advice that can get you back together with your ex.

As you may know from your experience with Heal My Broken Heart, we deliver quality and would never partner with someone that we thought did not match our level of service. If you genuinely want to try to reconcile with your ex, use the link below.  

Get your ex back at this special link: click here

Welcome to the Heartbreak Hotel. Your partner has just dealt a dagger to your soul, and you are worried you will never recover. He or she was your best friend, your lover; perhaps they occupied a part of your home, most certainly a piece of your heart. And now, the rug has been pulled out from under you. Without them, I am nothing, you fear. You are filled with sorrow—on the fringe of despair. You have broken up.

Dramatic? If you’ve ever suffered from a broken heart, you recognize the grief described is quite real. Trauma endured from a heartbreak can pervade every aspect of one’s life rendering some a prisoner to their own pain. Time irrefutably helps the healing process, yet thankfully, time is neither the only, nor most powerful healing agent.

“I knew I was falling completely, totally, hopelessly head-over-heels for this man. Maybe I couldn’t accept that right then. I know I was scared of being hurt again; jaded by one too many loves-gone-wrong. So, I kept my mouth shut.” Read full story

“About 6 years into the relationship, we decided to celebrate our commitment with a marriage-style commitment ceremony. We wrote our vows and I asked that he do only one thing for me – promise to tell me if he ever fell in love with someone else. I promised that if I ever had to let him go, I would do so with love. I just never thought it would actually happen.” Read full story

“We dated for 3 years and I still have the love songs he wrote me, the cards he sent me, the memories, the pictures. Things went sour Senior year when Brian decided our relationship didn’t matter anymore- that his friends were all important and I was second rate. I should have seen the signs but I ignored them – perfect example of freewill vs. fate.” Read full story

See All Stories

At Heal my Broken Heart, we offer a collection of hope: real stories shared from real people. These stories chronicle the full spectrum of the break-up process including those who have completely healed to those fresh in the midst of heartbreak. And though each journey is unique, you will find common and relatable elements offering comfort that you are not alone in your suffering, providing practical techniques to accelerate your recovery, and a clearer path to making your heart whole again.

Type of Relationship: An Affair of the Heart
Status: Providing Inspiration to others

I think a defining moment in one’s life comes the instant we realize what we could have had. Not that it makes us who we are or that we should spend our lives beating ourselves up over it; however, when these moments come, we often find ourselves in shoulda-coulda-woulda land for at least a short period of time.

I had returned to my hometown after what seemed like forever and a day. In reality, I had only been away a year and a half. My marriage had gone south, and having no close ties to anyone in Kentucky, I came home to Missouri to be near my family and start a new life. I was in a state of chaos and confusion – the emotional roller coaster that often accompanies separation and divorce. I had nary a clue as to what I wanted, where I was going, or even who I was at that point. My marriage had soured me on relationships, so I was certainly in no position to get involved, nor was I capable of recognizing what was there.

I met Billy Joe at the town square. He just happened to sit on the bench beside me, and we started chatting. We hit it off and quickly became involved. I thought he was a great guy: sweet, intelligent, straight forward, brutally honest, yet a gentleman. With Billy, what you saw was what you got. I liked everything about him, and thought he was rather cute too. He was a very young looking 30, with smooth skin, long legs, a nice body, and long, shiny brown hair. He was here for work, had come from Arkansas, and I thought I had hit the jackpot with this sweet southern rock charmer.

I knew I was falling completely, totally, hopelessly head-over-heels for this man. Maybe I couldn’t accept that right then. I know I was scared of being hurt again; jaded by one too many loves-gone-wrong. So, I kept my mouth shut. I never told Billy how I felt. Somewhere in my mind, I had convinced myself that this was not a serious relationship; it was more of a fling or friends with benefits kind of thing.

I started seeing other guys. I mean Billy and I were not exactly a couple, so I didn’t think it would matter. The first clue that it was an issue became clear when he saw me with someone else. The look on his face said it all. Still, he never mentioned it and neither did I. We just went on like usual. Eventually, I moved in with someone I did not really even like just because he wanted me too. I still saw Billy when I could, but eventually our meetings were few and far between.

I missed him all the time, but was still afraid to admit how I felt. Eventually, those hidden feelings backfired on me. Billy was planning to go home and came to see me. I was a wreck, unsure of anything in my life. I didn’t really think he loved me, so I was ready to just give up and move on. His last words to me as he left that day were “Who knows? Maybe in a year or so, we’ll be married.” I didn’t know what to say, so I silently watched as he walked away.

Billy knew how to get a hold of me, and for a while, I held onto hope that he would…don’t we all? By now, I had realized my mistake; I knew he loved me and kept asking myself why I had not run after him or left town with him? His failure to communicate in the beginning or to get in touch afterward was heartbreaking. Nevertheless, I could not lay it all on Billy’s shoulders; after all, I hadn’t said a word either.

For a long time, I moped around – depressed, angry, and very frustrated by what I felt as life throwing one more injustice in my direction. Yes, it was a pity party, and I was the honored guest. Two months after he left town, I found out I was pregnant with Billy Joe’s baby. I was joyous but terribly sad as well. I had no idea how to let Billy know and it mattered very little anyway, as our daughter only survived to the fifth month before I lost her.

After the miscarriage, I tried to rebuild my life. I tried to move on from all the heartache and sorrow. I started working more, meeting people, and doing whatever I could to rebuild the happiness I felt I needed and deserved.

A few months later, I ran into a mutual friend who told me Billy had never made it back to Arkansas. He had gone to a bar for his final night here and was killed by a knife-wielding maniac when he tried to break up a fight.

Since then, it has been 6 years. Time has helped ease the pain and has made things easier to deal with. The good memories are there, and I often miss Billy and wonder what if…

I have moved on in life, have remarried, have a family, a career, and have found the happiness I sought.

I found that time does heal the pain, but you have to work at it a bit and look ahead to find that bright light in your life after such pain. I could have sat back, wishing, wanting, and holding on to a past I had no control over. I could have allowed all the grief to swallow me up. Instead, knowing I had to get on with my own life, I made sure to embrace every opportunity to do so. Sure, I still felt pain and sadness, but it helped tremendously to stop and appreciate the small things in life for their simple beauty. Getting out there and living each day the best I could made time pass easily and pain fade over time. Most of all, I learned never to bottle up my thoughts and emotions. It was good to talk; to remember. Eventually, I could celebrate Billy Joe’s life through the good memories and knew that by moving ahead in my own, I was honoring him.

Note: This true story of courage was generously shared by freelance writer & editor, Stephanie Burtis.

In our first article in the series Making Choices, we discussed the theory of having options and making choices after your break up. In Making Choices Part II, we are going to highlight what choices you actually have and how to make them. The first choice we will discuss is forgiveness.

In my life, I have endured two gut-wrenching, painstaking, ripped-the-heart-out-of-my-chest break ups. One of these was a marriage that ended in a nasty divorce. There were bouts of intense fighting during the marriage, but that was something that was easy for me to forget. The divorce proceedings were vindictive in nature, but those memories dissolved soon after their close. What I could not overlook, what haunted me for years afterward, were the choices I had made that had led me to the marriage. I had known early on that my ex and I were a bad match and I could have prevented the chain of events that resulted in my wedding, marriage, and divorce. I was angry - with myself. I was angry for making such a monumental blunder in judgment. And I was angry at society for branding me with what I felt was the scarlet letter of being a divorcee. I was angry and I was unable to forgive.

I went to a therapist and after many sessions she concluded I was angry (great) and suggested that I forgive myself (ugh). I thought this advice too basic for the $125/hour I was paying her. I also held the notion that forgiveness was a natural process that comes with time, not something that you could invoke. I was wrong on both counts. For me, time continued to renew and deepen my resentment until I fell weak to truly unattractive behavior. I stayed home less work or a food necessity; I was short with friends and family; I transformed into a full on hermit. Each time a memory was triggered of the life I thought I could have had, should have had, I felt more enraged. Fortunately, I stumbled upon the study of positive psychology. It intrigued me because like conventional psychology it was based in science, but it also provided many practical techniques to implement solutions. I finally learned that what my therapist originally suggested was correct – I needed to forgive myself in order to move on. What my research taught me was how I could do this. I would like to share some of these techniques below.

Choose to forgive.

In order for us to forgive, we must understand what forgiveness really means. There are many, many different definitions for forgiveness, but one that resonates in a situation such as heartbreak is one offered by Robert Enright as a “willingness to abandon one’s right to resentment, negative judgment, and indifferent behavior toward one who unjustly hurt us, while fostering the undeserved qualities of compassion, generosity, and even love toward him or her.”

We all have a right to be angry and a right to resentment, but we can abandon this privilege if we choose. We can offer someone (ourselves included) undeserving compassion and love.

How can we forgive?

Everett L. Worthington, a renowned researcher who has extensively studied forgiveness says that “you can’t hurt the perpetrator by being unforgiving, but you can set yourself free by forgiving.”  The best part is that Worthington provides us a model for forgiveness that originated from his own struggle to forgive the person who raped and brutally murdered his mother.  Find the model below:

Exercise 1 – Five Steps to Forgiveness – R.E.A.C.H.

R = Recall the hurt by visualizing the event or the circumstance.
E = Empathize with the offender and understand his or her point of view.
A = Altruistic gift of forgiveness. This must be given freely and without self-interest.
C = Commit yourself to forgive publicly.
H = Hold on to the forgiveness.

Each of these steps can be extremely difficult to take and they may take time, so take your time. It is often one of the steps that stump us such as empathizing with the person that has hurt us, but with practice and visualization, this technique as described above is very effective. In terms of a public forgiveness, when you have reached this stage, you can tell your friends and family.

Exercise 2  – Write a Forgiveness Letter

Write a Forgiveness letter to each person or thing you need to forgive. Read it each day and log your thoughts on the letter until you see the change and feel your burden lifting.

Exercise 3  – Make and Contract

“I freely forgive _____________ (person’s name) for ______________ (list out all of the reasons)

Conclusion

The gift of forgiveness to yourself and others is a choice that you can make consciously. The serenity and empowerment you attain from offering forgiveness is agent that will definitively assist your recovery from heartbreak. Tell us about your journey to forgiveness. Tell us if you are angry or what is hindering you from forgiving your ex, yourself, or any one or thing that has hurt you.

Let’s start with a multiple choice question: What would you do if you fell and broke your arm?

A)    Take two Tylenol and call it a day
B)    Pray to God that the pain subsides
C)    Go to the hospital and have it set in a cast
D)    Have your dog lick the wound
E)    Ignore it

I assume most people would choose C) – go to the hospital to have it set in a cast. But what if you didn’t make that choice? What if you hate the hospital or love your dog or don’t believe in western medicine? The answer: you would still heal. Time heals. The difference is in how you heal. If you left your broken arm unattended, the split pieces would eventually reunite. The consequence is that the bones may reset improperly leaving you with a permanently mangled appendage.  Your heart works in the same way.

While heartbreak does not produce a physical wound, it can result in an exquisitely painful injury. Luckily, just like a broken bone, you have choices in your path to recovery after your break up. Unfortunately, most of us elect choice E) – the ignore method. If you do ignore your healing process, time will run its course and meld your heart back together. The problem? There is no guarantee how long this will take, nor is there any promise of the return of a strong and vital spirit. A heart that does not heal properly will be weak; a heart that does not heal properly will effect your engagement in future relationships, your ability to trust prospective mates, and your general well-being.

The good news is that by seeking out this site you are already demonstrating your desire to actively restore your heart. Here and now we are asking you to be aware that you are making a choice and to use this momentum to make more choices to feel better. So here is the crazy truth – You are in control of how much pain you will endure and how long it will take you to get over your heartache. This control is a good thing. Renowned positive psychologist, Rick Snyder, extensively studied hope and control and concluded, “Control helps people maintain emotional well-being and deal effectively with life problems.”

How can you exercise this control? Find out by reading our next article in the series of Making Choices.

Please provide us your comments: Whilst reading articles on this site, you may feel the need to take a break from your thoughts. It is ok to rest during the process and please remember that your pain will pass – we promise. If you would like, please share your thoughts below.

“Changing the destructive things you say to yourself when you experience the setbacks that life deals all of us is the central skill of optimism.” -Dr. Martin Seligman, former President of The American Psychological Association and the founding father of Positive Psychology.

I felt my heart ripped out of my chest and world turned upside after the divorce. At the time, a close friend advised, “Positive thinking, Amelie – it’s what will get you through this.”

I nodded and while I loved her care and best intentions, I wanted to scream, “Are you kidding me? Haven’t you ever lost love in your life? Don’t you understand your advice to think positively is an impossible mission?”

You may have friends and family that mean well, but give you the advice to embrace positive thinking. The problem is that our mind has a tendency to play a soundtrack of negative thoughts and put that soundtrack on repeat. The recurring negativity may sound something like this:

“I’m going to be alone forever.”

“I must be doing something wrong, this keeps happening.”

“I’m never going to feel that way again.”

Sound familiar?

Canceling out these negative thoughts and replacing them with positive ones is not an easy task; however, as your friends, family, and even inner self recognizes, the practice of positive thinking will help you take a tremendous step on the path towards healing.

So, how do you do it?

Forget positive thinking for a moment and focus instead on what I call positive speaking. The story you tell yourself and the world, the power of these words, has an incredible impact on your emotional state. So, change your story. Replace your negativity with positivity. Wait, isn’t this the same thing as positive thinking? No!

I am asking you to disregard the words in your mind and instead start speaking the words you know to be true to yourself and others out loud. In changing the words you speak out loud, you will in turn change the words you speak internally. Hence your positive speaking will influence your internal dialogue and produce positive thinking.

Before attempting the practice exercises below, let’s keep in mind a few crucial lessons from Dr. Martin Seligman about explanatory style. Per Seligman, your level of optimism is indicated by three crucial components in your explanatory style: permanence, pervasiveness, and personalization. (1)

• Permanence: Is your situation of being single permanent (pessimistic) or is it temporary (optimistic)?

• Pervasiveness: Does the situation reflect the state of your entire life, is it universal (pessimistic) or does it relate to something more specific (optimistic)?

• Personalization: Are you responsible for the break up (pessimistic) or are external factors outside of your control responsible (optimistic)?

Positive Speaking Exercise: Check out a conversation that you may have with a friend below. View how you can take your internal dialogue or negative thinking and flip it to positive speaking while keeping it realistic.

1. Question: “When are you going to date again?”
• Negative thinking: I feel like crud and will never date again.
• Positive speaking: “I probably won’t date right away, but I know I will feel better eventually and get back out there.” (temporary)

2. Question: “Why did you break up?”
• Negative thinking: We broke up because nothing in my life ever works out.
• Positive speaking: “We broke up because he/she betrayed me and honesty is important to me in a relationship.” (specific, external)

3. Question: “How’s everything else in your life?”
• Negative thinking: After the break up, everything in my life sucks.
• Positive speaking: “Everything in my life is tainted by this break up, but I know this is only temporary.” (temporary)

Do you engage in negative thinking that could be flipped to positive speaking? Share your thoughts below.

(1) Seligman, Martin E. P.  Learned optimism / Martin E.P. Seligman ; Random House Australia, Milsons Point, N.S.W. :  1992