The Psychology of your 20s - 79. The psychology of breakups

Episode Date: March 30, 2023

Breakups and heartache are a universal experience in our 20’s. But what exactly happens to our minds, our bodies and our emotions at the end of a relationship? This week we will break down the psychology and the science behind breakups, heartbreak and moving on. We will explore the theory of withdrawal, stages of grief, conditioning and the psychology behind why ‘no contact’ really does work to hopefully provide some solace to all the heartbroken out there on what exactly a breakup does to our psychology. Buy merch here: https://the-psychology-of-your-20s.myshopify.com/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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that trust your girlfriends. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe, on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Welcome back to the psychology of your 20s, the podcast where we talk through some of the big life changes and transitions of our 20s and what they mean for our psychology. Hello everybody, welcome back to the podcast. Welcome back to a new episode, new listeners, old listeners, wherever you are in the world, I am so stoked to have you here for perhaps my most highly requested podcast episode of all time. Every week I receive so many DMs from people who have had their hearts,

absolutely shattered, who have been through the worst breakup of their life. who are grieving the end of a relationship. And today we're going to tackle all of it. We're going to discuss the nitty-gritty science and research and psychology behind our brains and our bodies and our emotions during a breakup. Why they leave such lasting emotional scars and how we can essentially move on and really begin to realize. the best versions of ourselves in the midst of heartache.

On a personal note, those who have listened to this show for a while will know that this podcast emerged from the ruins of a relationship, one that I had in my early 20s. And this show, this podcast, all that it's become, it was kind of my savior, my little passion project, that got me through a rough time and allowed me to really reclaim a lot of my identity and my independence. And that very ex actually came on the show a few months back,

but right as I was beginning to heal from that breakup, I started seeing someone else. I can safely say it was never very serious in the way that my previous relationship was. I never really dreamed of marrying this person and, you know, God forbid having children with him, let alone a lease or a mortgage. But when it came to an end,

And it crushed me. It destroyed me in a way that for the last eight to ten months, I really never thought I was going to recover from. It's really funny how our brains take these intense romantic experiences and do not let go. And I spent so many weeks and months almost begging my mind to move on, to stop obsessing and thinking about all the what-ifs. And then the other day, a flip just kind of switched in my brain. I was driving home from somewhere. I don't really remember where. And for all of my Taylor Swift fans out there, the song Clean came on.

Honestly, number one breakup song. But I just had this weird epiphany where I was like, yeah, I'm ready to move on now. And I'm ready to make this episode. I've read so many books. I've done the research for my own. own sake, I've done the work, been to therapy, consulted all of my friends who would listen. So let's talk about it. And I really want to talk to my fellow 20-something-year-olds who are going through or have gone through the exact same thing. Breakups are hard. They are incredibly

confusing and raw and terrible. But they are also such a sacred time, I think, for self-growth and personal development. You know, I don't believe I would be the person I am today without the formative breakups that I've gone through in my 20s. They each have taught me something so unique and completely diverted my life path. It's also such a common pattern of behavior to leave or exit a relationship

and suddenly become like really obsessed with the gym or your work to find that you have more time for your friends and for your family and for yourself. And I believe it's because this experience presents such a pivotal time to realize the best version of yourself, even whilst we're still often hurting and grieving. You know, two complex versions of ourselves, two emotional states, can exist at once.

So what I want to do today is break down that complexity and reveal what's really going on neurologically and psychologically when our relationships come to an end. We are going to cover what happens to our brains in the weeks and months following a breakup, why we react the way we do, why the experience is so uniquely painful. We're going to discuss how we can actually apply the stages of grief to the end of relationship and why actually sometimes it's our shorter relationships that can be so much more significant. Of course, we can't talk about breakups without a discussion on heartbreak, but also

how we can move on and heal. What advice does psychology have for us in those moments when we are so done with the relationship, so ready to move on, but still feel really still. in the past and in the memories of the person and what was. For my heartbroken people out there, for those on the mend, those who are grieving, this episode is for you. I've been there. I know your pain and I want to give you the guidance and the advice that I so wished that I'd had earlier. So without further ado, let's break down the psychology of breakups, the psychology of heartbreak and how to heal, how to flourish, how to let go. I think that heartbreak is a universal experience for those of us in our 20s.

We spend this decade dating and figuring out what we like, falling in love, so effortlessly and carelessly believing that these characters are the loves of our lives. And then one day, it's all over. and whether you were the one who ended things or not, both parties are left picking up the pieces. It's an incredibly powerful experience, sometimes life-changing, always memorable. I think evidence of that is how fascinated we are by the end of relationships.

We talk about it all the time, we discuss it with our friends, people write some of the greatest songs of all time on the back of a bad breakup, entire genres of movies and books and televisions is created on the premise of heartache and heartbreak because the emotional and even physical impact is so profound and significant. So what exactly goes on in our brains at the end of a relationship? I think human connection is incredibly beautiful and love.

Well, that's one of the best feelings out there. someone really argue it's our entire reason for being to be seen by someone else and cared for and understood. Well, not only do I hope that that's been everyone's experience, but it really does change how our brain interprets the world. The saying goes that love is a drug, but it's actually not just a saying. It's very much true. Falling in love releases so many powerful neurotransmitters and chemicals like dopamine, like serotonin, like oxytocin, all of which are really important for pleasure and passion, bonding and other intense feelings. Researchers have found that intense feelings of romantic love affect the brain in the same way as powerful drugs. This

professor, Dr. Helen Fisher, she's an anthropologist and a relationship researcher. She's a She conducted a series of studies on this very interaction between our brain chemistry and the feeling of love. Specifically, she found that the same chemicals, that is massive amounts of dopamine and serotonin, are in play. And many of the same brain pathways and structures are active when we are falling in love as when we are enjoying a cocaine high. And we all know that illegal drugs like cocaine are incredible. addictive and we can logic that love given it activates many of the same neurological reactions is the same you've probably even felt those powerful effects our you know the rose-tinted glasses as we call it that are brought on by this influx and this rush of chemicals in our brain so what happens

when that source of our love often our relationship and the validation and the warm, gooey feelings comes to an end. It's a sad reality, you know, we go from talking to that person every day, from celebrating our successes with them and mourning our losses and our failures. You know, we know everything about them. And when that's over, essentially our brain goes into withdrawal.

You've spent, you know, the last six months, the last five years, however long it may be, receiving that stimulation and the release of these powerful neurotransmitters and then it drops off and the brain is left scrambling for more trying to re-establish that sense of homeostasis and normalcy. So post-breakup, especially if you go no contact, which I would definitely recommend and we'll talk about that later, but your brain enters basically a state of acute wanting and it makes it really difficult for us to focus on anything other than that person that we're missing. In fact, this relative kind of deficit in the neurotransmitters associated with pleasurable feelings and happiness

but also with that person, it can even give rise to symptoms that resemble clinical depression or withdrawal. And that is the love withdrawal hypothesis. It explains why we find that in the months after a breakup, we just crave this person like they're a drug. We want to call them. For closure or whatever reason you give, we become obsessed and unable to move on, but also willing to do really stupid and wild things. Just as a person who is fighting a drug addiction would do, someone who is a drug addiction would do, someone who is heartbroken, obsesses and craves their ex because they are essentially kicking an addiction

that this person has created for them, a love addiction, a neurochemical addiction. That is one possible theory that kind of explains why breakups are so unpleasant. Even when we know it was the right decision and we are entirely rational that we have no future with this person, that this needed to happen, that doesn't lessen our neurological response. Logic doesn't supersede biology in these instances. That was a huge struggle for me. You know, I mentioned my last breakup and how much it shook me up, but the hardest part of that was knowing, without a doubt, that I could do better,

but my heart still hurt so deeply because my brain was in the process of healing. and healing an addiction to this other person. This really links with another explanation. I'm just realizing that there are so many cliche phrases about breakups that we're talking about today. It was totally unintentional. But I think it really goes to show how much of our culture and our language is really influenced by this experience. I'm sure we've all heard people talk about the end of a relationship and say how their heart is crushed. heart is broken. We hear people wail and sob and talk about, you know, this almost physical pain that

they're in. You know, you don't really understand that pain until you've been through it. And we often dismiss this level of suffering is overdramatic or exaggerated. But the science shows that getting our heart broken is very much comparable to real physical pain, much like breaking an arm, this pain it's not just in the body, it's also in the mind. And that is especially the case for an emotional pain as profound as detaching from someone we were super attached to. MRI scans on the brain have shown that the withdrawal of romantic love activates the very same parts of the brain, which are triggered when you're in physical pain. similar to the previous study we talked about, these researchers in the US,

what they did was they showed people pictures of their exes, and then they looked at what areas of the brain lit up compared to when they were shown neutral pictures of their family or their friends. They compared these images of the brain, and what they found was it was really similar to the brain scans and the brain images of people who are undergoing a moderate to a severe amount of physical pain. It revealed that our brain processes emotional pain in the same areas in the same region as physical pain. That's why, although there may not be something causing us an explicit physical injury,

we still feel the sting of a breakup and the sting of heartbreak mentally, and actually to some extent this experience may even mimic pain in our bodies, physical pain. That may explain that ache in the chest that is often so common, the loss of appetite, the nausea, the fatigue,

the activation of fight or flight mode right after the end of a relationship. We talk about this reaction quite a bit on the show. Our flight or fight mode is essentially our body's unconscious an automatic response to a perceived threat. When you go through a breakup, especially one that's unexpected, your body may register it as an emergency and go into flight or flight mode or even a state of shock.

Essentially, what our body is doing is adjusting to a perceived threat to our survival. You know, evolutionarily, abandonment by a mate, signified danger. And that instinct is still alive. and still active in our bodies. Being in this state triggers the release of hormones that can prepare our body to deal with a threat or to run to safety. It can also trigger that response that we talked about

all of those physical symptoms. So even though the heartbreak, the loss of this person, this partner may be in the mind, our body also feels it. You know, we spend so much time learning this individual investing in the relationship, accepting their support and their validation, building trust, and then suddenly that is gone and we don't know how to cope. We may even question how we'll survive without them. And that triggers this very ancient, physical and

cognitive reaction. This idea of a loss of investment is another thing I really want to touch on. relationships can be incredibly fulfilling but I think the older we get the later into our 20s even into our 30s or 40s the more we realize that they're also work a really valuable article written by insider said this really perfectly so I have to share when you spend months or years building your life with someone breaking up with them can feel like you've lost all of the emotional energy and the material resources and the time you spent maintaining that partnership. Relationships involve big investments from us, time away from family, big feelings, attention, money. So losing a partner, not through death or anything like that, breaking up with them, it can make you feel as though everything you've put into that relationship was, at the end of the day, wasted. A reaction to this is that we can become quite jaded. This was definitely my experience. I cannot tell you the amount of times that I told my friends I would never date again. After every unsuccessful relationship or

situation or date, I would just almost reinforce this sense to myself that I was going to be happy being alone. And I truly convinced myself of that. But I think deep down, I always knew. that that wasn't true, that I was jaded. We all want someone who was our person. Despite being scared of being hurt again, it was really important for me to realize that my brain had subconsciously learnt this connection between love and trust and hurt through the repetition of these experiences from these relationships that had gone wrong. Or even in some instances for others, just a serious awful breakup can teach us this. It's a theory known as classical conditioning. As humans, we are primed to avoid pain and suffering. So if you've had your heart absolutely shattered, we feel it's necessary to

avoid or romantic connection as a result because we associate it with being hurt. But that's really no way, I think, to live your life. I think suffering and putting yourself out there, being vulnerable, that brings growth, that brings change. You honestly never know what a relationship is going to do to you and not in a bad way in a way that you never know what new door, new chapter is going to open. You really do have to take the risk and learn the lessons along the way. I saw this really interesting TikTok the other day, and I think it relates really perfectly to this next theory I want to touch on. Essentially, it explained this kind of anecdotal idea or theory around the journey we go through in the months after heartbreak. You know, we travel through this period of grief, then we kind of try and get back out there, date around, have a few unsuccessful experiences, and we hermit.

and her theory wasn't wrong. It was kind of spot on. Our journey through a breakup can actually be mapped on to the stages of grief that psychologists typically use to explain our reaction to death or the loss. This psychiatrist, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, she adapted this theory in the late 60s to talk about the loss incurred by a breakup. Yes, that person is still alive, they're not dead, but the relationship. relationship isn't and I think it sometimes makes it more complicated in my opinion, knowing that that person is still out there, but for whatever reason, you can't be together. I'm going to walk us through each stage. If you're someone who has been broken up with or you're going through a breakup in the last 12 months or so, I want you to listen closely here and see if you can identify yourself in any of these stages. The first one is denial. You know, those first few days after a breakup, you can feel completely normal and fine. And people often come to me and say, I just feel like I'm not emotionally processing this. I literally feel nothing. That is totally valid. It's actually

a really normal experience to be thinking, you know, this is the best decision I've ever made. You throw yourself back into socializing, you feel fine. Well, that's probably denial. And it's our brain's way of protecting us from immediate emotional pain by suppressing our reaction until a few days or even weeks have passed. During this stage, our reality has shifted completely. And it can take our mind some time to really adjust to this new reality, these new circumstances. And that's denial. That's where we almost, I haven't really processed what's happened. Life doesn't feel like it's changed much. But for my heartbroken, people out there, we know that that doesn't last long before the anger sets in. Anger is a completely normal reaction to extreme

emotional discomfort. And it often flows out of us a lot easier than sadness because it's a fairly uncomplicated emotion. Anger, especially combative anger, it also tends to be the first thing we actually feel when we start releasing all those pent-up emotions associated with a breakup. I see this all the time in friends of mine who have broken up with their partners. It always starts really civil, they wish them the best, They say they're fine. And then like three weeks in, you start to hear the anger come through. You know, the statements about how they were such a shit person, how, you know, they never deserved them, all the stories you've never heard before. The floodgates are opening and anger is the first emotion to be released.

I think it's best not to suppress this feeling, but let yourself feel this emotion. You'll get through it, I think, a lot faster if you do. Don't do anything rash, but allow yourself to feel angry. Bargaining, you know, despite how cruel or awful a person was, if we stayed with them for long enough, the chances are that we were attached. And as that attachment is put under pressure by distance, we may find ourselves backsliding and contemplating whether this was the right decision. This is where bargaining enters the breakup equation with thoughts like, you know, if we get back

together a promise that I'll be a better person or I'll go to the gym, they'll want me back, bargaining comes from a feeling of helplessness and it gives us a perceived sense of control over the situation. Regardless of whether you actually were the one to end the relationship or not, sometimes we get to this point of feeling like everything was our fault and that we want to go back. We want to change our emotional state. We don't want to experience this pain anymore. We might look back at our interactions with that person and realize all the times that maybe we ruin the wrong, think that we can't do better. And you know, sometimes we do get back with this person, but the chances are that if you're listening to this episode, that has not been the

case. And I saw this amazing quote the other day for all my people who and my friends who are in the bargaining stage. If there was a reason that you broke up in the first place, there's a reason why you shouldn't get back together. Like you have to really place yourself in that logical state of mind as hard as it is. There was a reason that relationship didn't work and that reason is a strong enough reason to not contemplate getting back together with them. And I think that's where we move on to the next stage, which is depression. I have this theory that this stage of the breakup, the depression stage, is really what people envision when we talk about heartache or we talk about a breakup. It's the misery. It's the 2 AM tears, the long drives in your car, the breakup playlist, waiting for a text

back, the pain, all the hard stuff, all the different. difficult emotions. During our experience of processing grief, there comes a time when all of our emotions and our imaginations and our bargaining begins to slow down and we start to really understand the state and the situation that we're in and kind of what we're faced with, which is that this person is no longer part of your life. And that's something that you really have to accept. So in this stage of the breakup, I think we really start to feel that reality a lot more abundantly. And as we begin to contemplate questions like, will I ever see this person again? Or who am I, if they're not in my life? Will I ever experience love again? All of those really existential

questions, our circumstances begin to become a lot more clear and our loss becomes a lot more unavoidable. And that sadness grows. And I think that's when the actual hard work and the healing really begins. In my most recent breakup, it was so strange. I spent like the first four months being totally cool, totally okay. I was like, wow, this is the easiest thing I've ever done. I'm so over this. And then it just all crumbled in like a minute. There was like this one day where this, I just could feel myself entering this stage and I just was like, oh my God, this is where it begins. I think it's important to note that the length and the intenseness of this stage is different for everyone because we each have different pre-existing attachment styles, temperaments and personalities.

There are people out there who can disconnect from a relationship just like that and who appear to move on really quickly. And if you're a sensitive person like me, sometimes that can really be the hardest part, knowing that the other person has moved on while you're still grieving and trying to process your emotions. It's almost like a competition. Like who can move on the fastest and when you're losing, it just feels really terrible. It really makes us question whether what you had was real. I promised you that it was, let me just say, if someone has appeared to move on, especially straight into a new relationship, I promise you, I promise you that they haven't moved on. And they will be either single in five months or, you know, we'll have to deal with the repercussions in their new relationship.

It's not going to be smooth sailing. The amount of people that I have dated who have started seeing someone like two months after we've broken up and then like a year later have like come crawling back is astounding. because you can't undo a relationship with the click of your fingers, you're using someone else as a distraction. And if you haven't taken the time to properly journey through the stages of grief, if you've skipped past that essential emotional work, you haven't accepted what's happened and you haven't fully processed your emotions

or what that relationship meant to you. So essentially what ends up happening is you use someone else as a distraction from the hard feelings, five months later, six months later, you're back at square one. I think what I'm essentially trying to say is that these individuals, they skip over all the important parts and they don't process your emotions, they don't process their emotions, and they just assume that they've reached acceptance. And acceptance, of course, is the final stage. If you've moved through all those other stages, like this isn't a past go situation,

you have to go through it, you have to go through the trenches. When we come to a place of acceptance, it's not that we no longer miss the person, that we no longer feel pain, all that sadness and regret can still be present in this phase. But you also start to feel at peace. You rationally come back to yourself. You accept that it is, you know, it is what it is, that it happened for a reason, that it needed to happen, you made the right choice, and you start looking forward and maybe even dating again, but also more importantly, you forgive yourself because you're now able to accurately reflect on the

relationship and see what went wrong. At this stage, I think reconciliation is possible, but a warning to the wise. I honestly don't think that you can be friends with your ex. I don't think that reconciliation will work in most cases. And like I said before, if you've been around for a while, you'll know that I did an episode on Can X's Be Friends featuring my ex-boyfriend? Let me just say that at the time I had a really positive outlook in that episode, but we're actually no longer friends. I always thought that it would be possible, but it's actually really hard to forget what you once were to each other. Romantic attraction, physical attraction may fade, but our bodies and our minds, remember.

And if both individuals are not on the same page, it is never going to work. You need to be completely and brutally honest with yourself. If there is even the slightest desire to get back together with this person, you're not ready. You're not ready to reach out. You're not ready for the closer conversation.

You're not ready to talk. I hope this has kind of given you guys a bit of an insight into the hidden mechanisms of our pain, regardless of what stage you're in, heartache is never easy. So if you're listening to this for some sage psychological wisdom on how to move on and fully let go, you are in luck because that is what I want to talk about next in just a moment. There is the brutal, honest truth. If you want to truly let go of someone after the end of a relationship, you need to disconnect from them entirely. It can be really easy to keep touching base,

you know, seeing each other after things have ended, but I promise you that will only elongate the process of emotional and physical detachment. All of the science and the psychology says that the months after a breakup are in essence a period of withdrawal. You're trying to eliminate your brain's addiction to this person and the feeling that they bring you.

but if you keep finding ways to see them, sleeping with them, talking, you give your brain what we call invariable reward or reinforcement, which only promotes the obsession and the difficulty in breaking things off completely. Every time you see your ex, especially in a manner that is reminiscent of your past romantic relationship, your brain receives a dopamine hit and it reinforces that pathway or learned condition. between this person and the warm, fuzzy feelings that we receive. I hate to say it. I know it's not always a popular opinion, but no contact truly is your friend if your aim is to let go,

if your aim is to move on. From my own personal experience, I know that decision is a lot harder than the easier path of kind of keeping in touch, but I promise you in three months time you will be shanking yourself because it's important to remember that breakups aren't just social, they're not just emotional, they are neurological, and your brain is the basis of your attachment and your obsession with this person. So if you break the habit, you'll find that you'll heal quicker. Block their number and follow them right now. You don't need to see what they're doing. You don't need to see what parties they're attending, what people they're with. It's like scratching an itch.

feel good, but the sting will only come back stronger later. No contact is your friend, as hard as it may be. We know from research that the end of a relationship causes a plunge in dopamine and serotonin levels, hence why we often enter, I think, a pretty dark state in many ways that kind of mimics even the symptoms of depression. Additionally, I think exposure to our past memories with someone and their images or thoughts of them, it activates some of the very same brain regions that interpret and process physical pain like we talked about before. So how do we minimize these physiological symptoms that often draw us back into connecting with our exes? You need to find a source of dopamine and happiness that has absolutely nothing to do with

that person. You need to find a replacement for the deficit that they've left you. You need to find a replacement meant for the deficit that they've left you in. And it's kind of up to you, but I would say something like watching TV or napping. That's a temporary fix. What we want is an activity that creates long-term gratification. One of my friends got super into doing triathlons and rock climbing after she split from her partner. She was honestly so jacked by the end of it. But it was also something that really gave her a sense of purpose and a sense of

of self beyond the relationship. Something like joining a sports club, a social sports team, an art class, gardening, miniature trains, you know, honestly, it doesn't really matter. As long as it makes you happy and crucially, you're able to enter a flow state, a state of complete calm and focus and excitement when you're participating. That is what's most important, that you're able to reconnect with yourself, you're able to increase those dopamine levels without needing the other person. But I would also say bonus points

if it involves being able to meet new people and hopefully new friends who have no idea who your ex is, who are not friends with your ex, who only know you as yourself. I think one of the major difficulties moving on from a relationship is how conflated our individual identities become with someone else's.

So finding new people, new hobbies, new facets of yourself that have absolutely nothing to do with that other person, it really does help aid your healing journey and reconnect you with your essence, with your personal sense of identity, and with your own self-worth and your own value. A lot of these tips may sound like avoidance or distraction, you know, cutting off your ex completely, diving into your new sport and your new friendships. But there is something really important about just allowing yourself to feel self-pity and to wallow. The people I know who try really hard to pretend like they're all right and move on really quickly, you know, four months later,

they're the ones who suffer the most and who hurt the longest because suppression, which is what they're doing, is an unhealthy coping mechanism and all it does is prolong the inevitable. You need to break down. You need to cry. You need to wish you'd never met them. And swear to your friends, you'll never date again. Trust me, it's a right of passage to really feel your emotions. You know, you don't need to get lost in it.

It's all with moderation. But I think, importantly, while you're going through this, make sure you create a safe space to really feel what you're feeling. to really, like I said, wallow. I do this thing where every time a relationship ends, I grow to Queensland, which is where I kind of grew up, and it's where I feel most vulnerable. And I know there that I am safe,

that I am able to really express myself, I'm able to feel my emotions, there's no one I need to keep up with, I'm not going to run into them anywhere. And it can be something, as simple as rearranging your room to kind of disassociate from the memories you might have with them in there. Go and buy yourself a cozy breakup blanket or a candle. Create a little oasis for yourself to be vulnerable and to be emotional and give yourself time to endure the pain. I know it's so

much easier to distract, to flee, to run away from hard emotions. But I think that you'll be surprised how much you will learn about yourself because emotional release brings clarity. I also think it's really important to give yourself the closure that you need. I think where people often go wrong as they try and move on from someone is believing that only the other person can bring them closure and I don't believe that for a second. Ask yourself if you're thinking about reaching out, if you're thinking about having the closure conversation with them, what exactly are you looking for when you're talking about closure? Is there really a specific thing that they can give you or they can say that's going to make you feel

better? The answer is probably not. And even if there is, it's very unlikely that they're actually going to say it. Here's the truth. You can give yourself the closure that you need. They are not responsible for healing you. That's your job. And there are a few ways that you can kind of activate that closing of the chapter, ways that you can pursue full body and emotional closure from your previous relationship. The one I always suggest is to write a letter to that person. Just get a couple pieces of paper. I want you to write everything that you loved about them, everything that was special but also why you're mad, why you're angry, while you're miserable. Talk about how you feel right now, but also why you need to let go. Consider it almost a final love letter to them,

all of the emotions that you're feeling, put it on the page. And then I want you to put it away. And I also don't want you to stop writing until you've really done. You've really exhausted all the thoughts in your brain and either get rid of that letter or keep it in a box. Don't send it to them. Don't tell anyone about it. Just do it for you.

Say goodbye in your own way. I also want you to remove anything that reminds you of them from your physical space. All that's going to do is reactivate those synaptic connections in your brain that make you want them back,

that make you long and obsess. It's really important to recreate or refurbish or clean your personal spaces of memories of them so that you can reclaim them as your own. If you're really struggling and you're like, I really want to reach out to this person, no contact isn't working, I miss them, they are the love of my life, visualization is your friend. I want you to visualize yourself bearing a box containing all the memories from that relationship. And if that thought comes in where you're like, I can't stop thinking about this person, I can't stop obsessing over them, one of my friends gave me an amazing strategy for this. Imagine their

face on a ball and then picture yourself hitting that ball as far away as possible. It really helps. I will say that I have used that a few times. And visualization is a great way of kind of tricking your brain into creating a reality that it wants. I think it's also important, you know, with that letter idea that we suggested to make peace with the past, but accept the future. They're no longer going to be in your life. That's a really hard pill to swallow. But write out all of your favorite things about them on a piece of paper.

And then for each reason, I want you to write down the reasons why you needed to break up. the reasons why you couldn't stay, why this breakup is necessary. Sometimes I think it's important to go deeper into the belly of the beast before we emerge. And remind yourself that there is a better love out there for you and you're willing to wait. There is someone who is going to love you in a way that you cannot even imagine who is going to think that you're the most perfect person, who is going to treat you in a way that you have begged to be treated from every past person. I always say this on the show, so sorry if I'm like a broken record, but I would rather find the love of my life at 35,

then reach that age and realize that I'd settled too soon. Also, whatever you do, if you are still emotionally raw, do not get into a new relationship. That is the number one piece of advice. I probably should have said it sooner. I know it can be so easy to use love and affection and the love and affection of another person to soothe the wounds of loss.

But I promise you in the long run it will come back to bite you. Take some time to be alone. It's really sacred. There is going to be a point in your future when you're married, when you have kids, whatever, where you're going to look back at this time where you were single in your 20s and wish that you just had one more day like that. So really cherish it. And I promise you will thank yourself.

You will learn so much about who you are. You will discover so much about your identity and your personality through heartbreak. More than you will in any relationship. more than any relationship can teach you. You know, we've all been there, and I know a few of you will roll your eyes when I say this. I'm sorry, but it does get better. There are people out there who will love you, like I said, more than you ever could anticipate. And the end of one chapter is the beginning of an even better one, even if it takes a while.

I promise that the growth and the maturity is worth it. So I'm sending love to you all, all my heartbroken people out there. I hope that this episode helped you and that you do not get into a new relationship. I feel like that is the major point that we took away from this episode. But I really didn't love kind of exploring this. You know, like I said, I feel like I've just come out of it and I finally kind of felt ready to really do some of the deep diving. that I'd wish I'd done earlier and to just kind of talk about it because I know it can be really, really difficult.

So I am sending you love. I'm sending you strength. It will get better. I'm sorry to say it. I know it's annoying, but I promise you it will. And I just want to thank you for following along and listening to this episode. If you enjoyed it, please feel free to leave a five-star review on Apple Podcast, Spotify, wherever you are listening right now.

Follow us on Instagram. If you want to be more involved, if you have to be more involved. any episode suggestions. I love to hear your ideas and it really makes my day to hear that you guys are engaged and that you want to learn more. So we are at that psychology podcast on Instagram. Also, I talked about this in last week's episode, but we now have merchandise available. So if you want to be decked out with some, the psychology of your 20s podcast merchandise, guys, please visit our website or the link in the podcast description and send me a photo. I would love to see you guys wearing your beautiful merch.

And thank you so much for listening. I can't wait to be back next week for another episode. Hey, what's good, y'all? You're listening to Learn the Hardway with your favorite therapist and host Kear Games. This space is about black men's experiences, having honest conversations that it's really not safe to have anywhere. but you're having him with a licensed professional who knows what he's doing. How many men carry a suit or armor. It signals to the world that you not to be played with.

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