Write the letter if there is something you need to express, but don’t send it.

To write a letter and send it primes your mind to expect a response and perpetuates the agony. Even if you say to yourself, “It’s okay if she doesn’t respond,” a small part of you will hope that she does.

I’m not sure where this concept of “closure” has come from and why it’s infiltrated the world of psychotherapy, but I personally think it’s bunk. I’m not a therapist, but in my humble opinion, trying to achieve “closure” is a rehashing of the past, it’s clinging to something that once was, and is now gone. It prevents people on both sides from letting go and moving on.

To borrow Matt’s term from another thread, I’ve been down that mental maze before; “Everything will be okay if they know how I feel….I’ll feel better if they just understood what they meant to me…If they just apologize, I’ll feel better…If we could just be friends, the world will be normal…blah blah blah.” Total and utter B.S.

Breaking up is painful. It sucks. It hurts down to the very essence of your core and being. And you know what, it’s suppose to. Why? Because it meant something. It was powerful. It was special. It was important. There is no “Let’s just apologize and be friends” like we see in movies and sitcoms. To be honest, that kind of attitude and approach actually insults the relationship and debases the experience.

This relationship is a learning experience. It says more about you than you may realize and therefore, use this experience to look inward. Looking to the other person to help you find inner peace and equanimity is a distraction from the work that needs to be done within.

You can working with your therapist by asking, why did you develop a relationship with a person who, in hindsight, was so unstable and broken? What unresolved issues might you have that propel you into unhealthy codependent relationships? How can you find more stability in your life without a relationship?

My experience is that for better or worse, people attract their perfect match. Broken people, attract other broken people. Strong and stable people, attract strong and stable people.

This relationship is over and, someday, you’ll find someone else. So, what kind of person do you want to attract?

“..I’m not doing enough or working hard enough to succeed..”
“..I should do more…”
“..feel like I never do enough..”
“..feel a bit bad about myself..”
“..you should at least be working…”

Holy crap! 😛 Sounds like you’ve got a really vicious demon inside you telling you some really nasty things about yourself and making up a lot of B.S. I’ve been where you are now and I know a lot of people who believed their parents, authority figures, and the media who tie our sense of self-worth to external accomplishments and unrealistic benchmarks of what it means to be successful and happy.

This book is not an exorcism, but it’s the closest thing that I’ve found to help kill that demon. Try it out: http://www.amazon.com/Soul-without-Shame-Liberating-Yourself/dp/157062383X

Believe me, there is freedom from this vicious cycle. 🙂

• This reply was modified 10 years, 9 months ago by John.

Your description feels all too familiar. From the sounds of it, you’ve slipped into the relationship danger zone. Namely, obsession and addiction. Now that you’re cut off from the source of your “happiness”, you’re experiencing the symptoms of withdrawal. The mind constantly wanders back the object of desire reviewing the past, looking around every corner for it’s presence, and finding reminders in even the smallest and remote details of everyday life.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that it was a relationship filled with high intensity and euphoria. It’s easy to misconstrue these feelings of “happiness”, “joy”, and “elation” as love, but recognize your relationship for what it was – a drug. Anything that moves you to that sort of extreme and overwhelming feeling is bound to rebound eventually. For every highest high, there is the potential for an equally lowest low.

Recognizing that this was not a healthy relationship, that what you’re experiencing now is simply withdrawal, and that your mind is playing tricks on you as it’s looking for a fix, is huge eye opener that can help you move forward. As much as it hurts, spend some time alone and if you need social interaction, seek good hearted people who will be supportive, empathetic, and compassionate.

Also, take some time to connect with your inner child. It’s probably been neglected over the years, may have suffered some hardships, and so it seeks out love, affection, and validation from the outside world. Take the time to play with it, listen to it, and console it. It will be okay, it just takes a bit of time.

I’m going to put on my beginner’s hat because I hear where you’re coming from and empathize with the struggle – I too have these moments of yearning and I’m trying to explore where they come from and what to do with that energy that brings about feelings of longing and desire to be with someone, which can sometimes be very frustrating with your mind lashing out at the world, “Hey! Why not me?!’

But if there is no void, if there is no self-pity, if there is no crisis, if you are perfectly content with all aspects of yourself and your life, what’s left but to take each day as it comes and accept whatever may or may not come?

I direct this question to you as much as I do at myself.

I’m in a state of mind right now where if I meet someone, if we like each other, if we fall in love, if we get married, if we have a child, that’s great. And if none of that happens or if along that relationship trajectory, one of us or both us decide to go our separate ways for whatever million reasons people do, it won’t be the end of the world. Life will go on. I’ll be happy. She’ll be happy. And eventually, the struggle will end with death.

I realize it’s a very stoic approach to life, but that’s simply where I am today and so I want to be transparent about where my response is coming from.

I can definitely hear where hellno is coming from and to some extent agree. At the same time, the “Light a fire under your ass and do something with your life” message is not always very conducive to bringing about the fundamental shift you may need to truly find the freedom and equanimity you seek.

I’ve been down the route of skydiving, climbing a mountain, scuba diving, running a marathon, moving to another country, and learning a new language as a way of trying to get out of a certain head space, but, from my experience, all I can say is that those things are simply temporary distractions. I’m not saying don’t do those things, but be very clear as to why you’re doing them. Do them because you want to do them, because they reflect your goals, values, and aspirations, not because they’re simply something else you could be doing with your time.

hellno is also right about exploring further the void that you’re currently feeling and hoping to fill with a relationship and a child. Could it be that there are certain aspects of yourself that you do not love or accept fully? Is there still some self-doubt about your wholeness as a person without being in a relationship or mother?

Do you pity those who have not had children or who are not in a relationship? Do you think they want your pity? Probably not. Why then do you pity yourself?

There is the possibility that you may never be a mother or a wife. There is a possibility that you may not wake up tomorrow from your sleep, be disfigured in a horrible car accident, or find out that you have a terminal disease. Not that I would wish any of these things up on anyone, the probability of having are just as great as the probability of not having. There is amazing strength, resilience, and ultimately happiness in the acceptance and letting go of things and not trying to drive and control circumstances to meet your will.

I’m not saying not to pursue a relationship or not to want to have children, but don’t get too emotionally attached to the outcome. Like skydiving or climbing a mountain, those things are simply experiences that you may or may not have. To say, “I will be happier if…” or “I will be happier when..” is setting yourself up for disappointment and mental anguish, stress, and anxiety.

You will never be more happy or complete that you can be right now. The lens through which you view yourself and the world around you is yours to choose.

• This reply was modified 10 years, 9 months ago by John.

I agree with Victoria – virginity is just a social construct and what you make of it.

So let’s drop the “V” word for a second and talk about sex in general. What does sex mean to you? Or more importantly, what do you want it to mean? You can decide.

Is sex something two people do for fun because it feels good, is it an expression of affection and a sign of intimacy, or all of the above? There’s no right or wrong answer here. You just have to choose what you want sex to represent in your life.

Personally, I could have lots of sex with lots of women, have no regrets about it, and form no emotional attachments. However, I choose not to. I choose sex to represent a new level of intimacy in a relationship and I don’t pursue sex outside the pursuit of monogamous relationship.

The choice is yours. It’s a personal choice that you don’t need to share with anyone else and no one should judge you for your choice.

Continue to talk it out and make the choice with your heart, your head, and your gut all in agreement.

I have to admit, there does seem to be some desperation in your words. I get the sense that there’s a holding or maybe even clinging onto something that doesn’t feel right for you.

If whatever it is that you are experiencing goes against the core of your being and your fundamental values in terms what you believe to be healthy relationships between people, trust your instinct. There’s no need for you to be there right now and there’s nothing any relationship can offer you that you can’t find within yourself.

Don’t ever feel like you to make it work for the sake of making it work.

• This reply was modified 10 years, 9 months ago by John.