We’ve all been there, occupying ourselves with meaningless tasks throughout the day to avoid checking our phone to see if the guy from the date last night has texted us. We’ve all went to bed with our ringer on loud in hopes that our crush will text us. We’ve all felt that flutter in our stomach when our phone makes a noise and we’re secretly praying it’s from her.

We’ve all waited and kept our hopes up for people that had no intention of being with us. Yeah, it hurts. Yeah, it sucks. But we, YOU, need to realize that you are more than that meaningless, “What are you up to” text at 2 am on Thursday night. You are more than a one night stand. You are more than the walk of shame on Saturday mornings. Your worth is much more than what you’re letting temporary people in your life get away with.

Think about yourself, all your achievements, goals and things you have to be proud of. You deserve to be treated like a priority—and if someone treats you like an option, kick them to the curb! That person you had a summer fling with that “didn’t want commitment” but now has a new boyfriend or girlfriend was never worth the tears, never worth your time and definitely not worth you being hung up over.

Thank that guy that never called you back after that “magical” date you thought you had—he wasn’t interested anyways and probably would have constantly left you feeling you weren’t ‘good enough’ for a call back. Thank the girl who flirted with you in your Stats class for the answers, she was never going to say yes to that date—but your intelligence got the prettiest girl in your 10 am to talk to you.

But honestly, the truth is that you are worth the call, the date to that fancy restaurant on Main Street, the good morning texts, the magical dates—all of it.

We need to stop making excuses for people who don’t prioritize us. Stop making excuses for people who don’t respect you and give you the love you deserve. Let go of the toxic people in your life who don’t make you happy; the people who make you feel like you don’t deserve them. It’s time to let go of people and that’s okay.

All those one-worded text messages she’s sending back to you and saying “aww” instead of appreciating the compliment you just gave her implies that she’s just not that into you. So he never called you after you let your guard down and maybe took things a little too far—don’t fall for his excuses on Friday night when he tells you he just “had a busy week.” The truth is, maybe his week was busy, but he was clearly too busy for you.

If someone isn’t taking time from their day to reach out to you, it’s because they really didn’t want to. Stop making excuses for people. It’s that simple, if someone doesn’t talk to you or bother to make plans with you—it’s because you just weren’t at the top of their priorities.

The hardest part moving on is actually realizing that it’s time to let them go. That guy who seemed great for the first month turned out to be a jerk. That girl you’ve been crushing on and flirting back and forth with in your Chem class actually has a boyfriend. When you realize your worth, when you realize that there are millions of people in the world, there are endless things you could be doing instead of feeling sorry for yourself—is when you’re going to finally pick your heart up from your sleeve and focus on you.

Find something new to focus on. You and your long-term significant other broke up; be sad, drink those extra shots of tequila, cry in the shower, do what you have to do—but don’t forget the most important part of a break up, moving on.

Train yourself for that 5k run next month. Join a club at school and meet new people. Take yourself out for coffee. Pick up a new book and melt into the pages. Hit the gym, sweat out all of those regrets and mistakes and lose the 10 pounds you’ve been putting off. Save up your money and plan a trip with your closest friends for spring break. Get out of bed, stop looking at old pictures and do something to get your mind off someone who isn’t doing the same for you.

I read this article on breaking up a few months ago and the analogy the author used really stuck with me and I wanted to share it with you— well, and because I love fashion.

She said that moving on is like breaking your favorite pair of heels. So for me, my favorite heels would have to be my black, lace-up pointed toe pumps from Aldo. Moving on is when the right heel breaks but the left one doesn’t.

If one heel is broken, you have to throw the entire pair out. You can try to glue it back together and fix it, but after time—like relationships, the same issue occurs and it breaks again. You won’t want to throw out these heels because not only are they adorable but they’re your favorite.

You’ve experienced so much together, crazy nights, romantic nights but then you remember all the bad nights—all the times they made you hurt from wearing them for too long or walking too far in them. But as you throw them out, you don’t feel sad anymore, it’s almost nostalgic. You remember all the lessons they’ve taught you—like maybe not to wear heels walking around for miles in Boston and all the times they’ve pushed you further—like that big hill you had to climb to catch your Uber in time.

But like the author who came up with the original heel analogy says, the good news is that there are plenty of other heels out there that are cuter, sturdier and that you can create new memories in. And that’s what moving on is.

There’s no need to hate or resent the person who you had to let go. You don’t need to promise yourself that you won’t slip up and read all the cute, lovey-dovey texts that your ex once sent you in the happy stages of your relationship. You don’t need block and delete them—only to borrow your bff’s phone to creep on their well-being after you’ve had that third glass of Moscato you know you shouldn’t have. You don’t have to ignore them when you see them out at Nathan Bill’s, in fact, say hi.

Let them see the new you, the person that finally chose themselves over someone who never put them first.

So when the girl who ghosted you comes crawling back and begs you to meet her out for drinks, or when that cute guy who suddenly breaks up with the girlfriend he told you that he never even wanted, raise your head high, ignore their desperate attempts to win you over, and let them know that this time you’re choosing someone new this time—you’re choosing you.