So, you are single for the first time in a long time. What do you do now?
You were in a relationship for what seems like the greater part of your life. You got so used to having someone to call when you were alone, bored, or just wanted someone to keep the bed warm, and now you have no one. Where do you even start to pick up the pieces and move on?
Well, for one, you need to cry. That’s right, turn on the sappiest movie you can think of- Marley and Me will do the trick- grab the biggest tub of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream you can find, change into your pajamas, curl up into a ball on the couch, and just let it out. Cry over the good memories that you will miss. Cry over nights where you should’ve known that this would be the person who was going to break your heart. Cry over everything in between. You can never truly move on until you allow yourself to mourn.
After a few weeks the crying has to stop. Enough is enough. You will never be able to pull your life together if you are constantly falling apart over drinking coffee because your significant other also liked to drink coffee, and you two used to drink coffee together. Seriously… stop that. Now. You need to accept the fact that that person’s chapter in your life has ended. They are never coming back. Once you understand this, than you can truly start to get back to whom you were before they were apart of your life.
That brings us to the big questions, who were you before you became so-and-so’s boyfriend or girlfriend? How do you define yourself now that they are gone? Who do you want to be?
If your answer to each of these questions read something along the lines of: wishing I was so-and-so’s girlfriend, no one without so-and-so, and wanting to be so-and-so’s girlfriend again, then you need to go back to wallowing in self pity on the couch because you clearly are not ready to get on with your life.
If you have dried all of your tears, are ready to eat something that isn’t frozen, have put on your grown up pants, and are ready to move on, then you are ready for the final step, you are ready to date yourself.
You need to fall in love with yourself all over again. Take yourself out on a date. I’m serious. Before every Sunday was dinner at so-and-so’s house, and every Friday was reserved for watching him play football or her play softball, what did you like to do? It may sound silly to you, but if you love to go out to fancy restaurants or concerts or sporting events, you need to get dressed, get up, and go. The biggest thing you need to understand about being single is that nobody is going to take you out anymore, but that doesn’t mean that you have to become a spinster with thirty cats, it just means that you need to take matters into your own hands.
Maybe you want to use this rebuilding experience to change some things about yourself that you never had the time or energy or even, desire to change before. Maybe you want to lose that ten pounds, so go out and join a gym and work out everyday until you are satisfied. Maybe you want to dye your hair blonde, because well, why the hell not, you no longer have anyone telling you that you look better as a brunette. Maybe you even want to experience new things that so-and-so was always too lazy to try, like hiking up that mountain that looks so beautiful from afar. Become who you want to be; this is the opportunity that you have been looking for.
Learning to be alone is certainly no easy task. I’m not saying that this is going to be easy, in fact it may be the hardest thing that you ever have to do, and you are going to work at it every single day, but who is more worth it than yourself? You may feel like a million eyes are on you when you say “table for one” at your favorite Italian restaurant, and you may suffer through dinner, awkwardly glancing at your phone, praying that the entrée will come soon, but after a few “dates” it will get easier. Dating yourself is no different from dating another person; eventually you will be comfortable without the company of another person because you will realize that you are enough. You don’t need a man or a woman to validate your existence.
Inevitably, so-and-so will send you a text that will make you want to throw your phone against the wall. It will read something along the lines of, “I love you, I miss you, and I want you back.” The old you would have gone crawling back because your fear of being alone made you do stupid things such as this, however, the new you has too much self respect. You have now fallen in love with yourself, and for the life of you cannot understand why someone like him or her would ever hurt you the way that they did. You would rather stand tall on your own then cowering in the shadows of someone who never loved you the way that you deserved to be loved.
