I think we’ve all had that person who we thought was “the one”, you swore they were "it". But life happens and things change. You’re picturing that person now, aren’t you? Well, I can almost guarantee that you, like I, had a moment or many in which you put their happiness ahead of yours, even sacrificing things that meant a lot to you.

For me, the biggest sacrifice was travel. After my college graduation all I wanted to do was book a one-way ticket to Europe. My boyfriend at the time didn’t think we should waste our time, explaining that traveling was just too expensive and out of our budget. He wasn’t entirely wrong. Anyone who has traveled before knows it can get a bit financially heavy, but I’m stubborn and not easily deterred. So I researched. For days I looked up and took notes on how to travel for cheap. Air BNB, house sitting, working while traveling in exchange for a place to sleep, hostels, etc. It cut the original budget in half. But still, he was not convinced and then it hit me that for him it wasn’t at all a priority. It made me realize, more than anything, that relationships are tough and as you continue and grow together sometimes you, inevitably, grow apart.

The best thing that happened to me during that time, besides my college graduation obviously, was our break up. Of course, in the moment I was devastated and didn’t know how I could go on and “Woe is me, how am I supposed to live without him??”, blah, blah, blah.

As it turns out, I went on without him better than when I was with him and I lived a life full of happiness and adventures that had been previously hindered. I recently found a quote online that could not be more true: "In three words I can sum up everything I've learned in life; it goes on."

I lost the supposed love of my life, but the insanely important thing was that I found myself.

There are cathartic moments when I think about that time and I’m truly glad I was left so broken hearted because it caused me to launch into a lot of self-evaluation. There was no better way, for me, to do that than to remove myself from a familiar surrounding and throw myself into a completely new place, where I didn’t know anyone. Now the point of this is not to put my ex in a poor light, he was a wonderful person, for a time. But as with friends, we outgrow our significant others and for me what I thought was the end all, be all ended up truly keeping me back from living a life that has been epically filled with travel in the past few years. The overall point is to find someone who compliments you, and differences will be had, that’s 120% okay. However, if anyone keeps you from your dreams, you should take some advice from Beyonce.....