Death of relationships
When I was younger, I was a firm believer that friendships are forever. Strangely enough, I never thought the same about love relationships.
What I still can’t understand are the mechanisms of break up. And trust me, I have been thinking about it a lot in the past year. The trigger, of course, was not a theoretical dispute, or a matter of interest, but a personal issue I am having with a very close friend of mine.
From besties to…nothing? We are not in high school anymore, so my expectation would be that we won’t be “breaking up” in front of a locker and then run away in tears. Reason is not a boy we both like, not a betrayal, no huge fights. How come you can stop caring about the other person and wish you do not have to see them too often? When you think about it it’s mind blowing. Imagine going through it.
Can I give you something like “5 steps to wellbeing”, or “10 ways to overcome breakup”? Definitely not. What I can share is my part of the story and you should always keep in mind that there is another part of it and another person suffering which words you cannot read or hear.
The biggest breaking point is lack of acceptance. You think you know the other person for ages, but then they change and you are stuck with their older version. I changed a lot in the past 18 months, I settled, I re-organized by priorities. I went from visiting home just to take a shower and change clothes to enjoying spending my free time on the sofa, cooking, reading, taking naps. I started putting myself first, still loving and caring about my close ones, but not going the extra mile for them every single time. I stopped caring about some topics and started caring about others. I became more easy going. A lot of Is. Death comes when you stop accepting life (or vice versa?), relationship death — when you stop accepting the other person and you do not change with the same pace.
How does a break up go? It is tough, it is somehow worse than ending a romantic relationship. You are oddly prepared that a romance can end up in flames, but we are thought from a very early age that best friends are forever. A lot of “Whys”, many “What can I have done better”, a load of drama and pain. Going to bed every night thinking why things went the way they did and how you can fix them. Until one day you realize that maybe it is not about fixing, that some things just can’t be put together with a magic glue. That maybe, just maybe, you need to do what is best for you at the moment and put your ego aside, the one telling you that the other person will be broken if you stop being their friend. A tough lesson learnt the past year is that I cannot help anyone if I am in an unstable state of mind and soul. Another great lesson is that if my body tells me that something is wrong, then I should listen.
Death = end. End + feelings = death.
Relationships are complicated, there is nothing easy, or easy going about them. They should not be a torture either. If someone or something makes you feel bad, you should try and find the reason behind it. But if you find it and you are still feeling terrible, you need to start asking yourself if it is really worth it. The answer will differ from one person to another, but no one knows what happens after death. So why should we assume that the end is always terrible?
