All Her White Dress Was Hidding.
A story about how to improve your emotional intelligence and learn how to close cycles in your life.
Human beings, like other animals of “higher” intelligence, tend to cope with the loss of members of our group in a very complex way. This process of physical or vital separation generates in our organism a chemical, emotional and even spiritual response if we have beliefs in the world of the “beyond”.
Today I don’t want to talk to you about the loss of someone who died or how to cope with the recovery process in stages. I believe that when such personal and sensitive circumstances arise, it is appropriate to contact someone qualified who can propose a suitable route.
However, the topic that I want to share with you is perhaps tougher because there is no definite end or a cycle that closes completely.
Let me put you in context to understand everything better.
A while ago, on one of these mornings where you can’t focus on anything, I started browsing FaceBook looking for old acquaintances or schoolmates, etc. Everything seemed to be going well, some had changed cities, others completely from professional life but nothing relevant beyond normal.
However I think you are familiar with the saying
“Who seeks, finds”
And so it was, I couldn’t get rid of the consequences of my curiosity and of going too far in my search by jumping through the profiles.
After seeing acquaintances or the odd friend, I wanted to raise the stakes and decided to find one of my old partners. All the ingredients to create chaos almost inevitably.
I have to add and admit that so far, she has been one of the most important relationships I have ever had. Not because it was especially long-lasting, but I think that due to the complexity of the circumstances that we live together, the emotional depth left an important mark on my life.
Back to FaceBook so as not to lose the thread, it all started in a very ironic way in a way. I visited the profile of her best friend and saw a photograph in which they were both dressed in full dress, without realizing any relevant aspect in this whole story. One of them wore a beautiful white dress while the other wore a coral pink one that enhanced her pregnancy in a very elegant way.
Illusory of myself I thought directly that that friend, being pregnant, had decided to marry to have greater stability in her life, in her family and as a “natural” step in the process of a life as a couple.
Days later by chance the profile of my partner crossed my path and like a bee that cannot resist and go towards the flower, I had to look.
Right now at this time you will be clear who had married and who was wearing the white wedding dress, however, for me it was a sudden stop, a complete clash with my reality.
But why? Because I’m having this reaction after so long and with everything that has happened.
As a general rule you will think that what was happening is that being someone so relevant, emotionally seeing that situation had brought up some ghosts from the past and removed my consciousness more than is usually normal. You are right and I went through that stage, however, I was aware that the root of all these emotions and anguish lay in something much deeper that needed exploration.
Without forcing anything inside of me, I had to find out what was the cause in order to be able, if not to cure that feeling of emptiness, at least to be able to understand it and be able to rationalize it later to find a way to cope well.
In recent years, due to my state of health and the big mistakes that I have been making like everyone else, I have decided to close cycles, talk to those people who were still “pending” an explanation or simply friends who were traveling or misunderstandings were distancing themselves.
Thanks to this process, many ideas came to my head, but among a large number, one was the one that showed the “most light” and seemed to be the winner.
After our breakup I have never been able to exchange words with her again. Everything that I have learned, everything that I have seen from a more complete and mature point of view, I have not been able to share with her.
Why is this so relevant? You may be wondering. After all, they are just words.
It can be so, I do not deny it. However, although I understand very well that we were not compatible people on a sentimental level and understand everything that we did wrong, it is also unattainable for me to abandon the idea of closing that cycle that we left open.
So what does this have to do with such an emotional response?
I realized that at no time was I jealous of her or her partner, although I have to admit that, by comparative injury, I did feel hurt when evaluating the situation of my life and the idealization of how hers would be.
I had spent the last few years living practically like a nomad jumping from job to job, city to city without having “objectively” achieved anything stable. I do not regret it or everything I have learned but there are times when looking around the cold makes you shrink more than it should. Have you ever felt it?
Because of all this, it was clear to me that all I wanted was to wish him happiness, to wish him that in all this journey he has done and what lies ahead they were as happy as they can be.
It may seem like a cliché but I honestly believe that when you have such a deep connection with someone, you will always want to wish that person well, even if life separates you and feelings change.
And then, now what?
With total sincerity, I don’t know very well how the situation will develop, I can only be aware of the steps that I have taken and the number of paths that I want to travel from now on. Many times these types of stages serve as a point of reference to understand what we want to achieve in our life, that it is dispensable and even more important than all this, learn to value those around us.
When I organize my mind a little better about it, I will write about it again and share with you what my personal discoveries are, but so that you do not go empty I want to show you some small guidelines so that if you find yourself in a similar situation you will know how to close the cycles in a healthy and balanced way.
1. Remember
As cruel as it may seem, we must remember everything we lived in that moment that hurts now, it is impossible for all memories to be negative, so we must learn from what happened, accept what happened and do not pretend to forget it.
If we just focus on forgetting, anxiety will eat away at us, bringing back pain and suffering.
2. Forgive yourself
We self-judge and punish ourselves all the time, and unfairly, we regret what we never imagined. Curiously, we should focus on being empathetic with ourselves, on trying to take care of ourselves one day, on understanding each other as we understood all those who also made mistakes and above all, on recognizing the successes we had.
Only in this way will we be able to close the door that no one else will enter.
3. Sorry
It sounds easy enough, but achieving it requires an apology that sometimes never comes, therefore, learning not to hold grudges becomes a purely personal job and on the other hand, we have to understand that the other, most likely, still has a major resentment.
However, it is the total responsibility of the other person to continue or stop feeling that resentment that little by little makes us all sick. We must try to understand that others sometimes do not have all the resources to avoid hurting, disappointing or disappointing us, let’s try to understand that it was a bad moment, a bad place or a bad decision from the past that we cannot allow to be repeated in our future.
Forgiving also leads us to learn from what we suffered.
4. Surrender
It is impossible for you to find an explanation or answer to all the questions that come to mind. The human being tries to rationalize everything in his path, leading him to suppose and therefore to suffer, so trying to answer all the question marks that arise from loss or abandonment will not diminish in any way what we feel.
Simply, sometimes not everything is fair or logical and we have to learn to live with it, cling to wanting to understand exactly what happened and the reason why it happened, it will only wear us out uncontrollably, taking all the strength that we have left to close the cycle indeed.
Don’t be overwhelmed by what you don’t know, let it go.
5. Accept
There are things that are out of our control, do not try to change them because immense frustration will come to you. The best way to accept what has already happened to us is to stop thinking about different possibilities.
Stop thinking about the “What if I had…? What if…? It would be possible that…?”.
Time does not return, what’s done is done.
6. Detach
In order to completely detach yourself from the negative feeling, you need to live it, that is, you need to approach a duel. Elizabeth Kubler Ross lists very clearly and simply the steps that all grief entails, this process requires time and it is necessary to allow ourselves to have patience to live all its stages:
- Denial
- Go to
- Negotiation
- Depression
- Acceptance
In no specific order, all these stages will appear while we live our duel, they are completely normal and from them an impressive fortress resurfaces.
Sometimes you win more when you lose.
It is very common to feel that when we break up with our ex, get away from a loved one, fight with a friend, let our pet go or suffer any loss that involves feelings, our joy, illusion, is also lost. , affection, confidence and satisfaction in life. We become attached to what we lost and we believe that this is the only source of our joy, that thanks to her we felt certain things and that for the same reason, we could only feel it with her.
However, those feelings were generated within you, from there they sprouted, they did not come from the outside. You are the one who decides to let them out and who sets certain requirements to let you do it. How painful or incredible your next cycle is will depend on how open you are to new doors opening and therefore new opportunities entering them.
