Breakup stings. Some people find it so painful that they even want to kill themselves. I’m here to bring good news (or perhaps bad news if you so want to die): Don’t kill yourself. The pain is just temporary. Nothing is permanent. Not even you. You’ll die one day eventually, be patient. The best is yet to come. 

Breakups have become something normal to me. It’s no longer an earthquake-like event. It’s more like, oh, we’re not compatible, OK then, bye. 

But I’d still cry solitarily if I really like the person. Sometimes I’d cry for several days. Or weeks. Or months. There were times I didn’t even want to get out of bed. Everything felt dull. And grey. It happened. But life goes on. Better days are coming, that’s the promise from my weirdly optimistic side that tends to voice itself louder whenever I’m down. And she’s always right.

We can’t force anyone to like or love us. And we can’t force ourselves to be someone we’re not just to accommodate the other person’s needs while our needs are not being met. It’s sad. But it’s a fact we have to accept. 

In this post, I’d like to share what I know (from personal experiences, personal observation on friends’ experiences, and from reading books and articles) about how to deal with breakups. The first part is how to deal with it destructively and the second part is how to deal with it productively. 

The destructive ones are fun, far from boring. They’re basically you being controlled by your emotions. It can be exhilarating when we do things under the control of our emotions. But of course, it comes with a price. The consequences can be harmful.

The productive ones are dull. Boring. It takes time as you can’t feel the effects straight away. But boy, once you master them, it’s magical! You suddenly care a lot about yourself and your standards. You repel anyone who doesn’t come up to your standards and that’s how everyone should live: authentically. No tolerance for nonsense.

Here Are 7 Destructive Things to Do After a Breakup:

1. Call Your Ex

Call your ex every two hours, half screaming, as loud as you wish, asking why you guys had to break up. Spice it up with crying out loud. Make sure you cry and speak at the same time to make it even harder to understand what you’re trying to say.

You may get a restraining order for this and breaching it is a criminal offence which is punishable by a fine or a prison term. If money is tight, then choose prison instead of paying a fine. Free food and accommodation. And if you’re a man, you may get sodomised too. Rumours say some, not all, men get sodomised a lot in the prison. And we still don’t know how to qualify to be sodomised. So don’t ask me about that particular subject.

2. Visit Your Ex

Go to your ex’ house or workplace, and interrogate them (with a gun in their head – if you have a gun, why not!) what’s wrong with them and why they don’t want you. This may result in the issuance of a restraining order, fines, or imprisonment.

3. Jog Around Your Ex’ House

Upload your jogging route to your social media, showing clearly that you’ve been jogging around your ex house. Every single day. Twice a day. For the past 14 days. This may also result in the issuance of a restraining order.

4. Make Your Ex Jealous

Upload your half-naked (or fully naked) pictures on social media to show off how many likes and sexy comments you’ve got just to make your ex jealous. 

This doesn’t apply to nude-art models though, because most probably your ex won’t get jealous as they may see your half-naked/naked pictures as part of your professionalism.

But if you’re not a nude-art model, you may probably get banned by the social media you use for your naked pictures. But as long as your partner’s jealous, why not? 

But is it worth it to make just one particular person jealous while there are 7 billion people in the world? That’s for you to answer.

5. Examine Yourself Excessively

No, don’t touch yourself. By examining, I mean, ask yourself what’s wrong with you and why they don’t want you. This is not necessarily destructive as it can lead to valuable self-improvement. But ruminating on what’s wrong with you without looking into what you really want in a relationship can easily slip into victimising yourself and giving up your values to adjust to the other person’s value system. Unless you want to experiment with a new value system. If it’s allegedly ‘better’, why not?

Be aware that you have your own value system. You have your own needs. For instance, your partner is aloof towards you and say they don’t do hugs. Hugs make them uncomfortable. But you are a passionate hugger. What do you do? Are you going to question yourself why you’re a passionate hugger? Or are you going to question yourself whether you’re with the right person? You can question both. But perhaps you want to get curious why you want to starve your needs for the sake of the other person’s aloofness? Is that even the type of relationship you want to be in?

6. Go Straight to Dating App

Go to Tinder, or whichever suits you, to find some random people to sleep with. Of course it’s possible to meet your soulmate this way. But most probably you’ll get an STD instead of a soulmate. Or even a more interesting story: a fresh, new stalker. A psychopath one. And you may later be kept in their fridge. In pieces. Without having a chance to request for a restraining order.

Furthermore, it’s never a good idea to fill a void with someone new. You may end up hurting them, or worse, hurting both of you. How? They may sense that you’re just using them to fill the void, they leave when you start liking them, and Voila! You hurt two people at the same time: that new person and yourself.

7. Go Have Extreme Fun

Go to a bar and drink until you find yourself singing and dancing on a table, naked, resisting arrest and then later call one of your friends to bail you out. This can be a fun experience, but remember that your name will be on the criminal record. This means, every time you want to visit certain countries and apply for a tourist visa, you may have to always include this information in the visa application. Doesn’t sound fun. But it can be fun (sort of) if a hot visa officer gives you a naughty wink. 

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Having read 7 destructive things to do after a breakup (which sound interesting and far from boring – oh, I have plenty of ideas), here are 10 productive things to do after a breakup, which may sound boring at first, but will change your life as the positive effects undoubtedly last much longer than the destructive ones. Not only you’re more focused on your life, enjoying life more healthily, and live more intentionally, but also, your next relationship is likely to be healthier than any of your past relationships.

10 Productive Things to Do After a Breakup

1. Evaluate

Write down the story from the first time you met, the arguments, and how one or both of you decide to break up. It can be tricky, as everyone is susceptible to biased thinking. But try your best. If possible, ask your ex their version of how the breakup happened. Don’t argue when they explain. OK you can argue but bear in mind that you ask for feedback, not to defend yourself. Just write it all down so you can later reread and contemplate. 

Theoretically, that’s the right thing to do. Practically, it can be challenging, especially when the two of you have strong chemistry and getting back together feels so easy. But it’s not a healthy sign if you argue about the same issues after getting back together. Arguments are healthy. But arguing the same issues over and over again is unhealthy. It can be a strong indicator that you guys are just not right for each other. Let go.

2. Grieve

When we allow ourselves to grieve instead of distracting ourselves with some instant-joy-but-fake-superficial-and-potentially-destructive quick-fixes, we usually, often, heal better with no or very little relapse. 

Need to take one-two day off from work? Take a break from anyone? Do it. You feel like crying? Cry. Feel the sadness. Sit down and digest it instead of denying it. 

Journal whatever feeling you have at the moment. It can be sadness mixed with anger and disappointment, anything. Give yourself time to grieve instead of pretending nothing happened. 

But of course, you don’t have to show your grief on social media, being a drama king/queen and displaying yourself as a sad victim. You’re not a victim. Anything that happens to you is either a blessing or a lesson. You never lose.

3. Self-Care

Don’t forget the most important thing when you’re going through tough times: self-care. Your health is your wealth. Prioritise it over everything.

This means, stop eating that tub of ice cream. Want ice cream? Just get one scoop. Not the whole tub! Want wine? Get one glass and sip it slowly. Don’t drink the whole bottle.

Self-care means taking good care of yourself like you take care of a 10-year-old kid: making sure they are well fed with nutritious food (lots of greens!), they have enough sleep, enough exercise – including physical (e.g. strength and endurance training) and mental exercise (e.g. meditation), enough learning (e.g. reading books, listening to useful podcasts), and enough healthy entertainment (e.g. the ones that don’t induce any addictions). 

4. Feel Gratitude

After a breakup, it’s easy to ruminate on what’s missing. The antidote is gratitude. List all the things you’re glad you have, no exception. If you have difficulties doing this, think of those who live in war-torn countries. What don’t they have? Peace. Fresh air. Clean water. Enough food. A place to sleep without worrying that a bomb can land and kill their friends and families in a second.

Now go back to your life and see what you have that they don’t have. It’s a twisted way to feel gratitude but if that’s the only way for you to be able to feel gratitude, then do it. Or better, perhaps you can contribute something to those war-torn countries: money, clothes, your skills and talents.

5. Make a Relationship List

Nobody’s perfect. We should all remember that.  I’m not perfect. You’re not perfect either. But make sure you know your values, you know what you can tolerate and what are the deal-breakers.

Generally speaking, a healthy relationship is when two people pouring into each other, trying to make each other happy (not out of obligation, but out of a desire to make their partner happy), embracing each others’ needs, respecting each other’s feelings.

If one selfishly fulfils their needs without caring about their partner’s needs, that’s a red flag.

If one does things they want, for instance, in the name of ‘freedom’, dismissing their partner’s feelings, that’s a major red flag.

Once you know exactly what you want, you’re likely to gravitate towards healthier relationships.

6. Try New Routines

Change your routines. Wake up earlier. Or later. If you’re slack, try to be more productive. If you’re a workaholic, try to relax a bit. Do activities that are good for your wellbeing.

Changing routines can push you out of your comfort zone. This is the zone where you find something interesting and where growth is likely to occur.

Placing ourselves outside of our comfort zone can also change our focus from always being sad to a desire to face challenges that come from outside of our comfort zone.

7. Do Temporary Projects

A temporary project is a good, productive distraction that can ease the pain of heartache. This may be refurbishing your professional website while also get to know yourself better on your strengths and weaknesses.

If you can draw, draw something nice with the aim to display it on your Instagram or even sell it on Etsy or your local art market. That would be like killing two mosquitoes with one stone. Don’t ask me how exactly it works because usually people use insect spray, not a stone, to kill mosquitoes. But let’s assume using stones is the right way to kill mosquitoes. Hopefully you know what I mean by killing two mosquitoes with one stone. 

If you can play a musical instrument, try to compose a song. I manage to transmute my sadness (and other emotions) into music. It’s been a fantastic, eye-opening experience as I didn’t know that I could compose a listenable song. Well, at least listenable to me. Be nice! If you’re curious about my ‘temporary’ projects, here are some of the songs I’ve composed and songs I’ve mixed digitally.

8. Do Long Term Projects

Long term projects can be anything to do with financial independence or doing what you’re passionate about, like planning to open up an online store, building a blog, and/or writing a book.

If you know something that people can benefit from, share it. It doesn’t matter how many people don’t get it. One of the most interesting quotes from Tim Ferris, the author of 4-Hour Workweek is:

“It doesn’t matter how many people don’t get it. What matters is how many people do. If you have a strong informed opinion, don’t keep it to yourself. Try to help people and make the world a better place.”

Tim Ferris

If you want to write a book, don’t worry about how thin or thick it is, as long as you think it can help some people. One of Richard Grannon’s books, How to Stop an Emotional Flashback, is only 20 pages. But that book is packed with such rich and relevant information that it’s impossible to deny its benefit if you have CPTSD (Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder).

9. Socialise with Your Friends

Remember to not get too comfortable with sadness that you forget about happiness. You can always share your sadness with your friends if you’re in the mood to talk about it and if they’re willing to listen.

But if you prefer to keep it to yourself you can simply let them know you’re not in the mood to talk about it and would prefer to just enjoy your quality time together. Good friends will respect and understand. If they don’t… change your friends.

10. Discover Your Life’s Purpose

I intentionally put this section in the end because I know how hard it is to focus on life’s purpose with a broken heart. If you already know your life’s purpose, good. Work on it.

But some people don’t know their life’s purpose. They’re busy distracting themselves with destructive activities like shopping recklessly, piling up debts and unable to pay them, eating mindlessly, picking a fistfight for the sake of adrenalin rush, having sex with as many people as possible – disregarding the feelings of those who are involved, abusing drugs and alcohol, and/or gambling excessively.

Life’s purpose is often discovered after doing temporary and long-term projects. Here are some questions to ask about yourself on how to discover your life’s purpose.

I wholeheartedly believe that life’s purpose is the ultimate antidote to everything. In this particular case, it’s the element that makes us realise that having no relationship doesn’t mean failure in life like many people believe.

While having a relationship can, of course, motivate us to become a better version of ourselves, we should also remember that it has to be a healthy relationship, with someone who is compatible with us.  It is better to have no relationship than being in one with the wrong person.

Remember

Each of us processes heartbreak differently, so be patient with yourself. Your grief may be shorter or longer than others, and that’s OK. Nothing’s wrong with shorter or longer grief. Just don’t forget about the other important elements in life, like self-care and life’s purpose. Be mindful when engaging in potentially destructive activities as they often come with unpleasant, even harmful consequences. 

The productive activities are often boring as it takes time. You can’t feel the effects straight away. But once you get it, you’d suddenly care a lot about yourself and your standards. You repel anyone who doesn’t come up to your standards and that’s how everyone should live: authentically. No tolerance for nonsense.

And also remember: there are 7 billion people in the world. Surely there are better people out there. I said surely. Not Shirley.