What I Hope You Learn From Your First Heartbreak
It's funny how you think you've always known something but couldn't actually believe it until it happens to you.
It will take some time but soon you will piece together the lessons that this experience is trying to teach you. Soon enough you will see through your tears, and pain wouldn’t exist anymore. You will soon see, and think clearly. The universe will seem bright again, and your chest wouldn’t be so heavy.
I hope you think of that person and not feel anger, or resentment, and feel like you’ve wasted your time.
I hope you think of them and remember all the beauty they showed you, the beauty they made you feel. I hope you remember how before them, you didn’t think beauty can be an emotion you can feel, a feeling you can experience. I hope you remember how they showed you that beauty isn’t just something you can see, but it can be a point in time, a moment, a kiss, a feeling of having someone next to you.
I hope you remember how you didn’t think that love will find you that way — exactly how it is in the movies. They filled you with so much nervous excitement that even your toes feel it. The thought of them sends shivers, and you have so much desire for them you feel as if you’re going to explode if they’re not there to keep you together.
I hope you don’t go resenting all of it.
I know how perplexing it was the way things changed, and how fast. How everything can flip into something you didn’t think you’ll ever have to live with.
It’s funny how you think you’ve always known something but couldn’t actually believe it until it happens to you.
Until it happened to you.
In a blink of an eye.
In a heartbeat.
In a second.
In a little text message you saw pop up on their phone.
In some unknown contact calling.
In a kiss that didn’t feel the same way.
In physical contacts that didn’t seem to send shivers.
In meetings that didn’t excite you anymore.
In eye contacts where you didn’t see the future anymore.
Everything, and anything can come between two people. And they will. And they have.
You must’ve known it even before it comes, and unfortunately, as you know, it’s not easy to make sense of it all. There were questions that you didn’t want to answer, or don’t want to hear the answer to.
I hope you come to a point where you decide to let go of the weight of hate, of anger, or of self pity.
Coming to terms with how things ended can’t be won. It doesn’t come easy.
But I hope you come to accept that it had to happen, and it had to happen the way it did.
The universe wants you to go through difficult times in hopes that you won’t want to experience it again, in hopes that you don’t pick the same choices over and over and hope for a different result. And this is not supposed to break you, or make you hard, or see that person, or the world negatively. The universe just wants you to learn that what doesn’t work, will never work unless you make some changes.
It’s the hardest lesson there is to learn.
Yes, it will take more than a little bit of time to accept that love is not like the movies. Love is not built in 2 hours, or 40 days, or between 800 miles, or between two people who are not quite there yet.
Love will prove to be hard for people who think they’ve got it all figured out.
Love will prove to be hard for people who think it’s not easy.
Love will prove to be hard for people who make it hard, and complicated, and toxic, and limiting, and demanding, and frustrating.
Love will prove to be hard for people who are not meant to be.
They say that one of the most difficult things one has to ever go through is to mourn the loss of someone who is still alive. It must be true. But how long do we have to mourn the loss of someone who wasn’t ours keep?
I hope you don’t let a person’s inability to see your worth define how you see your worth.
I hope you don’t resent love and give up. I hope you don’t regret anything that made you happy. Your past relationship is not a mistake. Love is always a win-learn situation. I hope you know that you never really lose.
I hope you thank the universe instead for the chance to experience another soul. To feel what love is like. To know what love is not. To learn how to love right. To recognise your toxic traits and learn to outgrow them. To learn how to let go. To learn what’s worth holding on to. To learn that your love is not wasted. To learn that all the love you give out will find its way back to you. When love is ready. When you’ve learned all that there is to learn.
Instead of lingering on the pain they’ve caused you, I hope the love they made you feel lead you to a whole new way of seeing things.
After a little bit of time, I hope you eventually find yourself not left with hurt, or pain, or misery, or worse, the feeling of not being good enough.
But instead, I hope you find yourself with love. I hope you find it underneath all the rubble. Let this love pick you up.
Because after all, they made you feel like you could be loved. They made you feel that someone could want you for themselves. They made you feel that you can make someone feel fuzzy, and warm. They made you feel that you can be with someone and that someone would wanna be with you too. They made you feel that you are a beautiful human being, and none of that has changed because you are, and always will be beautiful. And someone will make you feel this way again, and you should believe it because it is true.
Remember that they made you let go of your insecurities, and made you realize that someone can look at your insecurities and kiss them away.
And as they leave, the universe was trying to teach you the single most important lesson in love.
And that is that you need to love yourself first.
Above them, above anyone, under any circumstance.
You might not have thought about it but they taught you to have courage. Courage to go after something that will make you feel, something that is beautiful, something that is worthwhile, something that can be, well, someone.
In the end, they must’ve inspired you to live your life.
To stop being afraid.
To stop being insecure.
To stop thinking you’re not good enough.
They opened your heart to love.
I’m sure losing them put you through a lot, and I’m not here defending them, or what they may have done, or what may have happened.
I’m just here saying that I don’t want you to linger on hate, and resent a beautiful experience.
I want you to remember that experience and smile with all your heart. I want you to remember all the good times and remember all that’s beautiful about it and think that that’s how you want love to feel like.
Yes, in the end, you may not get to spend the rest of your life with them, they’re not gonna be the person you’re gonna see first thing in the morning, their snore isn’t what you’re gonna wake up to, it’s not their face you’re gonna kiss forever..
But I promise you, you will get to spend your life with someone.
Honestly, we get closer to the one we’re meant to be with with every person we lose. Because with every person we lose we realise more and more what we want, and don’t want. What we can’t live without, and what we can live without. What we want, and don’t want to spend our life with.
It’ll be strange starting over. Opening up to a stranger and risking the pain you just felt, thinking it might as well happen again. And it might. Maybe a few times it will. You will fall in love with strangers, and they might fall in love with you too and for a little bit everything will be perfect until it’s not anymore. But every time you pick yourself up, remember you won’t be starting from scratch, you will be starting from experience.
And with a little luck, one day, you’ll come across another stranger and they will go against your worst expectations, they will prove all your negative thoughts wrong, and they will make you feel thankful for all the wrong decisions you made because all of that led you to them.
Someday, you’ll wake up next to this stranger, you’ll look up to their peaceful face and thank God they don’t snore. You’ll kiss them, and a little smile will form at the side of their mouth, and they will wrap their arms around you, and you’ll curl up next to them. You will go back to sleep knowing they’ll be there when you wake up because you know they’re not going anywhere. You’ll be glad for everything you’ve been through because all of that led to them, and all of that led to this moment.
Not all first loves, or second chances, or third time’s the charm, or even fourth and finals last, but be glad all of that happened because you learned from it, and it taught you a lot of what you know now, and all of what you know now led you to this one. And maybe, with a little bit of blessing from the heavens, they could be the one.