Sure, sometimes I have a good reason to be heartbroken. An unwanted divorce springs immediately to mind, and a few other moments in my life when it would have been inhuman to NOT be heartbroken, but for the most part my life is pretty blessed. Despite knowing objectively that even in hard times, I have it pretty good, my heart doesn't seem to be on board with "being okay with it all". Sometimes the smallest inconveniences or the tiniest disappointments will leave me feeling completely broken and hopeless.
I'm not sure if this is because the true heartbreaks have left me fragile and more easily broken. I'd like to think this is not the case - I want to think, as all of us do when we have struggled through hardships, that I have become not weaker but stronger, and I know that in many ways, this is exactly what really has happened. So why is it that I still let these little things affect me so much?
My best guess is that, for some reason, maybe I still want the heartbreak. Perhaps it's an extension of "playing the victim," so to speak. If I let myself be hurt over whatever the issue is, I can pretend like the disappointment isn't my own fault. This weekend I experienced some disappointments that at first seemed like the world crashing down around me. I was devastated, and ready to give up before my weekend was through. Less than 24 hours later, I was fine. What I had considered life-alteringly disappointing was really just a minor setback that required me to reframe an idea in my mind. Once I took a step back and reshaped my expectations (not lowered, just altered), I found myself once again thinking positively about moving forward.
As it turns out, heartbreak is oftentimes only what you make it out to be. True, I'll never be able to convince myself divorce isn't heartbreaking, but I'm going to try to give myself a break on some of these other things. If it's not *actually* life changing, I'm going to try not to take it as such. When there's a way to take stock and rephrase my perspective or my actions instead of feeling like a victim again, that's what I'm going to do. And when it's time to get hopeful about something that is mostly unknown, I'll remember not to build things up too much in my mind and in my heart, so I can be better prepared to readjust if things are not quite what I'd wanted to see.
Life is what you make of it - this has been a constant lesson over the past couple years. I keep turning over new pages in this book, and every new chapter is a step closer to the happy, healthy future I want!
How do you combat heartbreak? Do you sometimes build the proverbial mountain out of a molehill? What are some of the "life is what you make of it" lessons that you've learned?
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