Instead of Crying

Anyone who says you should just cheer up and get out there and get over it doesn’t know jack about breaking up (or any kind of mourning, for that matter). That said, I had to slap a friend over Yahoo Messenger yesterday after her ex’s Facebook flirting with someone new came up in the news feed. (She’s straight, but this totally applies to all romantic relationships.) Here’s the complete convo, abridged:

My Friend: it’s like it cheapens the entire relationship. it’s like it meant everything to me and barely anything to him
My Friend: i need someone to be a Charlotte for me and yell at him
Me: this city is your oyster but you'd rather think about what your ex doesn't know about life? really?
Me: [SLAP!] Snap out of it, woman! you're missing your whole life here and it's one a lot of girls would give a lot to have
My Friend: thanks for slapping me back out of insanity
Me: np i thought someone hacked your account! You were talking CRAZY.

There is no deadline for being “over it,” whatever the hell that means. (Don’t all our experiences become a part of us?) Still, know that time spent rehashing your ex’s past would be better spent planning your future. No one can stop you from dwelling on your ex’s faults and the things you feel you lost in the morass. Meanwhile, though, everything you do have will wither away, but then you can miss those things later, too...if you want to. (Just givin' y’all options.)

Your future and present are plenty to have on your mental plate. You've got your finances to think about, your new year's resolutions and goals, and your social life might have been a casualty of an unhealthy relationship. You’ll need time to work on that. Then, there’s your job, and learning stuff on your own time so you can school everybody that might try to compete with you for that promotion, and your health - to say nothing of laundry and trash and bills. Seriously, if you aren’t too busy to be hung up on an ex, you should be a time management counselor. Actually, you should be my time management counselor.

I’ll let Ne-Yo, the songwriter, sum it up in his lyrics to "So You Can Cry:"