Do you have an ex who’s out of your life but there are things that still bothering you? The reaction you get might feel too big to make sense. It’s bothering you way more than it should. It might even make you wonder ‘am I really over them?’.
Let’s talk about something that’s going on that you may not have considered: grief. It’s not uncommon to break up and realize that you feel as sad, and that you have regrets, but completely overlook grief being in the mix. Having grief is probably not what pops into people’s minds for getting over a breakup. Part of the problem is that we don’t understand what grief is. Post breakup grief is a different flavor of grief than what we experience when someone dies.
In my own case, I used to criticize myself as ‘weak’ because getting over exes took me waaay too much time. I’d spend months ruminating on what happened. After maddeningly long stretch of constant replaying and reflection , the sting would lessen. But there were certain things, sometimes even minor details, that still remained tender long past when I considered myself ‘over him’. Any time I thought about those stray issues too much, I’d still suddenly well up with tears and feel fresh hurt.
When I learned about post-breakup grief, I understood that the lingering tender places held pieces of unprocessed grief from past breakups. Being trained in emotions-based coaching, I revisited those tender issues put grief to bed once and for all. Anyone that’s open to it can do some of their own work on this.
Read on to learn:
- The process I used to overcome grief
- Keys you can use to guid your own work in this area
ONE PROCESS FOR GENTLY OVERCOMING GRIEF
<Emotional Freedom Techniques (aka EFT, or Tapping)> makes it easy to work with grief gently and get effective validation of the feelings you have. You’ll get relief from the overwhelm that confronting grief might create. EFT makes it possible to pull the curtain on your grief, look at it properly, all without becoming engulfed and feeling stuck in a downward spiral.
“Tapping makes it possible to pull the curtain on your grief,
look at it properly, all without becoming engulfed
and feeling stuck in a downward spiral.”
Tapping is quick and easy to learn and use for yourself and I’ll be sharing resources that include instructions on this as part of a comprehensive <downloadable guide> that will help you organize the process of letting go of grief.
This work may have you look into reactions that you’ve suppressed, so approach it with self-empathy and gentleness. The 6 mindsets I’m sharing below will help you create the right approach for this work.
6 MINDSETS FOR WORKING ON GRIEF AND GETTING OVER YOUR EX
Here are some guiding principles to keep top of mind when you work through post-breakup grief. This will help you steer yourself in a forward direction as you examine things.
ONE PROCESS FOR GENTLY OVERCOMING GRIEF
<Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT / Tapping)> makes it easy to work with grief gently and get effective validation of the feelings you have. You’ll get relief from the overwhelm that confronting grief might create. EFT makes it possible to pull the curtain on your grief, look at it properly, all without becoming engulfed and feeling stuck in a downward spiral.
Tapping is quick and easy to learn and use for yourself. <Here’s a tapping guide that will teach you the technique>. Once you have the tapping technique. I’ve put together a comprehensive <downloadable guide> to guid you in identifying grief. Keep in mind that you’ll be diving into reactions that you’ve suppressed, and this is work that requires self empathy and gentleness. Use the 6 Keys as guiding principles to this work.
6KEYS FOR WORKING ON GRIEF AND GETTING OVER YOUR EX
Here are some guiding principles to keep top of mind when you work through post-breakup grief. This will help you steer yourself in a forward direction as you examine things.
1. Know that grief is normal to experience.
Grief is to be expected when you lose something that was part of your life. It’s not a source of shame to feel grief. Even if you are the one that instigated the breakup, you are still navigating a loss that is irreversible. This comes with grief.
Knowing how grief can take different forms lets you acknowledge your feelings even if your loss is different that what society classically associates with grief.
Sometimes having the words for your experience is enough to change the way you feel about it.
2. Welcome what you are feeling.
One of the most important tools for grief is to validate your feelings and emotions, even ones that don’t make logical sense. This is what brings healing. I wish I’d known earlier that allowing grief to to express itself would help me move past it more fully.
3. Clear out expectations and let things unfold
A lot of our expectations around grief are programmed into us. You have ideas about how grief should look, how long you should grieve or how much you are allowed to grieve. Put those aside and let yourself have the time and compassion and grace you need. Each breakup will have a different kind of grief, so welcome whatever you experience this time. Your grief may not look the way you expect.
4. Don’t compare yourself to others
One aspect of post-breakup grief is that we are often still connected to this person in some public way. People’s public persona, particularly in social media or a work setting, is polished and curated and can leave us feeling like our ex is not grieving. The reality is that you don’t know what is happening under the surface fro the other person. The other side of this is that we may look at friend that get over a breakup quickly and feel like we have to do the same.
6. Bring people in, use rituals
When someone passes away, there is finality of them being gone. This is opens up ritual and support from the community that surrounds them. You may feel like you are supposed to tough it out and work through grief alone when you break up but getting support is important. You aren’t meant to tough it out. Any rituals you feel are meaningful -like spending time reading poetry, with music, meditation, journaling- can help you facilitate the transition.
6. Use EFT / Tapping
If you are really looking to move forward fast, the best work you’ll do is to use EFT. Good EFT embraces the 5 mindsets above, and lets you look at grief with curiosity.
Grab the <downloadable guide to start your journey of getting over your ex>.
More Help For Working Through Grief
I’ve got several blog articles that will set you up for success in this work (see list of resources below). Want to go faster or deeper? It can certainly help to have an expert at this technique guide you, particularly if you have a lot of different facets that you need to be explored. contact me for a 30-min chat to discuss what we can do together
Be sure to check out the other resources I have on grief:
<your downloadable guide working on post-breakup grief using Tapping>
Learn about the kind of grief we experience when breakups happen
5 payoffs of working on grief with based on my own personal journey
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