Recently my father’s first true love contacted me – she had found me on the internet and was wondering if I was his daughter. The internet allows for extraordinary connections to take place because my father has been dead for many years. I was telling one of my 13-year old sons about this and he found it both strange and rather inappropriate. Shouldn’t that be in the past given that that was close to 60 years ago? It showed his lack of life experience and I’m sure that later he’ll remember our conversation and understand what I meant. I think that once we have loved or cared for somebody they will always have a place in our hearts. It may have ended, we may have well and truly moved on, fallen in love with other people but unless we feel very wronged – and keep nurturing the hate and resentment – a part of us will always care.
Entering relationships we never know how long they are going to last – a season, a reason or a lifetime – but I believe that all close relationships teach us something valuable about ourselves and about what it means to be human. It is natural in the initial phase when the relationship break down to feel angry, hurt and resentful. It is a psychological threat to our sense of connectedness and as such activates our primitive defensive mechanisms of flight and fight. If the relationship has been one where we felt violated, taken advantage off or used in some way, the anger can be helpful because it motivates us to take action to protect ourselves. However, we don’t want to get stuck in angry rumination – it does not bring out the best in us or allow us to learn from the relationship and move on.
A more adaptive way is to train in letting the person go with love. By that I mean that you remind yourself that it’s over and in this new phase of your life this dynamic is no longer helpful for you. The relationship has run its natural course. Ending things with dignity and grace is not generally something human beings do well – we struggle with endings even when they are for the better – but we can practice in accepting endings. And because of our incredibly sophisticated brain, the more we do something the better we become at it, which means that we can get better at this too.
Endings – big and small – are an inherent part of the human condition. I believe that it is worth practicing letting go with love, dignity and grace.