Avoid Revenge For Your Broken Heart

When your heart gets broken by a lover who betrays your trust in some way, revenge is the worst thing you can do. Why?

Because it basically means you’ve allowed what he or she has done to you to govern what you do for yourself and to him or her.

This reaction keeps you firmly attached, now in a negative destructive way, to someone you should leave as soon as possible. He or she has way too much power over your emotions. Sorry, but you’ve set it up that way.

The important point is, if the relationship can’t be ‘fixed,’ the sooner you leave the better. Revenge is another word for the ‘toxic’ effects of an unhealthy relationship that keeps on affecting you after a breakup. Nobody wins. Even if you succeed in hurting him or her.

So what? You’ve wasted your time and allowed this experience to blacken your heart. All this instead of thinking about how you can shake off the relationship you had with this person and move on to greener pastures. Get it?

Another unfortunate effect of revenge is, it gets in the way of healing your heart. There is no healing while revenge fills the heart. Absolutely none. Thinking about healing yourself is precisely where you should be putting your energies not into the most effective way of getting back at a limited person with intimacy problems.

The best way to heal after a painful breakup is to practice taking excellent care of yourself and making and keeping a few healthy friendships. Friendships will allow you to practice intimacy without losing yourself or giving yourself away. This is a good place to rest for a little while before getting out there again.

I know you’d prefer to think in terms of defensive strength and self-protection, but it’s actually helpful to let yourself grieve the loss of your lover no matter how badly he or she has treated you. The sooner you acknowledge that you’ve been hurt, especially to yourself, the sooner you’ll be able to move on.

Otherwise, you’ll get very defensive and distant and protect yourself from being vulnerable again. That is not a good thing. You have to get your ability to be ‘open again to love’ back at some point in the not too distant future. That’s the goal. Heal and get back out there again.

Look, if you have your heart set on revenge and nothing I have just said to you in this post is acceptable then, the best revenge is to take super good care of yourself, strengthen the right way, go on living, and find a better lover. Hopefully, in time you’ll eventually come to feel that what you are doing for yourself is really and truly for you, not to get back at the person who hurt you.

Thoughts? Welcome. Dr. T. Jordan

 

Posted in

Dr. Jordan

Dr. Thomas Jordan is a clinical psychologist, certified interpersonal psychoanalyst, author, professor, and love life researcher.

Leave a Comment