Breaking up is hard to do, there’s no doubt about it. Whether you’re in a crappy relationship or one that doesn’t seem to have very much conflict at all, it can still hurt to make a breakup official. When you’ve spent so much of your life (or perhaps not that much time at all) with a person and introduced them into your heart, breaking up with them can be one of the most difficult things you do.
However, it doesn’t always have to be heartbreak when you decide to walk away. Sometimes, ending a relationship can be the smartest decision you ever made, for a variety of reasons! Finally, you no longer have to be the nagging girlfriend (or boyfriend) to your SO, or feel like you’re half of a couple rather than a whole person. Sure, going through a breakup sucks no matter what end of it you’re on, but there are some silver linings if you squint hard enough. If you’ve just ended a relationship, or are starting to consider it, maybe we can help you realize that it’s not the end of the world and that, in fact, there are 13 very good reasons why you should be proud for walking away.
13. Your social circle can open back up
When we’re in a relationship with someone, we can get very enmeshed in each other, to the point that we’re at risk of isolating ourselves from other people. With our SO by our side, we choose to stay in more than go out, or do things together rather than with our friends. We all promised ourselves that we wouldn’t be like THAT person and neglect our squad, but it’s kind of inevitable when you get seriously involved with someone else.
When we walk away from that relationship, our social circle opens back up. We’re no longer forced to spend time with our partner’s friends, and now have the opportunity to meet new people, since we’re likely to go out more (after the initial mourning period, of course), and even hop onto dating apps where we come across new faces on which to swipe left or right. It’s scary to get out of that comfort zone, but something to be proud of going out all on our own.
12. You learn your limits
If you were in a relationship that ran over all of what you used to consider deal-breakers, now that that relationship is dunzo, we relearn and reconsider what are our limits in a relationship. Is it now a red flag when a guy puts off meeting our parents for ages, when maybe we excused it before? Do we decide that being called “insecure” when we were just worried is now no longer acceptable? Learning what we can take in a relationship is a huge part of growing up, and something that merits a great deal of importance when it comes to ending a relationship. While we may have let things slide before, on account of being so in love, we might redefine what we we’re willing to take going forward.
A lot of people don’t get to learn that in relationships, and can make the same mistakes over and over again, so looking at what made you unhappy and dissecting why you left is definitely something to be proud of, because it means you’re extremely emotionally mature!
11. You did what you thought was right
Look, leaving a relationship doesn’t make you a quitter, okay? Chances are, you had already tried everything you could at that point to make things work, and nothing did. You probably put a lot of thought into walking away before you finally pulled the plug, and that’s nothing to be ashamed of. On the contrary, it shows how mature you are and how seriously you understand your needs and the needs of your former partner. Ultimately, whatever was happening between you two was no longer working, and rather than stringing them along to avoid a confrontation, you stepped up and cut things off before anyone would get anymore hurt.
In this instance, you did what you thought was the right thing to do when you walked away, and that’s no small accomplishment. Many people stay trapped in unhappy relationships for years because they can’t bring themselves to drop the hammer, so you should feel proud of yourself for thinking selflessly for the both of you (even if it doesn’t feel that way yet)!
10. You reconnect with other loved ones
Like opening up your social circle, you might find that after a breakup, you lean on your friends and family to help get you through it. Although your whole world was largely comprised of this one person, knowing that these other people are there for you afterwards is a great comfort, and reconnecting with them isn’t always an easy feat.
Realizing what relationships are important to you and why is helpful in getting over a breakup, and an important part of developing and evolving your own identity. While your love and heart may have belonged in its entirety to this now-ex, it’s important and worthwhile to note that love is not a finite resource – it stretches to accommodate, rather than depleting. You should be proud of walking away and realizing that there are still others who love you who are there whenever and wherever you need them, so long as you just ask.
9. You can embrace spontaneity
In relationships, you can get stuck in a rut fairly quickly. It’s comfortable and easy to do nothing, because routines require very little thought. Once you’re out of that relationship, however, your whole world (and schedule) opens up, and you can do pretty much whatever you want – assuming you have the resources, of course.
Rather than checking with someone else’s workload or responsibilities, you only have yourself to look out for. Now, you can book trips on a whim or head out scouring used bookstores for an afternoon, because before your SO was a big planner and hated the smell of old shops, so you (probably somewhat unwittingly) chose not to do these things, lest your pleasure of it be ruined by their irritation. Spontaneity requires a lot of courage, especially if you’re travelling to various places alone, and being able to embrace that is nothing to turn up your nose at!
8. You refused to settle
In this day and age, when our social media feeds are filled with our Pinterest-worthy BFFs posting about their adoring husbands and perfectly-coiffed children (while still finding the time, money, and energy to go on cross-country trips and fit in yoga five times a week), we might be feeling the pressure to settle down now, so we can get that part of our lives started ASAP.
But, settling down doesn’t mean you have to settle. When you choose to walk away from a relationship because something isn’t quite fitting with you, that’s a big deal! You were able to see that perhaps this person – despite being really nice and a good cook – maybe isn’t everything you want in a life partner. And that’s okay! Just because a dude reaches the bare minimum of our requirements and isn’t totally awful to us isn’t enough of a reason to stay. Recognizing how much you’re worth and what you deserve is important, and choosing someone special rather than just SOMEONE is something to be proud of.
7. You realize what you want in love and life
Getting perspective once you’ve left a relationship is so important, because oftentimes, when you’re in a relationship that isn’t working in some way, it can be like you have blinders on. Hoping that your SO will change by some miracle and begin to want the things you want is an exercise in futility and will only cause you heartache and pain.
Realizing what you want in a relationship and in your life as a whole is something you should definitely be proud of, because it doesn’t come easily to most people. Even if you’re not sure exactly what you want just yet – and really, who among us is? – you had the foresight and the intelligence to know that whatever was happening with your SO wasn’t it – and that’s big! Your life should be led to the fullest, and having clear goals (without making some impossible-to-live-up-to checklist) is definitely a step in the right direction.
6. You don’t have to compromise on yourself anymore
It may not have been something you noticed until it was too late, but compromising on yourself in a relationship is one of the quickest ways to turn that love affair into something that seethes with resentment. Being forced to put your career or your goals on the back-burner for the sake of your partner is incredibly frustrating, and can leave you feeling like you’re putting a lot more into this relationship than they are, which is completely unfair.
On the lighter side of things, you can be happy not to have to do what your SO wants instead of what you want (or reach an unsatisfying compromise) when it comes to the little routines of a relationship, like what to get for dinner, or where to spend the weekend, or whether or not to get a pet. Now, you can have pizza every day of the week if you want, take a day trip to the beach, and get a cat, because your ex’s allergies aren’t around to ruin that dream anymore!
5. You left something toxic
One of the biggest reasons to be proud for walking away is when you’ve left something toxic. “Toxic” to describe a relationship can mean many things, whether they be serious issues like any sort of abuse or the kind of instability and emotional roller coaster that characterizes on-off relationships that toy with your emotions and leave you feeling more wrecked than loved.
If you are (or were) caught in the cycle of abuse, it is extremely hard to leave it, usually because you have been so manipulated and terrorized throughout it, you no longer feel like leaving is a viable option. However, while it is certainly one of the hardest things you can ever do, it is also one of the best, because it takes a lot of strength to acknowledge your worth as a person, and what you deserve in a relationship, which is definitely not what is happening right now. Something to be proud of? You betcha!
4. You can rediscover who you are
When you’re in a relationship, you become one half of a whole, one person in a couple, the yin to someone’s yang, the girlfriend to the boyfriend (or girlfriend, or any combination thereof). It can be easy to identify yourself in this way, too, and be unable to remember what life was like before you met this person.
But guess what?
You are a whole, fully-formed person, even without the arm of your SO around you. Walking away from a relationship can give you the chance to rediscover who you are now, after having been with them. Sure, it’s lonely and scary at first, but eventually, it’s pretty awesome to realize who you are, you strong, independent woman, you! Allowing yourself to melt away in a relationship is easy, because there’s always someone there to offer you some sort of identity and proof that you exist. Getting out of that is difficult, and something you deserve to be proud of.
3. You can test your independence
If you’re in a relationship that’s gotten into the serious territory of living together, it can be even more difficult to test yourself and see if you can live all on your own. Perhaps you’ve hopped from your parents’ place to living with roommates to living with an SO, and now you find yourself all on your own. It’s terrifying! Now, you’ll have to learn to take care of yourself beyond just basic feeding and cleaning.
When you live by yourself, you have to be the one to make all those calls to cable and Internet companies to set things up, contact places for apartment or house leasing opportunities, deal with that leaky tap, scrape the snow off your own car, and figure out how to pay for everything without splitting things down the middle (or relying on your fam to cough up the cash). Living like an independent woman is definitely something to be proud of, and it shows what you can do with no one to rely on except yourself.
2. You can assert your strength
Breaking up with someone you’ve been involved with for an extended period of time is hard as hell, there’s no doubt about it. In fact, it may be the most difficult thing you’ve ever endured to date, no matter how your relationship was when you finally ended it. Sure, you can argue that being the dumper rather than the dumpee is easy, but in truth, it’s a sucky situation for both.
Realizing that you’re a strong enough person to walk away from something (be it something great or something terrible) is a huge accomplishment, and not a thing a lot of people are able to do. Even if you need some time to cry into a pint of Ben & Jerry’s and binge-watch Legally Blonde, you’re still strong for having pulled the plug at all (assuming you aren’t desperately trying to get back with them afterwards). Like your independence, asserting your strength and how well you can handle things is something you should be proud of!
1. You can learn to love yourself
Look, learning to love yourself is no easy task. Many people go their entire lives without learning to fully accept and appreciate who they are, flaws and all. Some are unable to see who they are without another person at their side, or a list of accomplishments to fall back on. When you deal with a major breakup and have to put on your big-girl pants to handle it, you end up getting to know yourself an awful lot better. You can see how deeply you love, how much you can give, how vulnerable you can be, and, ultimately, what the other person saw in you that made them love you so much in the first place.
Learning to love you for you is one of the most impressive things you can ever do, and it can be almost impossible to do it if you’re always relying on someone else to prop you up emotionally, like you might do in a relationship. At the end of the day, it’s you who is around you 24/7, and learning to love all of that is major.