How I Let Go of My Ex and Past With The KonMari Mentality

You get the gift of goodbye and closure at its tidiest

Photo by tu tu on Unsplash

“Breakups are easy,” said no one, ever. If they were, I don’t suppose you would have clicked on this post for a shot of rejuvenation from failed relationships, or at least see how I got closure with the help of a book about tidying. I wasn’t searching for an answer — it magically presented itself to me.

Breakups can be one-sided or mutual. Messy and brutal. Bitter or regretful. They can be a combination of things, leaving people feeling a little less whole after giving fragments of themselves away.

I have been on both sides of the heartbreak spectrum, and while they are awful in their own ways, I’d rather be on the receiving end than to be the one ripping a collaborated love story to shreds.

Getting dumped can feel like being swept up in the sudden impact of a tsunami, where you lose control of yourself, questioning your existence and everything you had, stuck alone with the aftermath of your worst nightmare. But as the storm clouds of bad dreams wisp away over time, you recover — learn that pain is temporary — and you live on stronger and wiser. It was yesterday.

Breaking up with someone, on the other hand, you can move on, swiftly with one foot in front of the other without turning back to face the mess in your wake. It could be seen as heartless and as easy as turning the page with the flick of a finger when that couldn’t be further from the truth. It hurts the same. Only the pain is slow and dragged out, with the difference being something extra sticking to you, like an invisible scar called Guilt — and you carry it with you to tomorrows.

A universal truth is that goodbyes are complicated, and it is the hardest word to say

Take it from me; I broke up with my ex without giving either of us a chance to talk over why it all came to an end. I cut him clean from my life — which was, in hindsight, the worst way to end a long term relationship.

He had worked into the fabric of my life, making up a large part of my identity, my history, and once part of my vision for the future. Ripping him out was painful…