How to fix a broken heart | Guy Winch | TED

10,869,885 views ・ 2018-02-27

TED


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At some point in our lives,
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almost every one of us will have our heart broken.
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My patient Kathy planned her wedding when she was in middle school.
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She would meet her future husband
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by age 27,
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get engaged a year later
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and get married a year after that.
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But when Kathy turned 27, she didn't find a husband.
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She found a lump in her breast.
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She went through many months of harsh chemotherapy
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and painful surgeries,
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and then just as she was ready to jump back into the dating world,
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she found a lump in her other breast
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and had to do it all over again.
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Kathy recovered, though,
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and she was eager to resume her search for a husband
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as soon as her eyebrows grew back in.
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When you're going on first dates in New York City,
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you need to be able to express a wide range of emotions.
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(Laughter)
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Soon afterwards, she met Rich and fell in love.
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The relationship was everything she hoped it would be.
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Six months later,
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after a lovely weekend in New England,
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Rich made reservations at their favorite romantic restaurant.
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Kathy knew he was going to propose,
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and she could barely contain her excitement.
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But Rich did not propose to Kathy that night.
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He broke up with her.
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As deeply as he cared for Kathy -- and he did --
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he simply wasn't in love.
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Kathy was shattered.
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Her heart was truly broken, and she now faced yet another recovery.
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But five months after the breakup,
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Kathy still couldn't stop thinking about Rich.
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Her heart was still very much broken.
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The question is:
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Why?
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Why was this incredibly strong and determined woman
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unable to marshal the same emotional resources
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that got her through four years of cancer treatments?
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Why do so many of us flounder
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when we're trying to recover from heartbreak?
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Why do the same coping mechanisms
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that get us through all kinds of life challenges
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fail us so miserably when our heart gets broken?
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In over 20 years of private practice,
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I have seen people of every age and background
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face every manner of heartbreak,
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and what I've learned is this:
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when your heart is broken,
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the same instincts you ordinarily rely on
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will time and again lead you down the wrong path.
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You simply cannot trust what your mind is telling you.
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For example, we know from studies of heartbroken people
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that having a clear understanding of why the relationship ended
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is really important for our ability to move on.
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Yet time and again,
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when we are offered a simple and honest explanation
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like the one Rich offered Kathy,
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we reject it.
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Heartbreak creates such dramatic emotional pain,
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our mind tells us the cause must be equally dramatic.
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And that gut instinct is so powerful,
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it can make even the most reasonable and measured of us
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come up with mysteries and conspiracy theories
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where none exist.
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Kathy became convinced something must have happened
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during her romantic getaway with Rich
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that soured him on the relationship,
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and she became obsessed with figuring out what that was.
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And so she spent countless hours
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going through every minute of that weekend in her mind,
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searching her memory for clues that were not there.
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Kathy's mind tricked her into initiating this wild goose chase.
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But what compelled her to commit to it for so many months?
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Heartbreak is far more insidious than we realize.
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There is a reason we keep going down one rabbit hole after another,
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even when we know it's going to make us feel worse.
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Brain studies have shown
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that the withdrawal of romantic love
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activates the same mechanisms in our brain that get activated
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when addicts are withdrawing from substances like cocaine or opioids.
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Kathy was going through withdrawal.
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And since she could not have the heroin of actually being with Rich,
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her unconscious mind chose the methadone of her memories with him.
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Her instincts told her she was trying to solve a mystery,
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but what she was actually doing
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was getting her fix.
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This is what makes heartbreak so difficult to heal.
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Addicts know they're addicted.
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They know when they're shooting up.
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But heartbroken people do not.
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But you do now.
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And if your heart is broken, you cannot ignore that.
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You have to recognize that, as compelling as the urge is,
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with every trip down memory lane, every text you send,
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every second you spend stalking your ex on social media,
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you are just feeding your addiction,
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deepening your emotional pain
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and complicating your recovery.
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Getting over heartbreak is not a journey.
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It's a fight, and your reason is your strongest weapon.
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There is no breakup explanation that's going to feel satisfying.
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No rationale can take away the pain you feel.
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So don't search for one, don't wait for one,
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just accept the one you were offered or make up one yourself
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and then put the question to rest,
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because you need that closure to resist the addiction.
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And you need something else as well:
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you have to be willing to let go,
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to accept that it's over.
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Otherwise, your mind will feed on your hope
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and set you back.
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Hope can be incredibly destructive when your heart is broken.
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Heartbreak is a master manipulator.
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The ease with which it gets our mind to do the absolute opposite
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of what we need in order to recover
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is remarkable.
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One of the most common tendencies we have when our heart is broken
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is to idealize the person who broke it.
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We spend hours remembering their smile,
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how great they made us feel,
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that time we hiked up the mountain and made love under the stars.
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All that does is make our loss feel more painful.
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We know that.
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Yet we still allow our mind to cycle through one greatest hit after another,
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like we were being held hostage by our own passive-aggressive Spotify playlist.
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(Laughter)
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Heartbreak will make those thoughts pop into your mind.
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And so to avoid idealizing, you have to balance them out
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by remembering their frown, not just their smile,
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how bad they made you feel,
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the fact that after the lovemaking, you got lost coming down the mountain,
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argued like crazy and didn't speak for two days.
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What I tell my patients is to compile an exhaustive list
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of all the ways the person was wrong for you,
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all the bad qualities, all the pet peeves,
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and then keep it on your phone.
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(Laughter)
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And once you have your list,
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you have to use it.
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When I hear even a hint of idealizing
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or the faintest whiff of nostalgia in a session,
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I go, "Phone, please."
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(Laughter)
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Your mind will try to tell you they were perfect.
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But they were not, and neither was the relationship.
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And if you want to get over them, you have to remind yourself of that,
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frequently.
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None of us is immune to heartbreak.
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My patient Miguel was a 56-year-old senior executive in a software company.
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Five years after his wife died,
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he finally felt ready to start dating again.
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He soon met Sharon,
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and a whirlwind romance ensued.
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They introduced each other to their adult children after one month,
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and they moved in together after two.
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When middle-aged people date, they don't mess around.
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It's like "Love, Actually" meets "The Fast and the Furious."
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(Laughter)
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Miguel was happier than he had been in years.
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But the night before their first anniversary,
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Sharon left him.
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She had decided to move to the West Coast to be closer to her children,
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and she didn't want a long-distance relationship.
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Miguel was totally blindsided and utterly devastated.
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He barely functioned at work for many, many months,
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and he almost lost his job as a result.
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Another consequence of heartbreak is that feeling alone and in pain
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can significantly impair our intellectual functioning,
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especially when performing complex tasks involving logic and reasoning.
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It temporarily lowers our IQ.
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But it wasn't just the intensity of Miguel's grief
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that confused his employers;
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it was the duration.
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Miguel was confused by this as well
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and really quite embarrassed by it.
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"What's wrong with me?" he asked me in our session.
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"What adult spends almost a year getting over a one-year relationship?"
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Actually, many do.
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Heartbreak shares all the hallmarks of traditional loss and grief:
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insomnia, intrusive thoughts,
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immune system dysfunction.
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Forty percent of people experience clinically measurable depression.
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Heartbreak is a complex psychological injury.
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It impacts us in a multitude of ways.
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For example, Sharon was both very social
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and very active.
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She had dinners at the house every week.
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She and Miguel went on camping trips with other couples.
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Although Miguel was not religious,
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he accompanied Sharon to church every Sunday,
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where he was welcomed into the congregation.
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Miguel didn't just lose his girlfriend;
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he lost his entire social life,
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the supportive community of Sharon's church.
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He lost his identity as a couple.
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Now, Miguel recognized the breakup had left this huge void in his life,
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but what he failed to recognize
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is that it left far more than just one.
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And that is crucial,
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not just because it explains why heartbreak could be so devastating,
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but because it tells us how to heal.
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To fix your broken heart,
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you have to identify these voids in your life and fill them,
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and I mean all of them.
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The voids in your identity:
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you have to reestablish who you are and what your life is about.
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The voids in your social life,
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the missing activities, even the empty spaces on the wall
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where pictures used to hang.
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But none of that will do any good
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unless you prevent the mistakes that can set you back,
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the unnecessary searches for explanations,
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idealizing your ex instead of focusing on how they were wrong for you,
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indulging thoughts and behaviors that still give them a starring role
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in this next chapter of your life
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when they shouldn't be an extra.
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Getting over heartbreak is hard,
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but if you refuse to be misled by your mind and you take steps to heal,
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you can significantly minimize your suffering.
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And it won't just be you who benefit from that.
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You'll be more present with your friends,
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more engaged with your family,
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not to mention the billions of dollars of compromised productivity
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in the workplace that could be avoided.
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So if you know someone who is heartbroken,
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have compassion,
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because social support has been found to be important for their recovery.
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And have patience,
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because it's going to take them longer to move on than you think it should.
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And if you're hurting,
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know this:
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it's difficult, it is a battle within your own mind,
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and you have to be diligent to win.
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But you do have weapons.
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You can fight.
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And you will heal.
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Thank you.
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(Applause)
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