Health & LifestyleHow to Focus on Happiness After a Heartbreak
Do you feel unworthy and not good enough following a break-up? Find out how to regain your inner joy and feel more whole than you’ve ever felt.
I’d been heartbroken for over a year and it was taking a toll on me. Every morning I woke up feeling tired, uninspired, and just over it. I wanted nothing to do with men or love because I knew I couldn’t take another rejection. I felt sorry for myself, insecure, and worthless. These terrible feelings weren’t making me feel alive or excited to seize the day.
One day, I noticed that the guy I‘d been dating had posted a picture on Facebook of him and his new girlfriend. Here I was feeling miserable for his absence and patiently waiting for him to return while he was out there enjoying himself. The turning point happened the moment I realised I’d held on to the heartbreak for far too long and I deserved to be happy too.
I began to pay attention to the story I was telling myself on a daily basis. The truth was that I was spending all my precious hours of my day focusing on the pain and feeling sorry for myself. Thoughts such as, “Is there something wrong with me” or “maybe I’m not good enough” would play in the back of my mind.
The mental chatter I had wasn’t doing me any good. For example, the thought of “what if I’m not good enough” only made me feel unworthy of meeting any man because I thought I wasn’t worthy. I became very honest with myself and, even though confronting the negative beliefs hurt, it was better than letting them fester and cause me constant unhappiness.
It became clear to me that I had the choice to continue being upset for him leaving or take charge and become aware of where I was placing my focus. For once, I put myself and happiness first and it made me feel empowered. I knew I had the power to choose to focus on reconnecting with my happiness and that’s exactly what I intended to do!
I asked myself, “what do I want to continue giving my energy and attention to? The pain of being heartbroken or feeling happy again?” I chose the latter.
My new mantra was, “no one can ever take away my happiness.” While it feels like the man that broke your heart took your happiness, he didn’t. Your happiness is innate and it’s up to you to give your attention to it, like a garden that needs nurturing so you can see it flourish from within.
A few months after I constantly focused on my happiness, my life drastically changed. I felt lighter, happier, and genuinely enjoyed every day. My new empowered state made me feel alive. It reminded me of my interests that I had buried with my sorrow. For instance, I started to go out with friends, travel, and explore nature. It was in this happy place that the love of my life showed up without even looking for him.
If you feel like you’ve cried all the tears you have and are ready to move on from the heartbreak, just like I did, follow my advice. I’ll guide you through the steps on how to focus on your happiness.
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Where Is Your Focus?
Think about the thoughts you give your attention to that aren’t serving you and decide to let go of them.
Begin by analysing the story you’re telling yourself. Try to look for any thoughts you have about yourself or about love. How do they make you feel? If you’re anything like me, I always wondered “why did he leave me? or “did I do something wrong?” Thoughts like these only made me feel unworthy of any love.
Look for thoughts that don’t make you feel good. They’re a red flag signalling that they’re reinforcing your unhappiness. Why hold on to thoughts and feelings that don’t make you happy?
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Choose Happiness
You have the power to focus on your happiness. Don’t let anyone ever take that away from you.
If you don’t put yourself and happiness first, who else will? Take personal accountability and decide to put yourself first. After the breakup, I felt like I had lost a piece of myself. It was now up to me to mend my broken heart back together so I could reconnect with my happiness and feel whole again.
Decide to focus your attention on thoughts that make you feel good and inspire hope. For example, “I know I’ll find someone, it’s just a matter of time” makes you feel hopeful. On the other hand, “I’ll never find someone” only makes you feel helpless.
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Do things that make you feel good
Your feelings are your inner compass, listen to what they’re telling you.
After I decided to focus only on the thoughts that made me feel good, I felt revitalised and they gave me the energy to do the things I had neglected to do. Here are a few examples of how to engage in feel-good activities and take your mind off from what’s not serving you:
- Explore your passions – Do you like to dance, sing, paint, play an instrument? Spend time engaging with your creativity.
- Go out and enjoy outdoor activities – Go for a hike, run, swim, play a sport, camp. Nature has a way of revitalising our soul, it clears our mind and makes us feel peaceful. Spend more time in nature.
- Connect with friends and family – plan fun activities with the people you love. Most importantly, surround yourself with friends and family that appreciate you and lift your spirits.
- Listen to Happy Music – Is there a song that makes you want to get up and dance or makes you feel happy? Listening to music that makes you happy helps to lighten up your mood.
- Travel – You can do it alone or with friends, but get out there and explore. When you go to different places and meet unique people, you learn about the world and about yourself. You don’t have to travel around the world, a weekend getaway to a neighbouring town works too.
The key is to do things that distract you from the pain of the breakup and instead supports your happiness.
Your task after having read this is to plan something fun for yourself within the next month. What makes your heart sing with joy?
Check out these seven quotes to remind yourself that you are beautiful just the way you are.
Liz Luna
Liz is a Love Coach and founder of meanttobelove.com. Liz teaches women how to have the right mindset in love in order to awaken their power to attract the right man for them. She firmly believes every woman is deserving of living their “happily ever after” and she is here to guide you through the steps. Learn more on meanttobelove.com.
Absolutely true! Always choose happiness. Thank you for your tips and advises. It such a big boost to confidence and useful to stop the insecurities and to start loving ourselves more.
Going through this, it is so unfair that all this time that you’re doing everything in the name of love, you will end up in domestic abuse. We are so loving even if it’s not good for us.