To Continue, Or to Break with Everything?

To Continue, Or to Break with Everything?

Last update: 15 February, 2016

There are many moments in life when you have to decide whether to continue or to break with everything. There’s nothing left to do but decide. Love is probably one of the most complicated things to make decisions about. We feel divided between what our heart tells us with its relentless beating and what reason suggests we should do.

For this reason, when the heart beats strongly but also bleeds, cries, and suffers, maybe it’s better to say goodbye to that love. Because we’re like a boat that’s drifting away if we don’t love ourselves first. If we lose our self-esteem because we feel guilt over the treatment we receive from someone who we think loves us, we’re jumping into a vast ocean without an escape, and we can’t let that happen.

boat adrift

There are times when that love hurts, rips apart our soul, makes us unhappy, keeps us from respecting or understanding ourselves. There are times when that love doesn’t know how to be on our side during bad times; it confuses and upsets us We should say goodbye to it even though it breaks us apart on the inside. 

Love sometimes can’t be explained with words, it can only be felt and understood by the person who has lived it. And maybe all we can do is trace its meaning humbly and with very few words. Love arrives like a whirlwind full of hopes, emotions, and feelings that make us feel happy, alive, renewed.

“It’s burning ice, it’s frozen fire
it’s a wound that hurts but is not felt,
it’s a good dream, a present evil,
it’s a brief, very tired rest.
It’s a carelessness that makes us care,
a coward with a brave name,
a solitary walk among people,
a love only to be loved.
It’s an incarcerated freedom,
that lasts until the last convulsion,
a sickness that spreads if it’s cured.
This is the child called Love, this is its abyss.
Look at the friendship you’ll have with nothing but
that which is contrary to everything about itself!”

-Francisco de Quevedo-

But sometimes everything goes in reverse. If we don’t even understand ourselves, if we’re full of contradictions, trying to coordinate our lives with a partner can be a very difficult journey. And when our stability and inner peace start to break, we don’t have any other option but to say goodbye.

Because I love, appreciate, and respect myself, and I need the respect of others. Because I feel sure of what I want and especially what I don’t want. This is why I’m saying goodbye to you. And as often happens in life, everything remains and everything passes.

Experience and lessons learned remain, and the pain passes. Although the following saying is simple and cliché, it’s also quite true: It’s better to be alone than in bad company.

This is why learning to love ourselves is the first thing that should guide us, so that we don’t become puppets of love. Don’t break your heart, your soul, and your mind for a love that isn’t really love. Love yourself.


This text is provided for informational purposes only and does not replace consultation with a professional. If in doubt, consult your specialist.