“Every time your heart is broken, a doorway cracks open to a world full of new beginnings, new opportunities.” – Patti Roberts

Break ups just plain suck. Every holiday that goes by can make it even harder, especially hard if were just dumped or are spending the time without your significant other for the first time in a long time.

I can’t begin to tell you how many holidays I’ve spent alone. During some of them I felt super lonely and others not so much. Looking back, I wish I knew all the things I know now, but hindsight is 20/20 and you can’t change the past, you can only move forward.

What I do know and what I truly believe is that there are 3 keys to surviving a broken heart so you don’t feel sad and lonely.

Key #1: What Are You Going to Focus On?

As with anything in life you must decide what you are going to focus on, because whatever you focus on determines how you feel.

Here is a list of negative things you can choose to focus on:

  • I was dumped and therefore rejected
  • I’m all alone
  • I’m not wanted
  • No one loves me
  • He or she never loved me in the first place
  • I’m not deserving of love
  • Why does this always happen to me?
  • My heart is breaking
  • I’m devastated
  • I can’t go on without him or her
  • I’m going to be alone forever

If you choose to focus on those thoughts how do you think you’re going to feel? Good or bad? Negative or positive? It seems so easy to fall into a pit of despair and feel sorry for ourselves when something happens that we didn’t want to happen.

When are you going to realize that bad sh** happens every day and you can’t control it. People die, they leave you, catastrophes happen, we’re born into abusive families, we suffer abuse, we lose jobs, we lose money, we face hardships and things can just fall apart.

You cannot control external forces and to think otherwise is the ultimate in egoist thinking. The ONLY thing you can control is your emotions and your actions.

Granted, it’s normal to feel sad and mourn the loss of a relationship. The question is how long you’re going to do that. Are you going to let the sadness take root and start taking over your life, or are you going to take control of how you view the events and change them into something that serves you?

What you decide to focus on will decide how you feel over this holiday period. The choice is yours.

Key #2: What Does This Mean?

The second key to surviving the holidays intact is to determine what the break-up means. How you interpret this meaning will also determine how you feel.

So, you can ask yourself empowering questions or dis*empowering questions:

Is this the end or the beginning?
Am I being tested or challenged?
Am I being punished or rewarded?
Have I lost the love of my life or I’m open to finding someone more suitable?

One shift in meaning can change everything in your life. Let me give you an example.

At a Tony Robbins seminar (which I viewed as part of my training) a couple stood was chosen to talk about the struggles they were facing financially. It turns out they had invested their money with a trusted broker and he had lost everything. By everything, I mean a million dollars.

Imagine going to bed one day having a nest egg, having security, having a college fund for your child and feeling like you basically know where your future is headed and waking up the next day to it all being gone. Everything.

Can you control whether the money is gone? No. Will focusing on the fact that you lost the money bring it back? No. More importantly how would you interpret this loss of money?

Would it mean your life was over or that you were ruined or that you had no reason to live because you no longer felt secure? Sure, you can choose to focus on that, but where will that get you? Will it move you forward or keep you stuck?

It turns out the husband and wife had been having some intimacy problems and they weren’t as connected as they should be, but through the loss the husband was forced to face some of his shortcomings and open up his vulnerability to his wife in ways he never had before.

He kept trying to reassure his wife, but she kept focusing on the loss. She couldn’t see it. She kept harping on how the loss of the money ruined everything and how she has nothing.

Cue Tony Robbins: He basically yelled at her and tells her she isn’t getting it. He tells her a million dollars is the price you had to pay to create the marriage you always wanted, the intimacy you always craved and the connection in your marriage that people dream about. He tells, here, “That is Grace. You have been given Grace, whether you choose to see it or not is up to you.” Then, he asks her again whether she has lost or gained and she finally gets it.

Maybe you’d say I’ll take the million dollars. But, I’m guessing when you’re on your deathbed you won’t care how much money you have in the bank, you’ll care about how much love you felt and how much love you gave.

Decide today what meaning you are going to place on being alone or separated or broken up during the holidays.

Key #3: What Are You Going to Do?

Next you need to decide what you’re going to do about what it all. If you’ve chosen to focus on the positive and change the meaning of the event to something that serves you what are you going to do next?

What actions are you going to take to get to where you want to be? Will you go to therapy or hire a coach to break your past patterns and move you forward? Are you going to focus on creating that new career path you’ve been putting off?

You need to believe that the past does not equal the future and that you have the power to make change.

Then, sit down and envision what you want from your next relationship. What is your ideal and your musts? What is your dream person like physically, emotionally, spiritually, etc.?

What kind of person do you need to be to attract that mate into your life? Do you need to behave differently or believe differently? Figure these things out and ACT on them. Merely learning what kind of person, you need to be doesn’t help unless you become that person.

Set up goals for yourself that can be defined and measured. If you have a habit of being dishonest by omission in the past, then practice being fully open and vulnerable with friends and family. If you find yourself reacting to statements made by others in an angry manner, then practice not letting their words affect you.

Motion creates emotion. Changing your physiology leads to a change in mental state and to breaking negative patterns. In other words, if you notice you tense up when you start to get angry try smiling instead. Try jumping up and down. Try shouting, “I am the Master of My Emotions” while doing jumping jacks. Do something to break the old patterns.

It’s Up to You

It may not seem like it, but everything you think, and feel is a choice. So, you can decide to have a miserable, lonely crappy month or week or year because things didn’t turn out the way you wanted (and trust me I get it if you do as I’ve let myself feel this way on many occasions) or you can decide to do something and think something different.

The clock of your life is ticking slowly away. You never know how many days you have left. If you want to try and enjoy the time you have left, then take these three keys and apply them and remember:

What You’re Going to Focus on
What Meaning You’re Going to Give Your Feelings and
What You’re Going to Do About It