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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 1:57:05 PM | Transformed by love or break-up... which do you feel or believed changed you the most?
The impulse to cling to the past is self-defeating - the bridge between what can be and what is, we each climb in our own ways - sometimes being hand held by a friend or lover.
How were you transformed? was it a physical change, a mental change or an emotional one.
For some break-ups the lover simply crumbles in despair and desolation, ill-health follows.
Yet you can be 'love-sick'.
Why give a rose, in love knowing that it has thorns, unless these are a reminder of the obvious pain of love itself.
If you were morphed from the deepest or most significant transformation which one left you the wiser?
Do you feel jaded by your memories? Would you go through it again if the situation presented itself or are you searching for yourself and trying to find who you were before, because it was a more joyous time?
Most people say they are a better person for their experiences, others feel that they are broken inside because of it?
What leaves the deepest scars - profound break-up heartache from unrequited love, or cruelty, and/or cold indifference from ex-lovers?
Did you see an ex. after a period apart, of no contact and take stock of their transformation to discover from them or those qualified to advise you that your ex. was transformed by your breakup with them?
Are you in love and finding yourself changing and developing such that you are self-aware and can feel it inside yourself and finding it magical as it happens to you?
Do you welcome love again into your life, and hope it is exciting, or would you prefer it to be a calmer journey? | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 2:07:56 PM | I knew a husband and wife who taught some of the courses I was taking at a local community college many years ago...he was also a minister at a local church and being an atheist he and I got into some good discussions about religion. Anyway, I became friendly with them and often bemoaned my sad love life and cried on their shoulders. Luckily for me his wife had a low tolerance for self-pity and whining about the same thing year after year LOL and she point blank asked me why I always ended up in these bad relationships if I didn't enjoy the drama and whining. Since I wasn't a total loser and have some intelligence, instead of being insulted I started to ask myself why did I do this. So I went into some years of therapy with a some really good therapists and figured myself out. It's really so much more fun to be me and know why than to be always confused and whining and dating men who made me miserable. Not that I didn't have several false starts but it is great to leave that all behind. I remember telling one therapist that I was hanging on my my fingernails, I was going to fall off that cliff, whaaa whaaaa whaaaa, and she said, let go. Was she nuts??? LOL Yeah, that's what it is, just let go and face it all and get over it. Took me three years and some really rough times but it sure beats the blubbering idiot I use to be.  | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 2:15:25 PM | | Yes, I saw my X, after a twenty-two year marriage break-up and divorce. Didn't see him for two years. Saw him at a homecoming, for our son's welcome back from Iraq. I decided I am taking him back to court and suing him for alimony. I became very "self-aware and can feel it inside myself and found it magical as it happened to me." I decided I could give an extra $1000 a month spousal support to my church, considering the fact that he doesn't believe in God, is not religious..... because HE IS GOD..... so I will just give this extra money to the church. What a transformation? You betcha! | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 2:20:04 PM | daynadaze ... you go girl. I think I need to do a little [a lot?] more [therapy]... I keep choosing badly. I know no one is perfect so I forgive and put up with and overlook way too much, until I can't take it anymore. My last one had a lot of potential, but refused to work on his problems. [said he didn't have any - after being divorced 3 times and several other live in situations go bad!!!!!]
I hope I learn and grow from every relationship I have, and from the break ups. At least I try.  | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 3:45:02 PM |
hope I learn and grow from every relationship I have, and from the break ups. At least I try.
Thats all any of us can do if we want to have a healthy relationship in the future. The biggest thing I have learned, is that good communication is a MUST. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 4:25:38 PM | I have learned that communication is a must as well...I just wish the men I have loved would learn this as too!
I seem to fall for the ones who assume things, and draw thier own conclusions, without doing any fact checking or talking. They meander off to thier own homes and brood, then conclude...all without any input. Seems pointless to me. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 4:30:05 PM | It made me more aware of my flaws and what I needed. It allowed me to try to correct some things that I didn't like about myself so that I could strive for positive growth. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 5:24:32 PM | If we are not transformed by both love and break-ups, what is the point of having either, lol? I suspect that we believe that whatever phase we are in, love or break-up, seems like it has changed us the most as we undergo it.
In reality we are fairly constantly in flux in this regard considering your entire life and the time periods that could be attributed to getting together or splitting up. If we did not try to cling to the past at least for a short while, whatever we just lost would not have been particularly meaningful.
Ordinarily my change is mental or emtional while when I split with my x-husband, I literally had a gray spot in my hair about the size of a pencil eraser, that had sort of appeared overnight it seemed five years before and within a year of his leaving, it is now just a couple of strands. Everyone that talked to me said I sounded like a new person, more energy, happier. Of course, the first time I fell head over after we split everyone was tickled for me because I was happy enough to make you want to puke.
My most important discovery I think is that it takes me less time to figure out that someone is not the right person for me than it did years ago. No one wants to get hurt but I am not ready yet to sit the rest of my life out. If you don't experience pain pleasure is just merely another meaningless state of being.
I would not call them transformations, more the light-bulb moments. Around six months after the marriage ended and I thought to myself, someone had just celebrated a 50 year anniversary. If I got married tomorrow I will never mathematically be able to have that. Then I thought, but, I could have a marriage of easily 30 if not 40 years based on average life expectancy. Sometimes the real understanding of the lightbulb moment can also come years down the road. You recognize that something is important but you cannot really figure out why, suddenly one day it comes to you, so it is an ongoing process of putting in new information and merging and reformatting the picture of how things do and should work.
30-40 years is a really damned long time, what the hell am I gonna do? Guess it also gives me quite a bit of space with finding the right guy instead of a guy. Hell, even if it takes 10 years to find someone that is really suited for me, we would still unless I found a dude in a walker, have at least 20, maybe 30 decent years together? That is way beyond my shelf life for marriages anyway.
I wish I could more easily remember the joyous times of my marriage because I know we had some. Each experience, even the painful ones gives me more insight to myself and other people. Why would anyone not see this as an ultimately positive thing? Yeah, sure it would be nice to avoid the bad stuff but people do that every day and because they don't get how fortunate they are, they throw a good relationship away, often realizing later just how very stupid that move was.
Thing about scars is that they change over time. What was a really deep scar a couple of years ago is barely a blip on my radar. Emotional Vitamin E Oil. Until that does it's job, look past the scar to the you that you either want to be or are.
I think the break-up was good for my X. He does a bit better in the father department and while he still doesn't really get it he has more of a clue about the way that the world really is instead of the little bubble he cruised around in for so long.
I would be quite happy with a fairly calm relationship that is periodically passionate, not necessarily exciting. Excitement is not really all it's cracked up to be, sort of like being an interesting medical case the doctors discuss because they are totally baffled by it, you don't want to be one. Goose me every once in a while to make sure I am awake, but other than that, calm is good. So is sex every day. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/16/2008 6:03:54 PM | It wasn't love or the break up that caused the most significant transformation in my life. It was the conscious, willfull decision to let go of anger and bitterness and resentment and regret and to FORGIVE.
That act of forgiving the one who I loved the most and who hurt me the most was the most liberating thing that ever happened to me. It changed me, inside, where it counts, and transformed me into something new and good.
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 2:42:13 PM | Well I haven't experienced love and by now I fully doubt it exists. At 43 well it is extremely unlikely I will ever experience it as it requires a wrinkle and blemish free face for a woman - unless of course I would be willing to settle for a decrepit old fart, who is just after a screw and nothing else anyway.
Breakup was a wonderful liberating experience, it is the best thing I ever did in my entire life. Love of self, is the most fundamental thing to experience, not the transient passing unfaithful diseasing lust of a screwer or an egotistical old sleaze bag. Love is something women give freely, but the transformation is realising it is only ever going to be a one way street. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 2:52:36 PM | I have learned that communication is a must as well...I just wish the men I have loved would learn this as too!.... They meander off to thier own homes and brood, then conclude...all without any input. Seems pointless to me.
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If all the men do this, it isn't them its YOU. It's remotely possible, the odds improbable, that after experiencing a couple of "non communicators" and setting yourself on the right path to "get it" and then choosing wisely, the same mistake happens again and again, unless it is us, or a bazillion stars are lined up to send you another man (or woman) who cannot communicate.
(((I seem to fall for the ones who assume things, and draw thier own conclusions, without doing any fact checking or talking)))
I know that one..my last recent gf of 3yrs was exactly (in my mind) that way. Never ever a question about anything. For example, I love to super shop and get online coupons, free movie tickets, etc. Instead of her saying "Joe, it really bothers me that you spend more time shopping than at work, I am serious, please get a grip on that". Instead I would get a fonecall at 8:30 at nite.."there is a lady on Oprah with a shopping addiction, she has 200 pairs of shoes, still new in the boxes, you should watch it, its funny". I'm paraphrasing.
I am learning slowly, to rid myself of character defects that get in the way of future relationships and still be me. And to pay more attention to what people say even if they aren't saying it. And that aint easy! | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 3:39:48 PM | I think who we love reflects us. You cannot love anyone you don't see a bit of yourself in so to totally reject my exes would be to reject major parts of me. I also believe a broken heart is an open heart. I think if one takes each experience as an opportunity to learn, no experience is wasted.
I still love my exes. They were/are good people, but in the end we were not good together. One of my exes is dead, another has married, one refuses to mature, and my last has settled with a woman in his age braket. Each relationship was better than the one before for me so I seem to be learning something.
I'm looking for to go on a roller coaster ride with my next love. If we strap ourselves in don't do anything stupid, we can have an amazing ride.  | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 4:55:39 PM | I have learned something from every single one of my ex's.
Biggest lesson of late is to listen to my gut, NO, I mean really listen, and then act on it by saying yes or no and really truely following up on that.
2nd biggest lesson for me is for god sake's, if there's a huge red flag in front of me, pay heed!!
I have learned that words can be hollow, and that behaviour totally speaks way louder. That all of us are in a different 'evolution' of maturity in a relationship, and I would probobly do better with someone at the same evolution as myself.
Without communication there is nothing! Chemistry does matter! Men need different things then woman, and I need different things then every woman out there.
I don't know if I have been 'transformed' by love or a break-up. But I do know that everytime the sparks have flied, weather or not that relationship was a go or not, that there is hope that the one for me is out there somewhere.
I have some regrets, and some what if's. Those have taught me to give it another try. Keep an open mind. But most of all, be true to myself and say what I mean and mean what I say.
my ramblings.................
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 4:59:40 PM | | I was transformed by my last break-up. It made me impatient with collections of random, unrelated sentences posing as essays. It also made me curious about something the kids call dogging. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 5:15:43 PM | | Hi my husband left last year after being together 27yrs he didnt even tell me he was going.He picked me up from work as usual that day then as soon as we got home told me he,d moved out, got himself a house everything and I didnt know. I feel I lost a year of my life because I cannot remember anything about last summer it passed in a daze of hurt and humiliation. Its only now starting to clear.It still hurts when I see him but I will always have a part of me that will love him forever I know thats probably really stupid but in answer to your question I would welcome love into my life again but in a very different sense.I think there will always be a part of me now that will never completely trust a man ever again. A sad but true fact of my life from now on. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 5:46:36 PM |
Do you welcome love again into your life, and hope it is exciting, or would you prefer it to be a calmer journey?
Oh yes, I welcome it with open arms. And naturally it'll be exciting, even if it is a calmer journey.
As for being a little jaded by our memories... well, aren't we all? At least a little? But it's nothing a handful of hugs and a few meaningful "I love you's" can't cure... right?
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 6:02:21 PM |
I decided I am taking him back to court and suing him for alimony. I became very "self-aware and can feel it inside myself and found it magical as it happened to me." I decided I could give an extra $1000 a month spousal support to my church, considering the fact that he doesn't believe in God, is not religious..... because HE IS GOD..... so I will just give this extra money to the church. What a transformation? You betcha!
^^^That not a transformation. I find it rather telling you would give the church a$1000/month out of spite. It also suggests that you would cut off your nose to spite your face... I wonder how your children/grandchildren feel about you if they learned about that $1000/month?
On topic:
My divorce has taught me that sick minds will never change. I used to get upset at my ex's behaviour, especially when it came to our children and abuse, but now, I realise that mental illness is not curable when the ill person has no intention of changing.
My transformation is that I am at peace with myself and my decisions regarding divorce. I finally came to terms that I wasn't a bad father/husband..... I was simply the target of a mentally unwell person. Not meaning to brag but, I think she is more upset that her following two husbands failed to treat her the way I did..... she resents me for that.
As for the poster I quoted? My ex went to court out of spite and made a complete ass of herself. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 6:06:16 PM | I dated a guy somewhat whom I met on POF for several months. I was intensely attracted to this man and he to me also. It never did go to the next level but this man awakened something inside of me that I thought had died. I will probably never be the same.. which is a good thing believe me ;).
I felt so alive.. and so full of femininity and life.. my feelings would go from feeling like a soft gentle dove all quiet snuggling inside the nape of his neck to incredible sexual energy and desire.. It was glorious to experience the essense of his masculinity.. I can remember thinking "oh so this is what male female dynamics are all about".. hehehe.
So while things did not turn out the way I had wanted..and we parted ways on friendly terms. I try to remember that this man was such a gift to me.. and believe that I met him at the appointed time.
While I no longer have contact with him.. I will remember him...yes I sometimes am a little sad for the both of us that it did not continue.. but I firmly believe that short time was meant to be and to show me that yes I was a desirable, sexy, passionate, and loving woman.
I just think it is so important to walk away from a relationship even if it was short lived with something possitive.
So I was transformed by love.. lust what ever you want to call it.. not long enough to be love.. so I guess you could call it lust.. hehehe. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 6:22:21 PM | | I was transformed from love & break ups. Became stronger and continue to be stronger. I also learned to let bitterness with the ex's go and to speak up and to love without expecting anything in return except respect. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 6:46:51 PM | Most people say they are a better person for their experiences, others feel that they are broken inside because of it?
I think it's because I was so broken that I morphed, so to speak, and became a much healthier person. I won't begin to say I'm a better person; just a healthier one that actually uses her head.
There's something about crawling around on your belly, amidst a tragedy that touched the lives of too many, that tends to change things. But you have to be really quiet so you can listen to what it's trying to teach you.
I never looked back, never had any desire to look back, and for the first time in any break up, I felt absolutely nothing. Nothing good, nothing bad. It was a horribly toxic relationship that never should've happened and was destructive to everyone it touched; examining why/how it came to be was step one in the process of turning things around. It's always puzzled me that I don't feel anything, but that's probably because it died so slowly and thoroughly and viciously that there was nothing at all left to feel.
After that, all I could handle was calm. But I had to be calm first. From calm came an ability to just "be" and let be. From that came peace, from peace came contentment, from contentment came a happiness that just exploded like crazy, from happiness came love. I was finally attracting the good stuff.
And now, my marriage has lots of the same obstacles, but I'm able to handle them. In fact, I married into a dynamic that is the exact same dynamic (on the surface) as the relationship I left, sans the dysfunction and lack of love. It's weird, but it kinda seems like I was given a second chance to do better, from a healthy place and with a healthy person.
At my age, with divorce and kids in tow, this stuff is extremely hard. It pays to come at it from a healthy and loving place.
Edit: I think love transforms in that it takes us outside ourselves. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 6:55:34 PM | Break ups for sure. They made me look at me. At my behavior.
Perhaps the biggest goal of my life is to have a loving and mutually beneficial relationship. When the potential was on the horizon and things didn't work out, I didn't blame the men, I looked at myself as well. Since my divorce and including my ex-husband, there have been a few men, who have really mattered, who...I will never forget. They all taught me something and for that, they will alway have a place in my heart. I have to say, these men, made me a better woman. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 6/21/2008 6:56:34 PM | | Well I know myself that I was transformed but it took quite a few relationships for me to figure things out. I used to have high anger problems and would end up yelling at the ones I loved. Family and relationship alike. Then as I came to break up after break up, I started learning what kind of horror it was to listen to myself yell in a way I did. So I turned a new leaf and well became a nicer guy. Unfortunatly right now I am a nervous wreck. I dated a girl for six months and fell in love with her for real. We went to go live in Maine but I could not become finacually stable so I ended up having to move away. We broke up because I was in Washington State and She was in Maine. I ended up moving to Wyoming because of family and the cost of living is lower. To the point, She is visiting and I have seen her quite a bit. It crushes me so horribly because she has accomplished so much where I have failed, and she is engaged. Yet here I am a single guy just trying to figure out where to go in life. Well thats all I got for you folks. | |
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| Transformed by love or break-up
Posted: 7/4/2008 8:21:44 AM |
So while things did not turn out the way I had wanted. .. I try to remember that this man was such a gift to me.. and believe that I met him at the appointed time. ... I firmly believe that short time was meant to be and to show me that yes I was a desirable, sexy, passionate, and loving woman.
Sometimes people come into our lives for a season, sometimes for a reason. After they're gone, and we look back and remember and reflect, and can see the plan and the purpose, their time in our life does become a gift to us, even in the midst of the heartache and the hurt and the pain. If we stand outside ourselves, outside our feelings, and allow ourselves to see the good in the experience, to see the positive and not just the negative, it can have a positive impact on us and can change us and refine us and make us better than we were before. Of course, sometimes, it takes a while before we can see the experience as a gift and not as something that was meant to devastate us. I choose to see these experiences as a gift and as something that is part of a bigger plan that is meant to prepare me for something better. The refining process is never without fire.
I will remember him...
Yes....for all the days of my life.
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