How to find closure after a relationship

How the heck do you find closure after a relationship?

How do you close the book on a chapter in your life? How do you come to peace with what happened or what didn’t happened? How do you move past the temptation to text your ex? To have one more conversation? To find reassurance?

Well…

I think we need to flip the script on what closure actually looks like. 

You don’t actually need closure. You don’t need it in the way you once thought you did.

Traditional closure looks like an apology from an ex, one final conversation, one more conversation about what happened or what didn’t happen, reassurance that comes from mutual understanding, finding a common “why” or tying up loose ends.

But my friend, I really don’t think that is the closure you need.

You don’t need to hear someone else put a period or exclamation mark on that chapter. You don’t need to hear someone else’s reasoning, their frustration, their side of the story again (at least not right now).

You don’t!

Closure comes from what you tell yourself - not what they say.

Otherwise you’re essentially asking for permission to move on and that’s no way to live.

Closure comes from you - not them. For some reason we want to hear them say it. We want to turn somewhere else for that final validation or reassurance that what’s done is done.

Ultimately I’ve found that we think closure is something that is given to us. We think that we receive closure.

But that is so not true!

You don’t RECEIVE closure. You CREATE closure.

Closure doesn’t require an apology. It doesn’t require playing back the tape. It doesn't require texting, calling or anything that involves them right now. Sure - months down the line if you want to reconnect, if you want to talk … I think that can be healthy. 

But in the near term, you don’t receive closure. You create it. Closure doesn’t come from them. It comes from you.

Let’s replace the word “closure” with “peace.”

I don’t think true closure is practical to find.

But peace? You can create your own peace.

You can create peace by embracing the fact that in life, love and relationships… your journey is going to be filled with unfinished endings, messy conclusions, stories with no final chapter and things that just never end up making sense.

I really think that true closure is about resisting our human urge to want “closure.” It’s about resisting the urge to overanalyze, break down what happened, get an apology, try to be on the same page, find proof that it’s ok, etc.

Instead it’s to create your own peace by recognizing that some stories don’t have endings. Some parts of life have no answer and no blueprint - at least not right now. 

Life is filled with loose ends and if you spend your time, effort, energy and compassion trying to tie those up, you're going to find yourself even more drained and frustrated.

So instead of wanting to “receive closure,” create own peace with what happened by recognizing that you won’t always get the answer you want, the goodbye you want or the apology you deserve.

Closure is about creating the peace you need - not receiving it.

It’s about creating your own peace by realizing that who you are is not attached to that person giving you closure, you agreeing with what they think or their version of the story or creating an ending where you finally have their permission to move on.

Say: sorry, not sorry… but I don’t need that!

That’s a compassionate, self-loving sorry not sorry!

At the end of the day, closure is about YOU. It is something YOU create. It cannot be given to you. You cannot receive it. It doesn’t come to you in the form of an apology or reassurance from someone. You have to create that reassurance for yourself.

You create it in the form of peace - peaceful acceptance of the open endings, the loose ends and the unanswered questions in your life.

Closure starts with you and it ends with you.

You don’t need to go back and open a door you already closed. You closed that door for a reason or it was closed on you for a reason. Either way.

There’s peace in that. There’s a stripping of your ego in that. There's a vulnerability in that and THAT sets you free to create your own closure.

It’s not easy and it’s not overnight but you’ll create your own closure so much more quickly and with less frustration than trying to find it in someone else. You’ll create it with much more grace and compassion than looking for it to be given to you.