You don’t need to willingly take a deep dive into AI-narrated reddit stories about marriages collapsing.
You don’t need to watch therapists/therapist-adjacent influencers explaining red flags and toxic behaviors to look out for that you didn’t notice (or didn’t understand were toxic red flags), because you are no longer in that marriage.
You do not need to guzzle other people’s pain, real or fictional, to feel something. Or to feel like you can feel something.
Yes, you will get triggered. Yes, you will want to wrap yourself in the pain and insecurity because believing things are awful, will stay awful, and can only be awful for you is like a binkie that’s been dropped on the floor and is covered in dust and pet hair and some kind of residue and maybe a dead bug or three… but the binkie goes in the mouth and the brain goes on auto pilot.
Better understanding why you are hurting is not going to help you heal.
If you were shot, you wouldn’t decide this was the perfect time to enroll in med school.
And yes, it’s so hard, so very hard sometimes, to not crave the certainty of negative thinking. Because you know in the core of your being that it’s possible to manifest a future that looks as bad or worse as your past or present. You can make it happen!
But a better future isn’t certain. Healing isn’t certain. Rehab for your mind and your emotions are hard.
It’s not certain that you’ll ever let yourself be vulnerable again. It’s not clear you will accept love or offer it to someone else again.
But certainty isn’t what you need. Worthwhile things happen without certainty all the time.
And if you need to be certain about something, feel certain that the doom loop isn’t helping. It’s picking at your sutures.
This Builds Character 