September 30, 2024 • 41 mins
The right person at the wrong time might be one of the saddest kinds of love stories we come across. This person may be perfect for us, our dream partner, but factors like distance, life, obligations, emotional readiness get in the way and mean that we can't be together. Despite knowing we can't be together, we can't let go and pine after this person, wondering what we could have done differently. Or is right person, wrong time, actually just a myth? Is there ever such a thing as the 'wrong time' for our soulmate? In this episode we discuss:
- The obstacles that keep people apart
- The psychology of 'right person, wrong time'
- The cognitive biases that keep us attached to someone
- Why we feel more bonded with some people over others
- Why 'right person, wrong time' may be a myth
- How to get over this person you can't stop thinking about
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Psychology of Your Twenties,
the podcast where we talk through some of the big
life changes and transitions of our twenties and what they
mean for our psychology. Hello everybody, or welcome back to
(00:25):
the show. Welcome back to the podcast, my old listeners,
my new listeners, wherever you are in the world, it's
great to have you here. Back for another episode as
we of course break down the psychology of our twenties.
The right person but tragically presented to us at the
wrong time, who amongst us hasn't had someone in our
(00:49):
life or still does, Who is seemingly perfect for us,
who could be the love of our lives, but something
is kind of coming between you two distance, life changes,
other people, emotional readiness, timing. It always comes down to timing,
and these obstacles kind of mean that you can't be together.
(01:12):
It is so painful, I think, to finally find someone
who you actually really liked, especially knowing how hard it
is in the current kind of dating environment, and you
know you really like them. Everything is going so well
or it has this beautiful potential, only for it to
not work out because of something beyond your control. We
(01:35):
are so used to relationships not working out because of
something wrong with us or something wrong with the other
person the parties in the relationship, But when it's timing,
when it's something completely unrelated to who we are in
that moment, it can feel particularly cruel. What's even more,
and I would say the even harder part of this
(01:56):
experience is that we are often left in this perpetual
state of what if it could have been different? And
more than that, what if one day things do change,
What if all the obstacles are removed? What if the
timing does work out for us? Even when we know
that that's probably not likely or possible, you are kind
(02:19):
of still left with this slither of hope and this expectation.
You're still thinking about them, and it can kind of
keep us in the way of moving forward and moving on.
The interesting thing to me is that right person, wrong time.
Is that actually the case in most scenarios, or is
this way of thinking actually a myth, actually something really
(02:43):
comforting that we tell ourselves. I have a rather specific
opinion on this right person, wrong time. I don't think
it exists in the way that we think, because I
think that if it is the right person timing can
ever be wrong. We make it work.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
So sometimes these obstacles are a way of allowing you
to move forward without them. And it is true, of course,
that certain people do find their way back to each other.
But I think that often these examples are the exception,
not the rule, And when they do get back together,
they're not the same person anymore. Right, It's not that
they were the same person as when you initially thought
(03:21):
that they were the one. The only couples who can
really successfully do this are those who have really changed
from the person they used to be. Their circumstances are different,
maybe their values are different, and perhaps that means that
they weren't even the right person in the first place.
There's a different version of them, this change version of them,
(03:44):
that is the right person. But for most of us,
this kind of thinking actually does us more harm than good,
and it keeps us trapped by essentially our own misplaced hope.
We have all this hope that someone will return and
things will be different, and that we can make it work.
We can make it work no matter what, and sometimes
(04:05):
that's just not always the case. There are a lot
of reasons we think that someone is perfect for us
when in fact, they aren't. And I do believe that
there is not just one person out there for us.
We have many soulmates, many loves, many connections. So how
do we release ourselves from pining after just that one,
(04:30):
just that one person. On top of that, I think,
regardless of what comes in the future, we actually are
better off finding a way to move forward, even if
we think that one day things could change. In fact,
I think in that moment when it's obvious that right
now you can't be together, it's not your job to
start exploring all the hypotheticals in which it could be
(04:51):
the case. It's your job to concentrate on what else
is out there, knowing that if it happens, it happens,
having that radical acceptance we'll talk about like but eventually,
I think on that path of just letting it be
and moving forward regardless, you do get to a place
of just again acceptance and knowing that things will always
(05:14):
happen in the strangest ways at the strangest times. And
maybe that will involve you getting back with this person,
but it might also involve you turning around and just
meeting someone completely different who you realize actually is the
one so there is a lot to be discussed in
today's episode, and of course the main thing I want
to talk about is the psychology behind why we have
(05:34):
this connection to certain people, why we have this bond,
and what it is that creates this kind of poor
timing in a relationship. There are also a lot of
cognitive and mental biases that keep us connected to someone
even when we are ready to move on, and I
also want to talk about those how to move past
(05:54):
the urge to stick around and the urge to cling
on to this potential. I also, of course want to
give some psychological therapeutic instructions on how to move past
this right person, wrong time situation and how to have
a real open mindset that doesn't restrict your openness to
(06:17):
new relationships. And that's especially crucial during our twenties when
there is just so much love out there. There are
so many people out there that were yet to meet,
so lots to talk about, lots contained in this episode.
If you're someone who is currently struggling with having seemingly
met the right person at the wrong time and you
don't know where to go from here, this episode is
(06:39):
definitely for you. So without further ado, Let's break down
the psychology, Let's break down the research, and let's break
down the advice I have for the right person at
the wrong time. Right person, wrong time basically refers to
a relationship that is seeningly perfect, but it's held back
(07:02):
by circumstances, often outside of our individual control. The alternative
is obviously wrong person, right time, where you are super
ready and you're prepared to be in love, and you're
ready to date and be coupled up, and everything seems
to be going smoothly, but you know, you just don't
feel the spark so exhausting right. There's so much that
can go wrong and that can be off kilter when
(07:25):
it comes to love, But when it comes to wrong timing,
there are a lot of situations that can create this
tension in the relationship, this tension between kind of will
we won't we? The future is very uncertain because of
the environment and the context in which the relationship kind
of sits. The biggest reason people feel like it is
(07:48):
the wrong time for their right person is distance. Long
distance or even medium distance, which in my mind I
kind of classifies like more than two hours is incredibly
My heart truly does go out to anyone who is
trying to make a relationship work through distance, Sometimes that
(08:09):
distance is also reflective of different goals. Right there is
the primary frustration of not being able to see that person,
not being able to hold them communicate, as well not
being able to create shared in person memories. That kind
of creates a real divide. And then it's the fact
that sometimes the distance again does indicate that something else
(08:32):
is not aligned. So I have a friend I'm gonna
call her Emily for the purposes of the show, and
her partner is currently living in Singapore and she's in
rural Australia training to be a doctor. And the distance,
like it's not even that you know, Singapore and Australia
kind of far away. It's like rule Australia is pretty
(08:53):
hard to get to. And both of them have these huge,
huge goals that are super important to them, and either
of them really wanted to compromise, as they shouldn't have.
But she was talking to me about the intense strain
on their ability to actively be together, and you do
kind of start wondering, is this what's best for my
(09:14):
life right now? Is this actually making me happy? Is
this actually the person that I'm going to grow with
where I'm at in this moment. Actually, according to recent
research that was published in the Journal of Marital and
Family Psychology, Sorry, the biggest factor that people report as
(09:35):
contributing to their breakup is that they simply grew apart
and realized that their lives were going in different directions.
And sometimes that is reflected in distance. Knowing that both
of you want different things so intensely and you also
want to stay together, but eventually something does have to give,
(09:56):
you know, life, fate, fortune, whatever you want to call it.
It's also pretty unfair at times. It doesn't care about
your relationship status, it doesn't care about who you're with,
how great it's going before. It kind of throws you
a curveball. Sometimes our circumstances also complicate things, and it
doesn't just have to do with distance. Some situations aside
(10:20):
from distance are you know, when someone is going through
a really difficult time and their space for a relationship
just naturally becomes a lot smaller. This could be due
to work, poor mental health, poor physical health, chronic health,
family problems, other commitments. These things begin to consume our lives,
(10:41):
meaning that it no longer feels like we can give
ourselves to another person not because we love them any less,
but because our life is too emotionally full of other
stresses to love them.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Right.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
This can also be said for significant life changes, right,
and even positive life changes like when you graduate from
university or you get a new or your first full
time job. There's a really famous study that looked at
the biggest life stresses that we tend to encounter across
our lives. This study, it's kind of like an inventory.
(11:15):
It's a scale. It's called the Homes and Rath Stress Inventory,
and at the top of the scale is really really
significant things. So the death of a partner, the death
of a spouse, divorce, going to prison, those things are
naturally going to cause stress and put a strain on
every other part of your life. But then there are
also positive experiences like getting a new job, getting back
(11:39):
together with someone, getting into a new relationship that can
also create stress for us and you know, actually end
up fracturing the relationship. So even if everything seems perfect,
if everything is also changing rapidly, even if it's in
a positive direction, that can also bring about that poor timing.
(12:02):
Even if it is someone who is seemingly incredible. Finally,
and honestly, another hugely common one. Sometimes people are just
simply not ready for a relationship because of where they're
at in their emotional lives. And this is specifically the
case with commitment, and oh my goodness to those situations
(12:26):
not sting. When I was twenty one, I was dating
this guy for like six months, and everything in my
mind at least was perfect, we meshed, so well, we
got along. I felt like I was really connected to
him on this like level. But the thing that came
up time and time again across all these months was
(12:47):
that he just simply was very clear that he didn't
want a relationship. It was around this time that, you know,
I first learned about a concept called commitment readiness. And
commitment readiness is this term that came from a research
group in Singapore way back when. Essentially, what they say
is that we are different. Every individual is, you know,
(13:11):
more or less emotionally prepared to enter into a relationship.
So your preparedness, your willingness to enter into a committed
situation will vary based on who you are and where
you're at in your life, but also your history and
your personality and each of us really sits on that scale.
Some of us are very commitment ready at times. You know,
(13:34):
we crave a relationship, we are always ready for a relationship,
or we've been actively maintaining a relationship for a long time.
But some of us experience low commitment readiness, which means
that we almost have this innate aversion to committing to
someone and to settling down because of a number of factors.
(13:55):
We're scared to be hurt, we want to play the field.
Relationship seems like too much effort, that's a big one,
or we've had previous relationship trauma that's left us maybe
incredibly hyper independent. Regardless of it, when someone is low
on commitment readiness, you cannot force them to be more
(14:17):
ready for that commitment. It's something that they kind of
have to, you know, not even decide themselves, but rather
they need to be in that place. They need to
get themselves to the place of being like, yeah, I
really want a relationship. There's nothing you can do to
force them. That is something that we learn the hard way.
I definitely did, and so you know, it is almost
(14:39):
like timing is a factor there, but you just don't
want to be waiting around for when they're going to
Mondane magically change their mind. Right, you can kind of
almost imagine in those circumstances like, Okay, well, if I'm
just if I just stick around for like two years,
one day he's gonna or she's gonna like wake up
(15:00):
out of this trance and he's they're going to want
to commit to me fully. And that is the kind
of faulty thinking that we get stuck into. And it's
a big if, it's a big if, you know, if
they change their mind, then I'll be ready. But then again, like,
is it really your job to just like sit in
(15:22):
the waiting area until someone comes out and chooses you.
You know, they get to go off and live their
life behind that door, they get to do whatever they want,
and you just get stuck in the same spot. I
think we invest a lot of time, our precious time,
waiting for someone to transform and change their mind for us,
(15:43):
only to realize, you know, that they won't, and we
could have spent that time really enjoying our other options,
but also just our own lives, our own healing journey,
our own experiences. On top of that, one more thing
to know, often the things that these emotionally or commitment unready,
(16:05):
emotionally unavailable, commitment unready people. It's the best way I
can put it. Sometimes and most of the time, the
things that they really need to work through in order
to become ready for commitment or emotionally available are things
that have best worked on single and alone. I believe
that to my care that for a relationship to work
(16:28):
out the best it possibly can, each person does have
to come to the table with an awareness of their
baggage and not just a commitment to you, but a
commitment to unpacking what they can themselves. And the unfortunate
truth for you if you're pining after this person is
that sometimes that takes time, and it does take distance.
(16:52):
When it becomes clear that a relationship isn't going to work,
there is only so much that you can fight against it,
no matter how how compatible you think this other person is.
Especially in our twenties, I'm going to say this again,
wouldn't the better decision be to let them go, let
them be, and just trust that if it's meant for you,
(17:15):
they will come back to you as a different person,
and in that form they will be the right person.
But if they don't, you'll be fine anyways, and we
really want to work on prioritizing that I'll be fine anyways. Hypothetical.
That is a much more healthy, fruitful, productive outcome turning
(17:36):
the attention back to yourself, and it involves pouring all
that hope and all that expectation that you had for
someone else into yourself. When was the last time that
you saw as much potential in yourself as you do
in others. We think so hugely and generously of other people,
and we see an incredible capacity for them to change,
(17:59):
and everything about them is golden and wonderful, but then
when we look at ourselves, it's not the same. I
think detaching from the right person who came at the
wrong time means suddenly having all that energy in that
space just for you. Listen. I will say. There are
examples of people reuniting after years apart, like they're in
(18:21):
their own fairy tale rom con and they get the
happy ending that they always deserved. I actually saw a
really beautiful example of this in the news recently of
two people in their sixties who were trying to remember
it now. I think they were high school sweethearts. They
broke up at twenty one. They then went on to
get married to other people, and they had children, and
(18:43):
then in their sixties their spouses died and somehow they
reunited and they got married at like sixty seven or something,
after more than forty years separated. And we do tend
to look at those examples and invertently be like, hey,
well that could be me. I see myself in that situation.
(19:06):
This really proves right person, wrong time is a thing,
and I'm not trying to deny that. But the reason
this often works out in the future is actually because
these people are committed to the idea at the time
that they weren't meant to be with each other. It
wouldn't have worked out if one of them spent the
next forty years or the past forty years pining and
(19:30):
wishing and waiting, because by the time the other person
was ready, like They've done all this growth or this
exploration and you're still stuck forty years before. The thing
that really makes it work is that these people went
on to be committed to living a full life. They
had children, they had other partners. That's what made the
(19:50):
reunion possible. Otherwise, again, one of them would have been
stuck in the nineteen fifties and the other one would
have been present. There are unique conditions that really bring
people like that back together, including a personal commitment to
individual growth that had nothing to do with impressing or
trying to win back the other person. There's also a
(20:10):
mutual desire for reconciliation and for forgiveness, and yes, of course,
an element of timing. However, my problem with right person,
wrong time thinking it really occurs when we let this
belief disrupt us from moving on, because we are under
the false pretense or clinging onto this idea that yes,
(20:34):
this person must be my soulmate, no one else will compare,
and so I cannot let go. Sometimes we use this
thinking as justification to keep us in a state of limerence,
not out of true love, but because we crave the
structure of the relationship and the security of what is
known as human psychology will tell us that we crave
(20:57):
what is familiar, and that is a really powerful driver
for our emotional attachment to others. It's a phenomena actually
called the mere exposure effect. It goes by different names,
but the mis exposure effect is probably the primary one,
and basically, in this series of very pioneering studies at
the time back in the eighties and the nineties, This
(21:18):
researcher in his team essentially showed that we feel most
bonded to the people who we are around a lot. Naturally, naturally,
we like the people that were around a lot more.
But that can also lead us to misinterpret love and
liking and soulmate status simply with just plain old familiarity.
(21:40):
That's one reason why we feel unable to disconnect from
someone who felt right, who we spend a lot of
time with, who's brought us comfort. I also want to
discuss a few more reasons why we get caught up
in right person, wrong time thinking even when it's not helpful,
it's incorrect and you would be better off believing something else.
(22:03):
And I also want to dive into how to find
that space to grieve and to move on from a
situation such as this one, to reach a point of
acceptance and reach a point of healing and being ready
for the next chapter. Hold so all of that and
more after this short break. So why is it that
(22:27):
we experience this right person, wrong time feeling besides the
fact that this person is our soulmate, Because we are
definitely going to table that explanation for a second, I
think that is the less likely scenario here, and more
often than not, the reason we do feel this way,
especially at the end of a relationship, comes down to
some more basic psychology. Firstly, when a relationship does break
(22:51):
down because of some external reason, it is easy to
attribute everything to this outside reason. If you still love
this person, and I'm sure that you do, you don't
want to see them as bad or unkind or cruel.
You don't want to interrogate their decision making. You want
to maintain a sense of integrity for them, and this
(23:12):
is known as the halo effect. Because we love them,
we think that they can do no wrong in other
areas of your life, So we might actually have a
faulty internal image of their character that is sustaining a
right person wrong time mentality. Maybe it is the case
(23:33):
that they really deserve that positive assessment and they are
like a really, really good person, but that does not
change the truth that there is still something neither of
you were willing to fix or compromise, which deep down
indicates that you do want different things right now, at
least right now. It was eventually going to come to
(23:54):
the surface as these things always do. It's just that
you're confronting it, and you probably would have rather confronted
it well never, but second to never, maybe a little
bit later down the line. Wanting different things is we
know is a really common reason, if not the most
common reason that relationships break down, even if we don't
explicitly recognize that in the moment, and trying to make
(24:19):
it work through challenge after challenge after challenge may indicate
that something more fundamental isn't well matched, even if on
the surface everything looks great and you don't need to
villainize them for that, but just consider the whole context.
I promise you that in a year you will realize
that what felt like the hardest thing you've ever been
(24:40):
through was actually your destiny all along. This really links
to our second reason that you know. I think we
end up seeing someone as the right person, and it's
because at this stage you cannot imagine ever feeling as
in love with someone else or as connected with someone
else as you feel right now, because because because we
(25:02):
tend to prioritize our current experiences over potential future experiences,
meaning that your favorite outfit right now feels like it's
going to be your favorite outfit forever and your best
friend right now feels like the best friend you'll ever have.
When you're eating an amazing meal, you're not immediately thinking
about an even better meal that you'll have later on.
(25:24):
That is what's happening in this situation. Because you are
experiencing love right now, it's hard to picture a future
love that could be better. This is the result of
a series of cognitive biases called availability heuristics, which basically
say that we rely more heavily on information that is
(25:44):
immediately available to us. Specifically, the kind of bias that
we're talking about here is the salience bias. I know
a lot of terms to remember, but salience bias is
the most important to understand. What this bias tells us
is that we have a tendency, you and I to
focus on information that is present, prominent, and emotionally striking,
(26:08):
and we ignore other information that feels less significant. In
the case of right person, wrong time, the most emotionally
significant information available to you right now is that you
feel deeply about this person. You probably still love them,
so even though your friends may be saying no, like
you're going to find someone better. There's like so many cool,
(26:31):
great people out there. They just totally weren't the one.
It's very difficult to believe them because you have to
override this very strong cognitive bias that is telling you otherwise.
I think real connection is also so rare that when
we have it, it's very hard to let go of it,
given how hard it was to find it in the
first place, especially if you are someone who was not
(26:53):
used to falling so fast or so deeply. You're just
simply not going to have that feeling with everyone. But
that doesn't mean that you will only have it with
one person. When we have something special as well, we
do try and protect it and we feel very precious
about it, which is what can also contribute to this
(27:13):
thought pattern that, yeah, maybe I am meant to end
up with this person, maybe this is the love of
my life, when actually the case is probably a little
bit more nuanced and complicated. Finally, another reason that we
find ourselves adopting a right person, wrong time mentality, other
than that it's really just trying to protect us, we
(27:34):
may have also put on those age old rose colored glasses,
and so when it comes to examining the relationship, we
often selectively and accidentally forget about really crucial information that
was my case in that situation. I was just telling
you about here, I was thinking that we were destined
(27:56):
to be, that he was the love of my life,
because thinking that way let me stay attached to him
longer when the alternative of detaching from him would be
incredibly painful. This right person mentality was allowing me to
sustain the easiest reality for myself. And the easiest reality
(28:17):
was one in which it didn't contain heartbreak, that's for sure,
but also it was full of possibility, and who doesn't
love possibility? Then, you know, a few months later, when
I had endured the worst of the heartbreak and the breakup,
it was almost like this curtain lifted, and all these
things that I had ignored and forgotten about just came
(28:40):
like flashing back, you know. The inattention, the disrespect, the
genuine like lack of compatibility, and his lack of ambition,
all things that now and well then I knew were
going to would have ruined the relationship in the long run.
But I was just ignoring them because I thought I
had a good thing. Really kind of had to ask
(29:01):
myself in that moment, thinking back on it would my
soulmate treat me like this, is it really to do
it timing? Or is it actually just the fact that
he's not a very nice guy. What I had to
accept after that was that I had spent a long
time pursuing relationships with people, including him, that I thought
(29:22):
were the one, and I spent a long time sticking
around long enough that you know, eventually the timing would
be perfect, thinking that that was going to work, and
it always had just ended up hurting me. And that
was a kind of a big realization where it was like,
am I just using this notion of time and the
(29:45):
timing needing to be right to just kind of wilfully
remain ignorant about everything else that's wrong on these relationships?
And I really want to say, I'm not saying this
to dishearten you, but more so to you really encourage
you to search for other evidence. Are they really the one?
(30:05):
Or could you maybe feel this way about about anyone?
Is there even a slim, maybe even massive possibility that
you could feel this way about someone else, and maybe
even better than what you feel right now? You just
have to follow the ultimate conclusion that what you've had
at the time may have been precious may have been beautiful,
(30:25):
but there was a reason the relationship has ended. Even
if it feels like something you could one day change
right now, you can't. Right now. It is not your
business to change your circumstances for them. Either you end
up together or you don't. And this is really just
a form of a radical acceptance. Radical acceptance, if you
(30:48):
don't know what that is, is a therapeutic approach or
a therapeutic method. I guess that involves accepting that some
situations are simply out of your control without judging them,
trying to change them, or letting your pain towards the
situation turn into like prolonged suffering and gloom and melancholy
about you know how, there are just things that are
(31:10):
outside of our control. You just accept that. You go, Okay,
I'm just like I'm just like someone floating in the
surf right now. I'm floating in the waves and letting
it move me to where I need to be. That
is what we're embracing here, that sometimes life and your
circumstances are really unfair, and you know they could change
one day, but right now your best option is to
(31:32):
move on as if this person is not the one
Why because in that period of separation, that is when
you can delineate between them just being present, available around
and them actually being the love of your life. So
now that we have that clear, what are some strategies
(31:55):
to move on from what is a very complicated, and
let me just say, heartbreaking, painful situation. I do have
a full episode on this that I cannot recommend enough.
It's one of my favorite episodes, episode one hundred and
forty one. It's titled how to Get Over someone you
Can't Stop thinking about. I feel like a lot of
people listening to this should also be listening to that episode.
(32:17):
There are a lot of overlaps in a way, but
actually it's quite different. It's more about like the obsessive
spiral and that getting to that point where you were
like almost desperate to stop thinking about them. So go
and listen to that. There's actually a whole playlist of
my breakup, heartbreak, Lost Love episodes which I will link
(32:37):
in the episode description. But in the aftermath of a
right person, wrong time situation, what we are really aiming
for above all else is separation. We want emotional, social, physical,
mental separation as much as you can as much as
your circumstances permit that is the space that is required.
(33:03):
There is a tendency and definitely a strong emotional impulse
to continue to reach out to this person, to want
to maintain a friendship with this person, even because you know, well,
if we can't be together, we could be friends. I
am going to really advise you strongly against doing that
because they still stay as an option in your mind,
(33:26):
and it means that any new person that comes along,
you're still going to be comparing them to this other
person because they're still present. Instead, really try and create distance.
It's a challenge. It's a challenge not just because obviously
circumstances probably mean that you're friends or you share friends.
It's a challenge because if this is someone that you
(33:47):
deeply care about and you see as almost your assault mate,
letting that connection go can be brutal, but it is necessary.
It is a necessary pain. And in their absence, I
want you to really pick two to three things to
focus on in your life that have nothing to do
with anybody else. They are just for you. It's almost
(34:11):
like you need to start not necessarily scrubbing your life
of this person, but creating a life in which they
are not at this center you are, so pick a hobby,
pick a sport, pick even like some friends. Pick something
in your life that you really really want to do
and make that your focus. Make that where you put
(34:32):
all your energy and your healing. And I think through
that process we also come to new realizations about ourselves
and we begin to realize like, hey, I actually wouldn't
have been able to do these things if I was
still with this person. I wouldn't have been able to
do these like little weekend retreats with my besties. I
wouldn't have been able to solo travel. I wouldn't have
(34:53):
been able to do all these fun things on my
weekend nights or my weekday nights if I was with
this person. And most of the time you're like, slowly
you start to be like, oh so actually life is better.
Life is better like this. It can be a hard
thing to realize when you think that they were the
one and then suddenly you do one eight and it's like, oh, no,
(35:15):
you probably weren't. I also think part of this as well,
to add on to it, is that you start making
memories and experiences that they're not a part of, and
that's a really important part of the healing and the
closure process is realizing that you can create, enjoy, live
a meaningful life in which they don't have anything to
(35:37):
do with it anything at all. Additionally, I really want
you to continually focus on all the reasons that they
weren't right for you, rather than all the reasons that
they are. The reasons that they are right for you
often bubble to the surface because they're nice and they're positive,
and they're fluffy, and sometimes they're like kind of painful
(35:59):
to play with. We're going to ignore those and we're
going to focus all of our attention on what it
was about your current situation, circumstances, individual persons that meant
that you couldn't be together, and really that is the
focus of your thoughts.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
Here.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
The way that I like to do this is thinking
of attention as and this is a common analogy as
a giant spotlight that we have control of, where sitting
at the back, turning it, directing it, focusing on different
parts of the room, different members of the audience, whatever
it is, different thoughts. So when we get into an
obsessive spiral, we only selectively focus or turn the spotlight
(36:40):
to their positive attributes. Why they were so perfect, why
they were amazing. And you aren't seeing the situation clearly
first of all, but you also aren't seeing the situation
in a way that is helpful for your current circumstances.
So instead, I want you to continually come back to
why this couldn't be, why this didn't work, why it
(37:03):
was not an entirely perfect situation, why this needed to happen.
As a way to provide closure, rather than letting you
ruminate on all the things that maintain a connection and
maintain a love interest in this person, Another really important
way to find closure is to collect everything they gave you,
(37:25):
everything that you shared together, jewelry, photos, love notes, clothes,
anything at all, and put it into a box and
put it away. It's kind of symbolic of like packing
up all the connections in your mind as well and
putting it into long term storage. You know it's still there.
The items in the box are still there, the memories
are still there. There's still a part of you, but
(37:47):
it's not something that you visit and you look back
over every night. You've done yourself a huge favor by
removing not only reminders, but also memory cues in your environment.
That keep them, keep them in your current thought rotation,
and that might encourage you to reach back out when
(38:07):
we know, given our current circumstances, that is probably not
the best idea. Again, I want to just state before
we wrap this episode up with distance comes clarity, but
also comes the ability to solely focus on your life,
your baggage, your future, and to make it dreamy and
(38:29):
beautiful and worthy, regardless of what fate has in store
for you when it comes to this other person. Even
if you believe right now that this is a destined connection,
even if everything was perfect other than timing, timing is
still a factor and it is still actually at times
an indicator of why things were never going to work
(38:51):
out on a deeper level. So you kind of have
to accept this reality, accept that right now, this is
a situation that you're in. But again, there is a
lot of love out there, a lot of romance, a
lot of beautiful people. It's exciting that you don't have
the opportunity to meet them. It's exciting that you have
(39:12):
all these opportunities for new, fresh, beautiful connection. It's exciting
that you get to go on a first date again,
and it's exciting that you get to make even better
memories with someone new and someone who you know timing
is never going to be a problem because they love
you and they care about you. So I really hope
that if you're going through this right now, you've met
(39:33):
an amazing person and nothing is working out, nothing is
stacking up the way that you want to do, that
you have some hope for the future, and that you
see not only why this is the case, but why
it's very common, how to move through it, and why
when we're in that situation sometimes we can exaggerate the
connection that we have with someone. I'm sending a lot
(39:54):
of strength and a lot of love to you as
someone who has been through this and who was so
devastated by the loss of this connection and has come
out the other side and met someone brilliant and met
someone who I love and who I never would have
had the opportunity to be with if I'd let myself
(40:14):
continue to be a maybe. So I want that for
you as well as always, If you enjoyed this episode,
make sure that you are following along on Spotify or
Apple podcasts. Please leave a review of five star review
if you feel cold to do so. It's really special
it makes my day. I actually do read them more.
And I know a lot of creatives say that, but no,
(40:35):
I do, even the mean ones. So don't be that guy,
don't be that girl, don't be that person. Make sure
that if you have an episode suggestion, we are always
welcoming them. We always want to hear from you over
on that psychology podcast on Instagram. Just shoot me a
DM with your suggestion and hopefully I'll get to read
it and get to be inspired by you. But as always,
(40:56):
until next time, stay safe, stay kind, be gentle with yourself,
and we will talk very very soon.
Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Psychology of Your Twenties,
the podcast where we talk through some of the big
life changes and transitions of our twenties and what they
mean for our psychology. Hello everybody, or welcome back to
(00:25):
the show. Welcome back to the podcast, my old listeners,
my new listeners, wherever you are in the world, it's
great to have you here. Back for another episode as
we of course break down the psychology of our twenties.
The right person but tragically presented to us at the
wrong time, who amongst us hasn't had someone in our
(00:49):
life or still does, Who is seemingly perfect for us,
who could be the love of our lives, but something
is kind of coming between you two distance, life changes,
other people, emotional readiness, timing. It always comes down to timing,
and these obstacles kind of mean that you can't be together.
(01:12):
It is so painful, I think, to finally find someone
who you actually really liked, especially knowing how hard it
is in the current kind of dating environment, and you
know you really like them. Everything is going so well
or it has this beautiful potential, only for it to
not work out because of something beyond your control. We
(01:35):
are so used to relationships not working out because of
something wrong with us or something wrong with the other
person the parties in the relationship, But when it's timing,
when it's something completely unrelated to who we are in
that moment, it can feel particularly cruel. What's even more,
and I would say the even harder part of this
(01:56):
experience is that we are often left in this perpetual
state of what if it could have been different? And
more than that, what if one day things do change,
What if all the obstacles are removed? What if the
timing does work out for us? Even when we know
that that's probably not likely or possible, you are kind
(02:19):
of still left with this slither of hope and this expectation.
You're still thinking about them, and it can kind of
keep us in the way of moving forward and moving on.
The interesting thing to me is that right person, wrong time.
Is that actually the case in most scenarios, or is
this way of thinking actually a myth, actually something really
(02:43):
comforting that we tell ourselves. I have a rather specific
opinion on this right person, wrong time. I don't think
it exists in the way that we think, because I
think that if it is the right person timing can
ever be wrong. We make it work.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
So sometimes these obstacles are a way of allowing you
to move forward without them. And it is true, of course,
that certain people do find their way back to each other.
But I think that often these examples are the exception,
not the rule, And when they do get back together,
they're not the same person anymore. Right, It's not that
they were the same person as when you initially thought
(03:21):
that they were the one. The only couples who can
really successfully do this are those who have really changed
from the person they used to be. Their circumstances are different,
maybe their values are different, and perhaps that means that
they weren't even the right person in the first place.
There's a different version of them, this change version of them,
(03:44):
that is the right person. But for most of us,
this kind of thinking actually does us more harm than good,
and it keeps us trapped by essentially our own misplaced hope.
We have all this hope that someone will return and
things will be different, and that we can make it work.
We can make it work no matter what, and sometimes
(04:05):
that's just not always the case. There are a lot
of reasons we think that someone is perfect for us
when in fact, they aren't. And I do believe that
there is not just one person out there for us.
We have many soulmates, many loves, many connections. So how
do we release ourselves from pining after just that one,
(04:30):
just that one person. On top of that, I think,
regardless of what comes in the future, we actually are
better off finding a way to move forward, even if
we think that one day things could change. In fact,
I think in that moment when it's obvious that right
now you can't be together, it's not your job to
start exploring all the hypotheticals in which it could be
(04:51):
the case. It's your job to concentrate on what else
is out there, knowing that if it happens, it happens,
having that radical acceptance we'll talk about like but eventually,
I think on that path of just letting it be
and moving forward regardless, you do get to a place
of just again acceptance and knowing that things will always
(05:14):
happen in the strangest ways at the strangest times. And
maybe that will involve you getting back with this person,
but it might also involve you turning around and just
meeting someone completely different who you realize actually is the
one so there is a lot to be discussed in
today's episode, and of course the main thing I want
to talk about is the psychology behind why we have
(05:34):
this connection to certain people, why we have this bond,
and what it is that creates this kind of poor
timing in a relationship. There are also a lot of
cognitive and mental biases that keep us connected to someone
even when we are ready to move on, and I
also want to talk about those how to move past
(05:54):
the urge to stick around and the urge to cling
on to this potential. I also, of course want to
give some psychological therapeutic instructions on how to move past
this right person, wrong time situation and how to have
a real open mindset that doesn't restrict your openness to
(06:17):
new relationships. And that's especially crucial during our twenties when
there is just so much love out there. There are
so many people out there that were yet to meet,
so lots to talk about, lots contained in this episode.
If you're someone who is currently struggling with having seemingly
met the right person at the wrong time and you
don't know where to go from here, this episode is
(06:39):
definitely for you. So without further ado, Let's break down
the psychology, Let's break down the research, and let's break
down the advice I have for the right person at
the wrong time. Right person, wrong time basically refers to
a relationship that is seeningly perfect, but it's held back
(07:02):
by circumstances, often outside of our individual control. The alternative
is obviously wrong person, right time, where you are super
ready and you're prepared to be in love, and you're
ready to date and be coupled up, and everything seems
to be going smoothly, but you know, you just don't
feel the spark so exhausting right. There's so much that
can go wrong and that can be off kilter when
(07:25):
it comes to love, But when it comes to wrong timing,
there are a lot of situations that can create this
tension in the relationship, this tension between kind of will
we won't we? The future is very uncertain because of
the environment and the context in which the relationship kind
of sits. The biggest reason people feel like it is
(07:48):
the wrong time for their right person is distance. Long
distance or even medium distance, which in my mind I
kind of classifies like more than two hours is incredibly
My heart truly does go out to anyone who is
trying to make a relationship work through distance, Sometimes that
(08:09):
distance is also reflective of different goals. Right there is
the primary frustration of not being able to see that person,
not being able to hold them communicate, as well not
being able to create shared in person memories. That kind
of creates a real divide. And then it's the fact
that sometimes the distance again does indicate that something else
(08:32):
is not aligned. So I have a friend I'm gonna
call her Emily for the purposes of the show, and
her partner is currently living in Singapore and she's in
rural Australia training to be a doctor. And the distance,
like it's not even that you know, Singapore and Australia
kind of far away. It's like rule Australia is pretty
(08:53):
hard to get to. And both of them have these huge,
huge goals that are super important to them, and either
of them really wanted to compromise, as they shouldn't have.
But she was talking to me about the intense strain
on their ability to actively be together, and you do
kind of start wondering, is this what's best for my
(09:14):
life right now? Is this actually making me happy? Is
this actually the person that I'm going to grow with
where I'm at in this moment. Actually, according to recent
research that was published in the Journal of Marital and
Family Psychology, Sorry, the biggest factor that people report as
(09:35):
contributing to their breakup is that they simply grew apart
and realized that their lives were going in different directions.
And sometimes that is reflected in distance. Knowing that both
of you want different things so intensely and you also
want to stay together, but eventually something does have to give,
(09:56):
you know, life, fate, fortune, whatever you want to call it.
It's also pretty unfair at times. It doesn't care about
your relationship status, it doesn't care about who you're with,
how great it's going before. It kind of throws you
a curveball. Sometimes our circumstances also complicate things, and it
doesn't just have to do with distance. Some situations aside
(10:20):
from distance are you know, when someone is going through
a really difficult time and their space for a relationship
just naturally becomes a lot smaller. This could be due
to work, poor mental health, poor physical health, chronic health,
family problems, other commitments. These things begin to consume our lives,
(10:41):
meaning that it no longer feels like we can give
ourselves to another person not because we love them any less,
but because our life is too emotionally full of other
stresses to love them.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Right.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
This can also be said for significant life changes, right,
and even positive life changes like when you graduate from
university or you get a new or your first full
time job. There's a really famous study that looked at
the biggest life stresses that we tend to encounter across
our lives. This study, it's kind of like an inventory.
(11:15):
It's a scale. It's called the Homes and Rath Stress Inventory,
and at the top of the scale is really really
significant things. So the death of a partner, the death
of a spouse, divorce, going to prison, those things are
naturally going to cause stress and put a strain on
every other part of your life. But then there are
also positive experiences like getting a new job, getting back
(11:39):
together with someone, getting into a new relationship that can
also create stress for us and you know, actually end
up fracturing the relationship. So even if everything seems perfect,
if everything is also changing rapidly, even if it's in
a positive direction, that can also bring about that poor timing.
(12:02):
Even if it is someone who is seemingly incredible. Finally,
and honestly, another hugely common one. Sometimes people are just
simply not ready for a relationship because of where they're
at in their emotional lives. And this is specifically the
case with commitment, and oh my goodness to those situations
(12:26):
not sting. When I was twenty one, I was dating
this guy for like six months, and everything in my
mind at least was perfect, we meshed, so well, we
got along. I felt like I was really connected to
him on this like level. But the thing that came
up time and time again across all these months was
(12:47):
that he just simply was very clear that he didn't
want a relationship. It was around this time that, you know,
I first learned about a concept called commitment readiness. And
commitment readiness is this term that came from a research
group in Singapore way back when. Essentially, what they say
is that we are different. Every individual is, you know,
(13:11):
more or less emotionally prepared to enter into a relationship.
So your preparedness, your willingness to enter into a committed
situation will vary based on who you are and where
you're at in your life, but also your history and
your personality and each of us really sits on that scale.
Some of us are very commitment ready at times. You know,
(13:34):
we crave a relationship, we are always ready for a relationship,
or we've been actively maintaining a relationship for a long time.
But some of us experience low commitment readiness, which means
that we almost have this innate aversion to committing to
someone and to settling down because of a number of factors.
(13:55):
We're scared to be hurt, we want to play the field.
Relationship seems like too much effort, that's a big one,
or we've had previous relationship trauma that's left us maybe
incredibly hyper independent. Regardless of it, when someone is low
on commitment readiness, you cannot force them to be more
(14:17):
ready for that commitment. It's something that they kind of
have to, you know, not even decide themselves, but rather
they need to be in that place. They need to
get themselves to the place of being like, yeah, I
really want a relationship. There's nothing you can do to
force them. That is something that we learn the hard way.
I definitely did, and so you know, it is almost
(14:39):
like timing is a factor there, but you just don't
want to be waiting around for when they're going to
Mondane magically change their mind. Right, you can kind of
almost imagine in those circumstances like, Okay, well, if I'm
just if I just stick around for like two years,
one day he's gonna or she's gonna like wake up
(15:00):
out of this trance and he's they're going to want
to commit to me fully. And that is the kind
of faulty thinking that we get stuck into. And it's
a big if, it's a big if, you know, if
they change their mind, then I'll be ready. But then again, like,
is it really your job to just like sit in
(15:22):
the waiting area until someone comes out and chooses you.
You know, they get to go off and live their
life behind that door, they get to do whatever they want,
and you just get stuck in the same spot. I
think we invest a lot of time, our precious time,
waiting for someone to transform and change their mind for us,
(15:43):
only to realize, you know, that they won't, and we
could have spent that time really enjoying our other options,
but also just our own lives, our own healing journey,
our own experiences. On top of that, one more thing
to know, often the things that these emotionally or commitment unready,
(16:05):
emotionally unavailable, commitment unready people. It's the best way I
can put it. Sometimes and most of the time, the
things that they really need to work through in order
to become ready for commitment or emotionally available are things
that have best worked on single and alone. I believe
that to my care that for a relationship to work
(16:28):
out the best it possibly can, each person does have
to come to the table with an awareness of their
baggage and not just a commitment to you, but a
commitment to unpacking what they can themselves. And the unfortunate
truth for you if you're pining after this person is
that sometimes that takes time, and it does take distance.
(16:52):
When it becomes clear that a relationship isn't going to work,
there is only so much that you can fight against it,
no matter how how compatible you think this other person is.
Especially in our twenties, I'm going to say this again,
wouldn't the better decision be to let them go, let
them be, and just trust that if it's meant for you,
(17:15):
they will come back to you as a different person,
and in that form they will be the right person.
But if they don't, you'll be fine anyways, and we
really want to work on prioritizing that I'll be fine anyways. Hypothetical.
That is a much more healthy, fruitful, productive outcome turning
(17:36):
the attention back to yourself, and it involves pouring all
that hope and all that expectation that you had for
someone else into yourself. When was the last time that
you saw as much potential in yourself as you do
in others. We think so hugely and generously of other people,
and we see an incredible capacity for them to change,
(17:59):
and everything about them is golden and wonderful, but then
when we look at ourselves, it's not the same. I
think detaching from the right person who came at the
wrong time means suddenly having all that energy in that
space just for you. Listen. I will say. There are
examples of people reuniting after years apart, like they're in
(18:21):
their own fairy tale rom con and they get the
happy ending that they always deserved. I actually saw a
really beautiful example of this in the news recently of
two people in their sixties who were trying to remember
it now. I think they were high school sweethearts. They
broke up at twenty one. They then went on to
get married to other people, and they had children, and
(18:43):
then in their sixties their spouses died and somehow they
reunited and they got married at like sixty seven or something,
after more than forty years separated. And we do tend
to look at those examples and invertently be like, hey,
well that could be me. I see myself in that situation.
(19:06):
This really proves right person, wrong time is a thing,
and I'm not trying to deny that. But the reason
this often works out in the future is actually because
these people are committed to the idea at the time
that they weren't meant to be with each other. It
wouldn't have worked out if one of them spent the
next forty years or the past forty years pining and
(19:30):
wishing and waiting, because by the time the other person
was ready, like They've done all this growth or this
exploration and you're still stuck forty years before. The thing
that really makes it work is that these people went
on to be committed to living a full life. They
had children, they had other partners. That's what made the
(19:50):
reunion possible. Otherwise, again, one of them would have been
stuck in the nineteen fifties and the other one would
have been present. There are unique conditions that really bring
people like that back together, including a personal commitment to
individual growth that had nothing to do with impressing or
trying to win back the other person. There's also a
(20:10):
mutual desire for reconciliation and for forgiveness, and yes, of course,
an element of timing. However, my problem with right person,
wrong time thinking it really occurs when we let this
belief disrupt us from moving on, because we are under
the false pretense or clinging onto this idea that yes,
(20:34):
this person must be my soulmate, no one else will compare,
and so I cannot let go. Sometimes we use this
thinking as justification to keep us in a state of limerence,
not out of true love, but because we crave the
structure of the relationship and the security of what is
known as human psychology will tell us that we crave
(20:57):
what is familiar, and that is a really powerful driver
for our emotional attachment to others. It's a phenomena actually
called the mere exposure effect. It goes by different names,
but the mis exposure effect is probably the primary one,
and basically, in this series of very pioneering studies at
the time back in the eighties and the nineties, This
(21:18):
researcher in his team essentially showed that we feel most
bonded to the people who we are around a lot. Naturally, naturally,
we like the people that were around a lot more.
But that can also lead us to misinterpret love and
liking and soulmate status simply with just plain old familiarity.
(21:40):
That's one reason why we feel unable to disconnect from
someone who felt right, who we spend a lot of
time with, who's brought us comfort. I also want to
discuss a few more reasons why we get caught up
in right person, wrong time thinking even when it's not helpful,
it's incorrect and you would be better off believing something else.
(22:03):
And I also want to dive into how to find
that space to grieve and to move on from a
situation such as this one, to reach a point of
acceptance and reach a point of healing and being ready
for the next chapter. Hold so all of that and
more after this short break. So why is it that
(22:27):
we experience this right person, wrong time feeling besides the
fact that this person is our soulmate, Because we are
definitely going to table that explanation for a second, I
think that is the less likely scenario here, and more
often than not, the reason we do feel this way,
especially at the end of a relationship, comes down to
some more basic psychology. Firstly, when a relationship does break
(22:51):
down because of some external reason, it is easy to
attribute everything to this outside reason. If you still love
this person, and I'm sure that you do, you don't
want to see them as bad or unkind or cruel.
You don't want to interrogate their decision making. You want
to maintain a sense of integrity for them, and this
(23:12):
is known as the halo effect. Because we love them,
we think that they can do no wrong in other
areas of your life, So we might actually have a
faulty internal image of their character that is sustaining a
right person wrong time mentality. Maybe it is the case
(23:33):
that they really deserve that positive assessment and they are
like a really, really good person, but that does not
change the truth that there is still something neither of
you were willing to fix or compromise, which deep down
indicates that you do want different things right now, at
least right now. It was eventually going to come to
(23:54):
the surface as these things always do. It's just that
you're confronting it, and you probably would have rather confronted
it well never, but second to never, maybe a little
bit later down the line. Wanting different things is we
know is a really common reason, if not the most
common reason that relationships break down, even if we don't
explicitly recognize that in the moment, and trying to make
(24:19):
it work through challenge after challenge after challenge may indicate
that something more fundamental isn't well matched, even if on
the surface everything looks great and you don't need to
villainize them for that, but just consider the whole context.
I promise you that in a year you will realize
that what felt like the hardest thing you've ever been
(24:40):
through was actually your destiny all along. This really links
to our second reason that you know. I think we
end up seeing someone as the right person, and it's
because at this stage you cannot imagine ever feeling as
in love with someone else or as connected with someone
else as you feel right now, because because because we
(25:02):
tend to prioritize our current experiences over potential future experiences,
meaning that your favorite outfit right now feels like it's
going to be your favorite outfit forever and your best
friend right now feels like the best friend you'll ever have.
When you're eating an amazing meal, you're not immediately thinking
about an even better meal that you'll have later on.
(25:24):
That is what's happening in this situation. Because you are
experiencing love right now, it's hard to picture a future
love that could be better. This is the result of
a series of cognitive biases called availability heuristics, which basically
say that we rely more heavily on information that is
(25:44):
immediately available to us. Specifically, the kind of bias that
we're talking about here is the salience bias. I know
a lot of terms to remember, but salience bias is
the most important to understand. What this bias tells us
is that we have a tendency, you and I to
focus on information that is present, prominent, and emotionally striking,
(26:08):
and we ignore other information that feels less significant. In
the case of right person, wrong time, the most emotionally
significant information available to you right now is that you
feel deeply about this person. You probably still love them,
so even though your friends may be saying no, like
you're going to find someone better. There's like so many cool,
(26:31):
great people out there. They just totally weren't the one.
It's very difficult to believe them because you have to
override this very strong cognitive bias that is telling you otherwise.
I think real connection is also so rare that when
we have it, it's very hard to let go of it,
given how hard it was to find it in the
first place, especially if you are someone who was not
(26:53):
used to falling so fast or so deeply. You're just
simply not going to have that feeling with everyone. But
that doesn't mean that you will only have it with
one person. When we have something special as well, we
do try and protect it and we feel very precious
about it, which is what can also contribute to this
(27:13):
thought pattern that, yeah, maybe I am meant to end
up with this person, maybe this is the love of
my life, when actually the case is probably a little
bit more nuanced and complicated. Finally, another reason that we
find ourselves adopting a right person, wrong time mentality, other
than that it's really just trying to protect us, we
(27:34):
may have also put on those age old rose colored glasses,
and so when it comes to examining the relationship, we
often selectively and accidentally forget about really crucial information that
was my case in that situation. I was just telling
you about here, I was thinking that we were destined
(27:56):
to be, that he was the love of my life,
because thinking that way let me stay attached to him
longer when the alternative of detaching from him would be
incredibly painful. This right person mentality was allowing me to
sustain the easiest reality for myself. And the easiest reality
(28:17):
was one in which it didn't contain heartbreak, that's for sure,
but also it was full of possibility, and who doesn't
love possibility? Then, you know, a few months later, when
I had endured the worst of the heartbreak and the breakup,
it was almost like this curtain lifted, and all these
things that I had ignored and forgotten about just came
(28:40):
like flashing back, you know. The inattention, the disrespect, the
genuine like lack of compatibility, and his lack of ambition,
all things that now and well then I knew were
going to would have ruined the relationship in the long run.
But I was just ignoring them because I thought I
had a good thing. Really kind of had to ask
(29:01):
myself in that moment, thinking back on it would my
soulmate treat me like this, is it really to do
it timing? Or is it actually just the fact that
he's not a very nice guy. What I had to
accept after that was that I had spent a long
time pursuing relationships with people, including him, that I thought
(29:22):
were the one, and I spent a long time sticking
around long enough that you know, eventually the timing would
be perfect, thinking that that was going to work, and
it always had just ended up hurting me. And that
was a kind of a big realization where it was like,
am I just using this notion of time and the
(29:45):
timing needing to be right to just kind of wilfully
remain ignorant about everything else that's wrong on these relationships?
And I really want to say, I'm not saying this
to dishearten you, but more so to you really encourage
you to search for other evidence. Are they really the one?
(30:05):
Or could you maybe feel this way about about anyone?
Is there even a slim, maybe even massive possibility that
you could feel this way about someone else, and maybe
even better than what you feel right now? You just
have to follow the ultimate conclusion that what you've had
at the time may have been precious may have been beautiful,
(30:25):
but there was a reason the relationship has ended. Even
if it feels like something you could one day change
right now, you can't. Right now. It is not your
business to change your circumstances for them. Either you end
up together or you don't. And this is really just
a form of a radical acceptance. Radical acceptance, if you
(30:48):
don't know what that is, is a therapeutic approach or
a therapeutic method. I guess that involves accepting that some
situations are simply out of your control without judging them,
trying to change them, or letting your pain towards the
situation turn into like prolonged suffering and gloom and melancholy
about you know how, there are just things that are
(31:10):
outside of our control. You just accept that. You go, Okay,
I'm just like I'm just like someone floating in the
surf right now. I'm floating in the waves and letting
it move me to where I need to be. That
is what we're embracing here, that sometimes life and your
circumstances are really unfair, and you know they could change
one day, but right now your best option is to
(31:32):
move on as if this person is not the one
Why because in that period of separation, that is when
you can delineate between them just being present, available around
and them actually being the love of your life. So
now that we have that clear, what are some strategies
(31:55):
to move on from what is a very complicated, and
let me just say, heartbreaking, painful situation. I do have
a full episode on this that I cannot recommend enough.
It's one of my favorite episodes, episode one hundred and
forty one. It's titled how to Get Over someone you
Can't Stop thinking about. I feel like a lot of
people listening to this should also be listening to that episode.
(32:17):
There are a lot of overlaps in a way, but
actually it's quite different. It's more about like the obsessive
spiral and that getting to that point where you were
like almost desperate to stop thinking about them. So go
and listen to that. There's actually a whole playlist of
my breakup, heartbreak, Lost Love episodes which I will link
(32:37):
in the episode description. But in the aftermath of a
right person, wrong time situation, what we are really aiming
for above all else is separation. We want emotional, social, physical,
mental separation as much as you can as much as
your circumstances permit that is the space that is required.
(33:03):
There is a tendency and definitely a strong emotional impulse
to continue to reach out to this person, to want
to maintain a friendship with this person, even because you know, well,
if we can't be together, we could be friends. I
am going to really advise you strongly against doing that
because they still stay as an option in your mind,
(33:26):
and it means that any new person that comes along,
you're still going to be comparing them to this other
person because they're still present. Instead, really try and create distance.
It's a challenge. It's a challenge not just because obviously
circumstances probably mean that you're friends or you share friends.
It's a challenge because if this is someone that you
(33:47):
deeply care about and you see as almost your assault mate,
letting that connection go can be brutal, but it is necessary.
It is a necessary pain. And in their absence, I
want you to really pick two to three things to
focus on in your life that have nothing to do
with anybody else. They are just for you. It's almost
(34:11):
like you need to start not necessarily scrubbing your life
of this person, but creating a life in which they
are not at this center you are, so pick a hobby,
pick a sport, pick even like some friends. Pick something
in your life that you really really want to do
and make that your focus. Make that where you put
(34:32):
all your energy and your healing. And I think through
that process we also come to new realizations about ourselves
and we begin to realize like, hey, I actually wouldn't
have been able to do these things if I was
still with this person. I wouldn't have been able to
do these like little weekend retreats with my besties. I
wouldn't have been able to solo travel. I wouldn't have
(34:53):
been able to do all these fun things on my
weekend nights or my weekday nights if I was with
this person. And most of the time you're like, slowly
you start to be like, oh so actually life is better.
Life is better like this. It can be a hard
thing to realize when you think that they were the
one and then suddenly you do one eight and it's like, oh, no,
(35:15):
you probably weren't. I also think part of this as well,
to add on to it, is that you start making
memories and experiences that they're not a part of, and
that's a really important part of the healing and the
closure process is realizing that you can create, enjoy, live
a meaningful life in which they don't have anything to
(35:37):
do with it anything at all. Additionally, I really want
you to continually focus on all the reasons that they
weren't right for you, rather than all the reasons that
they are. The reasons that they are right for you
often bubble to the surface because they're nice and they're positive,
and they're fluffy, and sometimes they're like kind of painful
(35:59):
to play with. We're going to ignore those and we're
going to focus all of our attention on what it
was about your current situation, circumstances, individual persons that meant
that you couldn't be together, and really that is the
focus of your thoughts.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
Here.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
The way that I like to do this is thinking
of attention as and this is a common analogy as
a giant spotlight that we have control of, where sitting
at the back, turning it, directing it, focusing on different
parts of the room, different members of the audience, whatever
it is, different thoughts. So when we get into an
obsessive spiral, we only selectively focus or turn the spotlight
(36:40):
to their positive attributes. Why they were so perfect, why
they were amazing. And you aren't seeing the situation clearly
first of all, but you also aren't seeing the situation
in a way that is helpful for your current circumstances.
So instead, I want you to continually come back to
why this couldn't be, why this didn't work, why it
(37:03):
was not an entirely perfect situation, why this needed to happen.
As a way to provide closure, rather than letting you
ruminate on all the things that maintain a connection and
maintain a love interest in this person, Another really important
way to find closure is to collect everything they gave you,
(37:25):
everything that you shared together, jewelry, photos, love notes, clothes,
anything at all, and put it into a box and
put it away. It's kind of symbolic of like packing
up all the connections in your mind as well and
putting it into long term storage. You know it's still there.
The items in the box are still there, the memories
are still there. There's still a part of you, but
(37:47):
it's not something that you visit and you look back
over every night. You've done yourself a huge favor by
removing not only reminders, but also memory cues in your environment.
That keep them, keep them in your current thought rotation,
and that might encourage you to reach back out when
(38:07):
we know, given our current circumstances, that is probably not
the best idea. Again, I want to just state before
we wrap this episode up with distance comes clarity, but
also comes the ability to solely focus on your life,
your baggage, your future, and to make it dreamy and
(38:29):
beautiful and worthy, regardless of what fate has in store
for you when it comes to this other person. Even
if you believe right now that this is a destined connection,
even if everything was perfect other than timing, timing is
still a factor and it is still actually at times
an indicator of why things were never going to work
(38:51):
out on a deeper level. So you kind of have
to accept this reality, accept that right now, this is
a situation that you're in. But again, there is a
lot of love out there, a lot of romance, a
lot of beautiful people. It's exciting that you don't have
the opportunity to meet them. It's exciting that you have
(39:12):
all these opportunities for new, fresh, beautiful connection. It's exciting
that you get to go on a first date again,
and it's exciting that you get to make even better
memories with someone new and someone who you know timing
is never going to be a problem because they love
you and they care about you. So I really hope
that if you're going through this right now, you've met
(39:33):
an amazing person and nothing is working out, nothing is
stacking up the way that you want to do, that
you have some hope for the future, and that you
see not only why this is the case, but why
it's very common, how to move through it, and why
when we're in that situation sometimes we can exaggerate the
connection that we have with someone. I'm sending a lot
(39:54):
of strength and a lot of love to you as
someone who has been through this and who was so
devastated by the loss of this connection and has come
out the other side and met someone brilliant and met
someone who I love and who I never would have
had the opportunity to be with if I'd let myself
(40:14):
continue to be a maybe. So I want that for
you as well as always, If you enjoyed this episode,
make sure that you are following along on Spotify or
Apple podcasts. Please leave a review of five star review
if you feel cold to do so. It's really special
it makes my day. I actually do read them more.
And I know a lot of creatives say that, but no,
(40:35):
I do, even the mean ones. So don't be that guy,
don't be that girl, don't be that person. Make sure
that if you have an episode suggestion, we are always
welcoming them. We always want to hear from you over
on that psychology podcast on Instagram. Just shoot me a
DM with your suggestion and hopefully I'll get to read
it and get to be inspired by you. But as always,
(40:56):
until next time, stay safe, stay kind, be gentle with yourself,
and we will talk very very soon.
Host
Jemma Sbeghen
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