The switcher-theory:
A first step to forgetting that "someone" that broke your heart
The other day I found myself explaining to one of my housemates my very own "switcher theory" and thought that actually my theory perhaps could be a bit more interesting for those of you out there who are trying to overcome love-related problems than my previous and shameful post cited earlier. And so, my theory goes as follows:
I defined a switcher as "the argument that makes you realise that your former (or current) other-half, the one that you once thought was the love of your life, was actually not right for you. This argument has the power of changing your feelings and views towards that person almost immediately". The switcher is that "something" that he or she believed in but that it might absolutely conflict with your personal world views or might go against your very own core values. Once you are able to find your switcher, you can peacefully start to move on. There can be more than one switcher, and the more switchers that you can find, the easier it will be to change your emotions towards that person.
As a result, after a breakup, you need to find your switcher, that argument that would convince you, and that it is irrefutable evidence, that your past relationship/lover/hookup/one-sided love is never going to fully make you happy as it is not the right person for you. Perhaps some can say that we are tricking our minds and feelings, but trust me, I've seen the power of the switcher when overcoming disappointment in love, and it can work within seconds of finding the right argument.
I'll give you a few examples:
Example 1: Once I dated a girl from the online world (a story yet to come) that told me that she thought that science was trying to kill the joy of life. She said that scientists were foolish if they thought that they could ever understand the meaning of life and, therefore, they were wasting their time and everyone's money on doing research. I generally tend to respect everyone's opinions even if they are completely opposed to my own. Why not? I'm not going to argue against anyone's own worldviews because core values and beliefs are very hard to change and, there is always room in this world for different views, right? It is foolish to try to impose your world views on others as it doesn't work that way, we all have our own personal beliefs and values and they are at the core of our identity. Aiming to change them is a very (if not impossible) job that I'm not willing to even attempt to do.
As a result, and following basic hypothetical syllogism (if A is B and B is C, therefore, A is C): if she thought that scientific work was stupid and useless and, I am a scientist (or pretend to be at least), in her world view I was stupid and my work was meaningless. Who can live happily ever after with someone that doesn't value your work?
When she said those words I actually did not give them too much importance and took them as some kind of weird joke, or perhaps I was just blinded by her external beauty. She was a self-defined artist and so, I tended to swallow her eccentricities and crazy speeches with humour. However, when we broke up (well.... I have to confess that she broke up with me BUT I thought about breaking up with her several times due to her quirkiness and multiple addictions...) I suddenly remembered her words about science and used them as my switcher.
How could I ever be happy as an almost-scientist with someone that thought that scientific work was trying to kill the joy of life? Well, perhaps I thought, it was one of those things that someone might not really believe but would say with a glass of wine (in her case with a full box) to challenge a conversational partner. But still, it was a very strong statement to be used as a controversial punch with the intention of looking for an intellectual discussion and it might have been a reflection of some kind of attention deficit or even a sign of some mental issues (possibly her case). So, I used her past words as one of my switchers to completely disregard her in my mind as a potential life partner.
Ok, I know what you are thinking, this might be a bit of an extreme example, but bear with me...
Example 2: I have a friend that has had addiction problems in the past but has fought hard to overcome them. He met a guy with whom he was in a relationship for almost a year. When they broke up, he had to find his switcher in order to move on. In his case, the switcher was that his former lover believed that using drugs on a non-regular basis and in low doses could be fun. He liked to use and share them with others and have some fun every now and then.
As a result, over the period of time that they were together, he took and facilitated drugs to my friend and did not make a big deal when my friend started to develop his addiction patterns and anxieties again. In this case, if they would have stayed together, it would have been a disaster for my friend's health (and also to his financial situation). Its former partner drug's tolerance and the fact that he did not care about my friend's well-being but prioritized his own fun was my friend's switcher, what make him change his feelings towards his ex-other-half. My friend knew that he could never find that balance and moderation when it came to certain substances and so, abstinence was his only option. However, his former partner just thought that this attitude was some form of being a "party-pooper-joy kill". Their views on drugs and having fun, in conjunction to their past experiences were conflicting and could have been also very detrimental for one side of the relationship.
Ok, I know what you are thinking, perhaps this example might be a bit too extreme too, but I have one last one...
Example 3: Once upon of time I was in my late teens and had a crush on someone slightly older than me from high school. My inexperience and youthfulness made me put her up on a pedestal. Also, due to the fact that I was "still in the closet", I never actually did anything about this crush. We both left our home town to go to University (she left before I did) and so, our lives took different paths... The years passed and I forgot about her but, somewhere deep down a small part of me kept holding on to that young crush. She was sometimes the one that I would think of when listening to songs like "The one that got away" by Katy Perry or "Someone like you" by Adele and felt melancholic about my high school days. Our story was never resolved and so my one-sided love never had a clear end because at the time, I was still in the closet and I was not able to deal with my feelings properly.
A few years ago, we somehow ended up living within a 20 minutes drive from each other and, as we were about 1,000 miles away from our home town, she decided to contact me to meet up and reconnect. The passing of time and other "loves" had washed off my deep feelings for her, but I possibly had some unresolved high school issues towards her. We met up and this time, the blindfold that I carried for years had fallen off and I got to see her real character. I perceived for the first time how negative she was about everything: the restaurant was "cheap & tacky", the waiter was rude, the cutlery was dirty, the weather was bad, her job was unbearable... and so on and so forth. She was the kind of person whose complaints and negativity were a never-ending stream. Nothing was ever up to her standard. The last straw came when she complained about some lower back pain and I suggested to her that perhaps swimming (one of my passions) could help her, to which she replied:
"I tried swimming for a while, but it messed up my hair so, I gave up" WHAT? How can you prioritize your looks over your health? That was my final switcher.
I talked to an old friend of mine about our encounter and commented on how much she had changed over the years to what my friend pointed out that she had always been that way, but I was too blind to see it. In this case, the switcher that completely helped me to move on with my teenage feelings towards her was that she was an extremely negative person that prioritizes looks and external appearance over other things that are more important to me such as health, exercise or self-development. I could have never found happiness with someone like her.
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| Board done by my housemate in an afternoon of creative work with sprays (2015) | . |
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