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Speaker: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Bite-Sized Brilliance podcast. I'm your host, Dr. April Darley, and I want to talk about something today because I have a few friends that are going through it. I know a few people right now who've had sudden breakups. Their relationships ended out of nowhere, and they're struggling to find closure.
So that's what I wanna talk to you about is how do you find closure when something unexpected happens? And this could be a job loss, a relationship ending, or even a sudden death of someone you know and love. All of those scenarios have this element of where we didn't see it coming and we're struggling to make sense of it.
And that's really what closure is about, is you struggling to make sense about something that you didn't want to happen happening. And that is the very nature of life that things are going to [00:01:00] change and how we deal with that is up to us. There's this old saying about forgiveness, that forgiveness is for you and not for them.
And people can logically get behind that. Some people resist that concept because they're like, " _something was done to me that was so horrific. It is unforgivable"_. And that is fair and it's totally your personal choice. And that absolutely happens. But. when it comes to something like closure, I also believe it's similar that closure is up to you.
So, let me talk about the two main reasons I see why people struggle with closure. Number one, it's the concept of an open loop, and number two, it's ego. Let's talk about open loops first. Even the term closure implies that there is something that is open and you want to shut it down. Closure in terms of sudden [00:02:00] relationship endings or endings of any kind, mean that you're struggling to understand why.
I'm going to use romantic relationships as an example because I know two people right now who had relationships suddenly come to an end, and they are struggling emotionally with that closure. What happened for them and what may be happening for you is when you keep alive the question of _"What happened? I just don't understand it. I need to know." _You are teaching your brain to constantly look for an answer that you're probably not going to get. That alone keeps the loop open and then you do something like go stalk their social media. Both of these people have done that.
They have looked at their Facebook, their Instagram, where are they? Where are they hanging out? Who are they hanging out with? And that is [00:03:00] doubling down on the pain. So when you have an open loop, your brain tags it with a particular kind of meaning. This is called_* value tagging*_, and when you tag it with a painful emotion like longing, or anger, our brain is designed to keep us safe, and so it will prioritize anything you tag with an intense emotion.
Passion, anger, longing, want, need, and so it shows you more of that. And when you replay the memory, go look at your photos, you really get stuck in that loop of why. You are teaching the brain to serve more up to you. That is one pathway. The other pathway you could choose is to shut it down. This is a more difficult pathway if you have not been trained to do [00:04:00] it.
Both pathways are your choice, and I want to truly have you understand this concept .. When you are looking at their social media, when you are going to look at the old photos, when you are still texting them and you guys have broken up, you are reinforcing habits that are causing you pain. You do that. You can just as easily block them on social media, stop looking at their stuff.
And stop wondering what happened because here's the truth. A very small percentage of the time will you get that closure and the open loop of, _I don't know why_. Your brain doesn't like open loops. It's not energy efficient, so it will try to close the loop in the absence of facts.
So what you tend to do is insert,_ it must have been something about me. I must have _[00:05:00] _done something wrong._ You start examining your behavior, looking for why you might have been the cause, or you do it the opposite way and you start analyzing the last few days or that last conversation to figure out why they felt the need to do what they did.
But the truth is we're not in their head. We're never gonna know why they did it unless they fess up. And let's be honest, most of the time people just ghost and run. So you are left holding the bag unless you put that bag down. What I recommend to give yourself closure is the following.
Number one, do not stalk them on social media. Number two, do not go back and read the old letters or look at the old photos. Put 'em in a box, burn 'em, put 'em in storage. Make them difficult for you to access.
Number three, you will now need to break the habit of making that person your go-to person, and you will need to find a healthy [00:06:00] way to spend the time and the energy that you used to pour into them now needs to be redirected into you or a healthy activity.
Breaking the habit is what keeps people in this cycle of, we're back together. Oh, we're broken up, we're back together. Oh, we're broken up. When you don't have a choice, when they broke up with you and ghosted, you listen to that. Respect that they showed you what they wanted. And so you can show yourself what you now want, which is to have a stable, loving, healthy, emotionally secure relationship.
And if a person is going to ghost and run, then that isn't it. And chances are you're not going to get what you're looking for by taking them back or by stalking their social media or keeping that open loop of, I just wanna know why. So what I'm gonna ask you to do is you to insert your own why that [00:07:00] is complimentary to you and healthy.
One of the exercises that I recommend to clients that are struggling with closure is to write a letter. I want you to write this letter in a way where you have a conversation with this person. You say everything you need to say. If you're angry, put it in the letter.
If you're hurt, put it in the letter. If you were blindsided and feel betrayed, put it in the letter, but I also want you to write their response back to you in a way that you wish things would've happened. If you want closure, understanding, you want to know the real reason why. Then insert a reason why you think they would've done that.
Insert an apology if you feel you need one but didn't get one in real life. Whatever you want their response to be other than, _"girl, let's get back together"_. Put it in the letter, then burn the letter. Because this is closing the loop that you have kept [00:08:00] open when you keep asking the question, _"I don't understand. I just want to know why". _
Write this letter in such a way that you get your answer, you get your why. You get it to where you can move on and focus on something that's a better match for you. That's realistic, that's healthy.
Now this works. If it was a job loss, then write in how hurt you are, how blindsided you were, and write in what you wish they would've said to you instead.
If they would've said, you're overqualified or It's not about you. Your work is excellent. It's just budget cuts or whatever you needed to hear to make the situation not about you. To take the personal pain away from yourself and to put it where it most likely belongs, that chances are it really wasn't about you. There are two people in [00:09:00] jobs and relationships, and we don't get to control the other person.
Everybody's going through their stuff and there's always a reason, but we may never know that reason, and we wanna get ourselves okay with not knowing because that happens. So you fill in the blank of what you think happened, what you think they were going through, or what happens on their end, and then you shut it down.
You close the loop. Write down what you need in this letter, then burn it and move on. Block this person. Go find another job.
Now, when it comes to death and unexpected death, it's slightly different. The open loops and the lack of closure with unexpected deaths, you start to pull up all the things where you feel they weren't good to you, you weren't good to them. There's a lot of guilt, there's a lot of shame.
The letter [00:10:00] concept still works. If there was anything in your life that you felt was unresolved and you didn't get to address before that person passed away, you can still do that in the letter.
You can write out how they hurt you, write out how you hurt them, write out what you wish you would've done. But here's what I want you to do as an extra step. I want you to look at it from their perspective and a perspective of love. If they would've said, you were a good daughter, or you were a good son, or you were a good partner, put that in the letter.
Because when you punish yourself with unfinished business, that's not the whole story. The point of the letter when someone unexpectedly passes away is for you to end on love, forgiveness, compassion, if at all possible. And if they did something you feel is unforgivable, then you can make it about total [00:11:00] release.
_You're no longer in my life. I no longer have to be tortured by you. I no longer have to experience this. I am free._ You can write that version of the letter as well, but the letter concept is really about being done, closing the loop, giving yourself what you feel you need because you won't get it in real life any other way.
Now, the second way I see that closure doesn't happen is because of ego. Now, your ego is not your amigo, so I want you to remember that phrase. Everybody has an ego, and if you think you are the nicest person alive, you're still gonna have ego. You just may be expressing it in a different kind of way.
So if you feel you are an empath or a super nice person or a healer, your ego might be coming out in solving other people's problems when they didn't ask you to or overgiving to the point of your own [00:12:00] detriment or trying to pick somebody up, but they weren't receptive to it. But you keep trying. It comes out in a form of control.
And we don't like to say that about ourselves, that we might be over controlling or overgiving to our own detriment, but it's true. The other side of that spectrum is when you have an ego that makes you arrogant, cruel, and mean, where you think you are better than other people and you put down people or you enjoy seeing them suffer, it can come out that way as well.
But our ego keeps these loops open. It keeps us going, _"why did they do this to me? Why did this happen to me? Don't they know who I am?"_ And so it keeps this anger going, this bitterness, this resentment that keeps loops open. And that can stop you from closure. When you don't admit your own ego, you might be [00:13:00] unable to see where you contributed to the problem.
And if you were the one who was dumped, you may not like to think I was the problem. But if you really assess it when you have enough emotional distance from the situation, you're probably going to admit that you could see problems popping up. That there were red flags, that maybe they pushed your buttons.
You pushed their buttons. Look, relationships are challenging because it's two people who are totally different trying to blend and become one. And that's hard because you are very different. You weren't raised the same. You may not have the same values, you may not have the same traumas where you react the same way.
And so we need to own up to our part in the painful journey with relationships. If this was a job loss, then own up to your part. Is there some way where you were just phoning it in or you didn't do your [00:14:00] best work? Is that true? Could that have happened? Could in some way that loss be due to performance?
Is that relationship that ended in some way, were you not available for them? Were you an irritant to them in some way? Were you too needy and they needed to be your support and they just couldn't take it anymore? Is there something unflattering that we would not like to admit that might be true?
If we get our egos out of the way, we might be able to see how we can improve and be better so that the next relationship, the next job, we don't repeat unflattering things. We don't go in with another red flag and we don't have to learn that lesson anymore. If you are the person who has the ego, where you punish others, where you like to make people suffer, that is a character trait you wanna work on because that is going to continually push people away from you and you [00:15:00] will end up alone.
And that is the very thing that most people do not want to happen. So own that part as well. Did you keep your emotional walls up so high that they couldn't get into you? Did you not fully trust them because you were hurt, not because of what they did, but because you were hurt and you couldn't get over that trauma?
Be honest with yourself because your ego can block you from good relationships, good jobs, good friendships, and that is the other thing that keeps closure from happening is you might not see your part in it, or your part might be really unflattering, and so you'd rather just put blinders on and move on.
The endpoint is the same. You need to move on. That is what closure helps you do is move on. How long you keep it alive is up to you. But ultimately, just like forgiveness, closure is for [00:16:00] you and often you give that to yourself because you may never get it from the other person. And getting yourself to an emotional point where you're neutral on that, where it's okay.
Where it would be nice if they could chime in with what they were thinking and feeling and what their perception was, but getting yourself to a point where you're like, I don't need it to move forward. Because truly, you really don't. The longer you sit in the pain, it keeps you stuck. It keeps you from moving forward, and we've all done it.
It's human. But if you had a tornado destroy your house, and if you went back to that house every day and cried over the wreckage, it doesn't build you a new house. You've got to clear that wreckage out, save the mementos that you can and move on. That is the only thing that is going to make you happy again.
That is going to lead to growth and to the next place. And I [00:17:00] understand it was disappointment that you felt or fear, but again, that's not going to move you forward. It's just going to keep you stuck. So closure is for you and you give it to yourself and it's going to take as long as you make it take. You can block that social media today.
You can write that letter today. You can get back on those dating apps today. You don't have to wait if you don't want to. You can decide enough was enough, you deserve better, and you're ready to open your heart, drop those walls and receive better. Because I guarantee you there is better and you don't have to keep hurting yourself to get.
I am a big proponent of realism therapy, so check yourself before you wreck yourself. Give yourself the closure. Look at yourself to see how you may have contributed in a fair and [00:18:00] factual way, not in a judgmental or detrimental way where you put yourself down and make it your fault, because that is probably not the truth either.
It's that balance, and if you need a guide to help you sort out fact from fiction, give me a call. I do complimentary consultations to help you figure out what is the piece that's keeping you stuck. What is the piece that is keeping you coming back to the pain and not allowing you to close those loops and get real closure.
You can book that at aprildarley.com. It's quick, easy, 20 minutes phone consultation. We'll find out where you're getting stuck and what it's gonna take to move you forward again. This week, I am wishing you so much love, success, and the closure that you need so that you can move forward and do life better.
Goodbye my friends.
