How To Increase Your Happiness After Someone You Love Has Hurt You

Photo by Szilvia Basso on Unsplash

I don’t know about you, but I can’t stand the feeling of, “I should have said….”

Do you know why?

Because it can leave me feeling angry and upset. Even though I consider myself as a quick responder when I’m caught on the off, there have often been times, hours, days, or even months after, when I say in my head, I wish I had said…, or I should have said….

I know these kicks start the negative self-talk of how useless I am or how the other person who has hurt me was so right. It leads me down the path of self-destruction and I can steadily tread the dark path for a period.

I need to hold my hand up here. I have said some hurtful things to those I love in the past, and I have had to make peace with the previous version of myself that didn’t know any better. Self-forgiveness has been one of the most challenging jobs I have undertaken. It seems forgiving others is a much easier feat.

How have I become so forgiving?

I write letters. Writing letters that are for my eyes only has set me free. Now I like a good swear word and I know others become offended when profanity is present, but for me, it’s such a great release. I swear a lot when I’m writing, particularly when I’m writing to the person who I feel hurt by.

Because I know they will never read it, (I would never send it), I am free to spew my guts out onto the page, release the rage and the hurt. They will never see it, so I can be brutally honest and expel that what needs to go. It truly is a liberating process to manage my emotions.

I have suffered from the deepest depression; I have experienced suicidal thoughts frequently, and I have hit rock bottom more frequently than I care to remember.

When I discovered the writing letters method, it gave me the opportunity to become the master of my emotions. It gave me the chance to choose to be happy. It’s still a work in progress and, to be honest, I write more than one letter to the same person, a week or a year later, and anything in between.

This technique works for me. Once I’ve finished writing to the culprit that I feel hurt by, I then decide what to do with the letter. To be fair, it depends on my state of mind. Burning letters; ripping them up into tiny pieces and either burying them or throwing them out with the rubbish are all good ways to dispose of the released thoughts and tension. I’ve even taken a letter and put it in the sea.

At the end of these choices, I am feeling so much happier, and I smile. This, my friend, is priceless.

So the next time you wish you had said….. try saying it in a letter and release the unspoken words to set yourself free. ❤