Did you know that your brain looks the same when you fall in love did it does when you smoked crack cocaine?

little surprise then, that getting over an ex is emotionally and often physically painful when your brain is literally going through withdrawals.

There are 5 critical things you need to do to get through this period as quickly and with as little drama as possible:

STEP NUMBER 1: Remove all contact with your ex for at least three months.

If you maintain regular contact with your ex, it will take you a lot longer to recover because every time you see them you get reminded of them and it becomes incredibly hard to move on and put them out of your mind.

This is the most difficult step for most people.
When they first breakup, they still want to keep that person around for comfort.
But they can no longer truly comfort you!

They can only prolong the pain you have to go through.

You can be friends with your ex one day, but not until you have completely grieved the relationship and moved on.

STEP NUMBER 2: Make some time every day to grieve

It’s very important not to try and bury your feelings…

It’s doubly important not to use drugs like alcohol or prescription medication to try to make these feelings go away.

It’s only by creating the space to openly feel as much pain as you want, that you can emotionally work through the things you need to work through.

However, you don’t want to make this time unlimited….

Give yourself at most an hour or two a day in the first week or two.

In that time, put on some music that reminds you of your ex, allow yourself to cry, or get upset or get angry…

Write letters to your ex that you’ll never actually give them, start whacking a pillow – Do whatever you want that allows you to express what you are feeling.

By purposefully and freely expressing yourself in a safe space, you’ll find that you’ll soon not want to spend so much time grieving them, so they don’t make any more time to grieve.

We often make grieving difficult by trying to bottle up these feelings or hide from them as much as we can.

So they linger for much longer than they need to, and the experience becomes much more traumatic.

STEP NUMBER 3: Find at LEAST 2 or 3 different friends you can open up to.

One of the reasons men often struggle more with breakups than women is that most men don’t have anyone to talk to about their emotional turmoil.

Humans are designed to be social creatures!

After a breakup, you are suddenly deprived of a whole tonne of care and affection and human connection you got from your ex.

Finding a small number of friends who you can open up to emotionally about your struggles will help salve the sense of suddenly being alone.

Your friends will also help give you much-needed perspective.

WARNING – it’s best not to rely on just one person for emotional support because that’s a big load for one person to bear alone, best to have a small group who can take turns supporting you.

STEP NUMBER 4: Create a Silver Lining Journal.

Sit down and create a list of all the reasons it’s really awesome to be single again.

This can be really hard to do in the beginning, but persevere.

Think about all the ways a relationship may have held you back..

Think about the things in life you procrastinated on doing, but now this breakup will give you the inspiration to follow through on…

Think about all the bad things about your relationship (There are always bad things about every relationship) that you are suddenly free of…

Think about all the personality traits you wished your ex-had, but that a new partner will possess in the future..

Have fun with this list, it will really help you get focused on the things you have to look forward to in the future.

STEP NUMBER 5: Be Social

When you are getting over your ex, the last thing you want to do is go out dancing with friends, or go to that housewarming on the weekend.

But it’s really crucial to force yourself to go out with others.

Spending too much time alone makes it really difficult for us because we get stuck in our heads and it can be really hard to get out again.

Just commit to going out somewhere with a group of people at least once a week, even if you hate every minute of it.

I promise it will help you immensely.

Breakups aren’t ever going to be easy, but you can get through them a lot better if you use the 5 steps above to get through them as quickly and healthily as possible.