If you’re looking for help on how to end a relationship, the chances are you’ve already done a lot of soul searching before coming to the decision to end it. Of course, a lot of times the end of a relationship comes about in a spur of the moment fight or argument. Some relationships end on a regular basis, maybe you like the ‘making up’ period?
But if you’re actually searching for advice on how to end a relationship, then this probably isn’t a response to a single event or some big argument. It’s much more likely that the relationship has been bad for some time and you are wanting to end it gracefully so that you can both move on with your self respect intact, and the minimum of pain being caused to either party.
Being able to end a relationship in this way is especially important if you’re just wanting a temporary separation and are hoping that perhaps some time apart might help your relationship improve and get back that spark you used to have but seems to have been lost under the mundane, day to day frustrations and problems of everyday living.
So, check out our 3 tips to breaking up gracefully below.
- Be clear on your ‘why’ – it’s easy to think you want to end a relationship for one reason, but when you take a long, deep look at the relationship, it’s often something else entirely. It’s not fair on either of you to say you want to break up because “you spend more time with your friends than with me”, when what you really mean is, ” I don’t feel I’m important in this relationship”.
- Choose your time and place – this may seem like common sense but trying to tell your partner you want to break up while you’re rushing out to work isn’t a good idea. Similarly, and a mistake more often made by men than women, is to take your partner out for a meal and do the break up in a public place. Perhaps the idea is to hopefully save them from reacting badly by the fear of creating a scene in a public place? But all it does is create bad feeling because they think you’re taking them out because you love them and in reality the opposite is true. Make time when the two of you won’t be disturbed and you have the space to be truly honest with each other.
- Don’t put all the blame for the break up on to your partner. This is never going to be true anyway and simply puts your partner on the defensive. Being honest about your part in the break up goes a long way to keeping your self respect intact as well as helping your partner retain theirs.
If you can end a relationship gracefully, you will find it much easier to move on after the break up. And should you ever come to the realisation that breaking up was a mistake and you want to get back together with your now ‘ex’, you’ll find it much easier to do if you’ve managed the break up in an open and honest manner.
