Remember that person you were so in love with? The one that you vowed to never stop loving. The person who made you feel as though you were the only person in the world. They were your first love, your best friend and your partner for everything. But then as quickly as they came, they went. You were forced to pick up the pieces of your heart.

You were forced to learn how to live again without them.

So you spent weeks trying to get over them. You spent months pretending you were OK. Then one night, after a few too many drinks, you found yourself on their Facebook. You see them with their new love. You see them smile that very same smile they had with you. They look happy. They’re life has continued on without you; a realization that hurts like hell.

There was a time when you couldn’t live without each other. It was late nights. It was stupid fights. It was loving someone like you had never known before. It was putting someone else’s needs ahead of your own. It was everything you had heard love was going to be. But it didn’t last. It wasn’t meant to last. They were meant to show you what love is so that the next time you do it, you know what it means to give your heart fully to someone.

It’s not going to make sense to you if right now you still miss them so fully it hurts every time you hear their name. It’s not going to seem like you’ll ever be able to be open with someone else the way you were with them.

You’re not going to be able to believe that love will someday again find you. It’s going to be something that is meant for everyone else except you.

Sometimes those people circle back. Maybe it’s a quick text to see how you’re doing or an Instagram like. It’s something that makes you wonder if they too are thinking about you. They’re also nostalgic for the good times and it’s naïve to think that nostalgia is one sided. It doesn’t mean more than that which you figure out. The hurt then sets in for one more round even though you feel like your heart can’t take anymore.

Then you meet someone new. It’s going to hit you hard and fast. It’s not going to be on your timeline. It might feel too soon. It might feel like it took forever. No matter what it’s going to feel different.

It’s almost like someone turned the lights on. You’re going to finally understand why people write so much about love. You’re going to understand why all of your friends told you not to give up. You can just feel it, really feel it, deep down in your bones. You know that it’s something special, just for you, and you’re so ready for it.

It’s then that it’s going to make sense. Why you had to say goodbye to someone you thought you truly loved in order to meet the one you actually do.

That’s not to say you didn’t love before, it’s just going to be different.

This new person is going to scare the shit out of you. You have built this tall and impenetrable wall that no one was allowed to knock down but they did. A part of you wants to hate them. You want to hate them for making you feel things again. You want to hate them for making you scared of losing them. You’re going to hate the fact that they have shaken your entire world that you had neatly put back together.

The new person isn’t going to be perfect but you don’t care. You don’t care because all you care about is keeping them and they make damn sure you know they want to keep you too. You don’t have to guess where their head is at because they tell you. You don’t have to play all the games you had to before. It just feels right.

So when this happens. When you meet someone after heartbreak, it’s going to all feel brand new again. It’s going to make you remember those first time feelings and it’s going to be better. You’ll have no proof of forever but you’ll have enough to know that this is worth the risk. So take the jump and don’t look back.