This Is How You Know You’ve Moved On

Closure is a strangely foreign notion. We gawk in amazement when victims of unspeakable crimes calmly declare that they’ve forgiven their perpetrators. We look up in awe to the likes of Mahatma Gandhi and the Buddha who seem to emanate from within an aura of peace, and we wonder, how is it that these people do this?

What we don’t realize, however, is that in our own ways, through the inevitable fall-outs and fights we’ve had, we’ve walked down the same road – we just haven’t been conscious of it. So here’s a news flash for anyone who didn’t get the memo: you (yes, you) are capable of being as zen as anyone else you can imagine (and these are the times you are that person):

We feel no anger towards our offenders. Indifference, sure, but there is no burning desire to watch karma in its lead role from the front row and see what went around to come back at them. In fact, we don’t even wish them to experience what they made us feel, whether or not we get to ‘see’ it, because now we recognize that as spite that we are above.

We aren’t agonized when things go right for them, and we certainly stop thinking it’s unfair because they haven’t ‘paid’ for their mistake. Sometimes, it doesn’t bother us. Other times, we feel genuinely happy for them in their successes, regardless of what transgressed between us.

We rarely wonder ‘what if?’ anymore. What if I’d done things differently? What if they’d done so and so? The questions come few and far in between, and on the rare occasion that our minds do wander to the question, there’s no hurt or regret – now we’re alright with accepting that what’s done is done and that there’s no changing it.

The situation turns into something about us rather than them. When we think about what happened, we no longer fault-find and look for their mistakes and berate them in our minds,  but instead see the things we learned – about them, about people in general, and most importantly, about ourselves.

We no longer wonder whether they care anymore. And we know that when we say it, it isn’t with a cold angry defensive front, it’s with the peaceful calm that comes from having taken everything in our stride and having moved on. We recognize that they are entitled to their opinions and whether good or bad, they’re nobody’s business but their own. It doesn’t agonize us to think they might not, nor does the thought of their repentance bring us any joy. Once again, it’s because we’ve understood and accepted that nothing will change, and that that’s perfectly OK.

Good times past make us smile unconditionally. The end no longer colors the moments that were good, and we are able to truly cherish and be grateful for those times. We no longer question the validity of the moments we want to hold close to our hearts, no longer questioning what it says of us, and more importantly, knowing that those moments will never return doesn’t fill us with regret or pain as it once did.