Letting go doesn’t mean you don’t love them. It doesn’t mean that you don’t value the time you’ve spent together or the memories you’ve made. Sometimes, letting go simply means that you love yourself more than you love them. It means you’re putting your health, your happiness, and your sanity before anyone else’s. It means you’re deciding you’re important, too. It means you’re actually putting in the effort to treat yourself as a priority.

If you’re the type of person who is always giving, who is always putting other people first, it can be difficult to shift your thinking. It can be a challenge to choose yourself over everyone else. But you have to remember, following the best path for yourself doesn’t make you selfish. It doesn’t make you a horrible person. It actually makes you a better person because it means you’re dedicated to growing, to evolving, to becoming the best version of yourself.

You should be proud of yourself for letting go instead of clinging to a relationship that isn’t working.

You should be proud of the fact you’re able to see the beauty in an experience while recognizing it is only temporary.

You should be proud of yourself for doing what is right over what is easy, because most people would choose differently.

It’s important to give up the idea that letting go means you’ve failed, because that is far from the truth. If you’re happier after letting go, you haven’t failed. If you can breathe easier, you haven’t failed. If you’re confident in your decision, you haven’t failed.

Figuring out the best move for yourself and making it, even though it’s scary, even though it’s going to make your life more complicated, even though you might get judged — that means you’ve succeeded. It means you’re doing well for yourself.

Sometimes, letting go means you love yourself more than you love the idea of a relationship. It means that you are more interested in finding real, genuine happiness than you are in pretending a relationship is working when you’re clearly not meant for each other. It means you don’t care about a relationship status more than your actual mood, because you understand it has absolutely no correlation to your success or fulfillment as a person.

Sometimes, letting go means you’re brave enough to be honest with yourself. It means you’re wise enough to see when something isn’t working.

You shouldn’t fight for a relationship that has clearly run its course. You shouldn’t try to fix something that is supposed to be over. Sometimes, letting go is your best option because it gives you a fresh start. It gives you a chance to move on. It gives you a chance to become your best self.

You need to stop thinking of letting go as a bad thing, as a failure, as a problem you never should’ve had to face, because sometimes it’s your best course forward. Sometimes it’s exactly what you need to do to reach your fullest potential. Sometimes, it’s a beautiful thing.