I read an article the other day that said something along the lines of, “You know you have healed when you can finally start to love someone else” and “Healing happens when you can kiss someone and not feel pain.” I was completely distraught by this concept because it completely undermines the work of oneself. The more I thought about it, the more I realized how many people associate feeling ‘better’ and ‘healing’ with moving on and into another person, when that isn’t the case at all.
Let me redirect these statements because in all honesty, healing and moving on have absolutely no connection to one another and they do not happen simultaneously.
Know that you can fully heal while never fully moving on.
Healing does not happen when we leap into the arms of someone brand new; it happens when we leap into the creation of a brand new life. Healing happens when we let go of our plans for the future; it happens when we give up our need for certainty. Healing happens when we know that we know nothing. Healing happens when we spend every single weekend laying in the sun with our girlfriends eating watermelon. Healing happens when we set new goals for ourselves; it happens when we develop new hobbies. Healing happens when we spend three hours alone on the floor in a book store reading self transformation books.
Healing happens when we remember how important we are, it happens when we practice and give gratitude for everything we have. Healing happens we learn how to be naked in our own skin and still unconditionally compliment our birthmarks.
Healing happens when we give pain permission to leave and joy permission to stay.
Healing happens when we make forgiveness one of our best friends and faith one of our mentors. Healing happens when we pay attention to our own progress, when we honor time as if we know its importance and we know we can’t live without it. Healing happens when we learn to be patient, when we define our intentions, when we decide to be the artists of our own life and we begin to paint the masterpiece of who we want our best selves to be.
We heal when we think about what other people are doing less and purely focus on what we are doing more.
We heal when we start to live. We heal when we learn how to be alive. We heal when we give silent love to our surroundings and we let the sun kiss our cheeks and we let movement touch our minds.
Never feel obligated or rushed to hurry up and move on. Heck, give your body permission to never move on. If your heart isn’t ready to invest in romantic or intimate love with another person, honor it. Your life’s happiness and your healing is not defined by how fast you can be resilient and love again, it is defined by the journey you take to discover yourself and your openness to live, learn, and make the most of the life that is happening right this moment. 
