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| Photo by Ines Mataiche |
Okay so, heartbreak. Everyone’s had it, everyone says it gets better, and somehow that never actually helps in the moment. You just feel gutted and a bit stupid for caring that much, and there’s no shortcut through it.
What I can say, from the other side of a few of my own, is that it does eventually turn into something. Not instantly. Not in a neat way. But you come out knowing more about what you’ll actually put up with next time.
So here’s 30 quotes on it. I skipped the greeting-card ones and kept the ones that felt true. They’re grouped by stage, so if you’re in the ugly-crying part, skip ahead, no judgment.
The Pain Is Real
No point pretending it doesn’t hurt, because it does, and pretending otherwise usually just delays the part where you actually feel it and move through it. These are for the early days, when it’s still raw.
1. “Nothing hurts more than pouring your entire life into someone, showering them with love, only to watch them disregard your existence, leaving you to gather the pieces of your own heart.”
Unknown
2. “When you go through heartbreak, you just do the things that get you by. Eventually you realise it’s about making most of life.”
Britney Spears
3. “It’s amazing how someone can break your heart and you still love them with all the little pieces.”
Ella Harper
4. “I took a chance, I took a shot and you may think I’m bullet-proof, but I’m not. You took a swing, I took it hard. And down here from the ground I see who you are.”
Taylor Swift
5. “Hearts can break. Yes, hearts can break. Sometimes I think it would be better if we died when they did, but we don’t.”
Stephen King
6. “The emotion that can break your heart is sometimes the very one that heals it.”
Nicholas Sparks
When They Don’t Value You Enough
This is the part that took me the longest to actually believe, not just repeat. Someone treating you like an option instead of a priority isn’t a reason to try harder. It’s information.
7. “Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.”
Unknown
8. “If they ghost you, don’t text. Quietly accept and move on.”
Unknown
9. “You have to get up from the table when love is no longer being served.”
Nina Simone
10. “Giving up doesn’t always mean you are weak; sometimes it means that you are strong enough to let go.”
Unknown
11. “The more chances you give someone, the less they value you.”
Unknown
12. “Don’t throw away your time dreaming of someone that doesn’t want you. No one is that amazing, certainly not the one who would pass you up.”
Donna Lynn Hope
There’s Something Bigger Holding You
You don’t have to be religious for these to land. There’s a version of comfort in them that doesn’t depend on the person who hurt you ever coming back or explaining themselves, which honestly is the version worth having.
13. “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.”
Psalms
14. “Sorrows are our best educator. A man can see further through a tear than a telescope.”
Bruce Lee
15. “I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.”
Mother Teresa
16. “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
John 1:5
The Silence Is the Hardest Part
Nobody warns you about this bit. It’s not the big blowout argument that gets you weeks later, it’s the ordinary Tuesday when you almost text them something funny and then remember you can’t.
17. “The only thing more unthinkable than leaving is staying. The only thing more impossible than staying was leaving.”
Elizabeth Gilbert
18. “Ever has it been that love knows not its depth until the hour of separation.”
Kahlil Gibran
19. “The hardest thing is not talking to someone you used to talk to every day.”
Unknown
20. “The most painful thing is losing yourself in the process of loving someone too much, and forgetting that you are special too.”
Ernest Hemingway
What Heartbreak Teaches You
You don’t get to skip this part. But most people, months or years out, will tell you the breakup taught them something they wouldn’t unlearn even if they could. These are the ones pointing at that.
21. “I wish I was a little girl again, because skinned knees are easier to fix than a broken heart.”
Julia Roberts
22. “Every time your heart is broken, a doorway cracks open to a world full of new beginnings, new opportunities.”
Patti Roberts
23. “Sometimes a little heartbreak is a lesson, and the best thing to do is just learn the lesson.”
Jon Voight
24. “Life is not about waiting for the storms to pass, it’s about learning to dance in the rain.”
Vivian Greene
25. “Some of us think that holding on makes us strong; but sometimes it is letting go.”
Hermann Hesse
26. “Sometimes it takes a heartbreak to shake us awake and help us see we are worth so much more than what we’re settling for.”
Mandy Hale
27. “Never regret. If it’s good, it’s wonderful. If it’s bad, it’s experience.”
Victoria Holt
28. “In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.”
Robert Frost
Two More Worth Sitting With
These didn’t fit the categories above but they’re two of the sharpest lines in the whole list, so here they are anyway.
29. “The saddest thing is to be a minute to someone, when you’ve made them your eternity.”
Sanoba Khan
30. “Sharp are the arrows of a broken heart.”
Cassandra Clare
None of these quotes fix anything on their own. But they’re a decent place to sit for a minute when your own words aren’t coming, and sometimes that’s enough for one day.