Twenty-three-year-old Smita (name changed) spent the last two months planning her revenge on her ex, Vivek (name changed). Similar to a real-life episode of Axe Your Ex, she was about to do something nasty when a friend gave Smita a piece of her mind. “On looking at the situation objectively, I realised that Vivek had something I never had — stability. And that’s why he was unhappy with me,” she says. “Now, I respect him for ending the bond in a nice enough way and letting me know how I must grow up and move on,” she adds.
Today, many young singles have learnt lessons from their failed relationships and respect their exes for their good qualities. While international portals such as WotWentWrong.com are helping singles learn from their past failed relationships, some like Dr Vijay Nagaswami, a psychiatrist, says, “Thanks to liberalisation, which gets singles relationships of all kinds — short term, friends-with-benefits or hook-ups, it may not be presumptuous to say that today’s youth have greater wisdom on relationships that we did.”
T. Sakshi (name changed), who got married at 23, shares, “We had work-life balance issues. No one was ready to quit for the other. Now after six years and into my second marriage, I know where I need to let go,” she says.
Marriage counsellor Dr Gitanjali Sharma says that youth have the ability to acknowledge others if not openly, then to their friends, she says. “Since today’s youngsters enter into relationships when they are in school, by the time they become professionals, they are much wiser. Today, the youth analyse not just their love interests, but also their friends and acquaintances,” she adds.