What’s the magic formula to keep your cool when things are boiling over, when your mind is screaming out, when you want to jump off a cliff, when you want to strike out at the person you once loved? Nothing. In truth, there is no formula.
When you are heartbroken, you tend to fall back into your elemental self and follow behaviour patterns that are ingrained in your being. When you are heartbroken, all your composure, culture and learning go out of the window. If you are the violent type, you will get violent. If you are the shaky type, you will get depressed. On the other hand, if you are the calm, confident type, you will naturally segregate the problem from your self-esteem and view it from a distance, at least for a while. Even if the problem drowns you in misery, you will manage to keep your nostrils above water and breathe air while underneath, you flap about miserably.
If you want to know how you will respond to a huge emotional crisis, watch your reactions to small ones. When you had to rush for a big date and your favourite dress was found torn, did you scream, yell, blame your mom and throw a fit? Or did you calmly change into another dress and slip out? Did you think all evening, “Oh God, I hope no one will notice I am wearing my second best dress”? Or did you forget it and focus on having a good time? Be honest with yourself and accept your findings with a smile.
The smartest thing you can do to handle heartbreak is to be prepared for it in small ways. That’s what the left part of your brain is good at. In fact, your left brain is your best friend. You can easily train it to keep a watch on yourself.
I remember that as a child, whenever a big bully would try and beat me up (which happened fairly often in school), I would take the punishment, fight back and cry out while resisting, but a small part of me would never cry, never feel fear. When things would get worse, that little voice inside would always be there, talking softly, hoping I would hear it and calm down. There were many times in my life when I heard that voice and listened to its sweet reason. There were also times I chose not to hear it even though I knew it was trying to help me get out of a mess. The times when I went overboard with misery and wallowed in dark brooding feelings, they were generally the worst moments of my life.
At my age, I don’t get heartbroken in the same way as a teenager. But emotional heartbreaks do happen. As a filmmaker, I have to live with commercial success and failure. After making a really good film, a director sometimes has to watch it crumble at the box office — for no fault of his. Those moments can be devastating. Well, I have my voice of reason. It has helped me ride a wave of depression rather well and cheerfully bounce back.
The only advice I can give my young friends is this — find that voice of reason inside your head. You can do this by observing yourself, watching your reactions and accepting the truth in them. You can empower that voice by giving yourself a goal, telling it which responses you want to change and how. Once you switch on the voice of reason inside, it will keep talking to you, telling you things about yourself you need to know. The only thing left is to listen to that voice, follow its calm instructions and spare yourself a gigantic mess. So typically, when your heart is broken and you want to jump off a cliff, that voice inside will tell you “don’t do it”.
Listen to this voice and obey. When you want to say something nasty and vulgar to the person you once loved, your voice will say “keep quiet and walk away”. Obey it at once. When you are with friends and you brood in silence, your voice will say “shout, scream, cry and get it all out”. Obey it and get the toxins out of your system.
I said it was easy. It is. You are actually the best friend you can have when the storm breaks out. But you need to find and cultivate that friend first, then learn to take his (or her) help in times of crying need.
The writer is a film director