I had one ex, we were together for two years, didn't see each other for 6 months and then had additional 2 years of casual sex and going out. I think the time needed depends on how it all "ended". I don't think that it ever ends. Somebody that has been part of your life for so long, shared such amazing moments with can't just be forgotten, erased from our existence. It is however hard to let them back into your life, depending on how strong the trust break was. In my case, there was barely any break of trust so it was relatively easy to become friends again. In a case where the relationship ends, for example, due to someone cheating, the break of trust is pretty strong and it will take longer to forgive (unless you realize that the majority of us are forced into monogamous relationships while many are actually polyamorous).
You wrote: Absolutely relationships can really really end. Memory takes work. You have to water those memories with longing for them to stay alive. You can sometimes remember that you had an amazing experience -- but you can't feel the feeling you had for that person. It gets kind of sad anyway, and you'd rather move on to feeling the feelings in real time with a new person who shares the feelings with you. The issue I think is this: When our hearts finally open and we feel deeply for someone, we like to hold on to that big passion and do, until someone else comes along that we can transfer the big passion to. This is why, for some people, after a breakup they want to have as many new and random sexual experiences as possible -- just to loosen the hold that the big passion has on them. You start to replace it with smaller passions and heartbreaks which are more manageable than the devastation of losing the big passion. Among the many things, loosely termed shit lil says is this: If you've had at least one big, crazy, wrong-headed passion in your life that doesn't end in broken glass, then it's been a good run.Somebody that has been part of your life for so long, shared such amazing moments with can't just be forgotten, erased from our existence.
shit lil says always makes me think. In this discussion I feel like I can't answer your experience with my experiments. I am a "late" bloomer with only one long-term relationship and dozens of relationships from casual sex to polyamorous lets try this out's. I feel weird nowadays. I don't know what I want from a relationship or if I want a relationship at all. I cut the ropes to my casual sex partners because I either lost interest or they wanted more than I felt. I miss this feeling I had during my first relationship and fear that I will never have it again (4 years since it ended).
This feeling that you miss - that feeling of intensity, passion, and excitement for one person - you may not have quite that again, although you might. You might have a deeper one that grows out of loss and gratitude. I've been saying for a long time that sex is easy, but feelings are hard. After several heartbreaks we might learn to protect our heart in various ways. One of those ways is to be more careful. Love, as you've discovered, is a vast territory, but in the Venn diagram of love, sex, time, and place the overlapping bits seem to grow smaller. When we try to make it wider - with what I call "concurrent monogamy" (as opposed to serial monogamy), you might be left with less genuine connection, rather than more. Like when you have homes in two cities, do you live anywhere? To feel a oneness with someone, you need to be present with them, and they with you, presence as a natural not forced or prescribed way of being You stop and lie down in a divine and circumscribed zone of acceptance, yet opening into worlds of possibility. The possibility of identities dissolving into oneness flowing from individuation to oneness to individuation to sameness to difference and back to oneness in those moment after moments you feel connected, accepted maybe, somehow understood without a lot of pre-judgements about who you are or might be not sex, not only sex, but what I call full-contact conversation. "Magic happens outside of our comfort zones." (read this today as I will likely take it down tomorrow.) _refugee_
That was a great discussion. I think it's in pm. I can't find it. Can you? Maybe it was posted? Text? Private email? Buried in some other shit? I had an interesting response from bf as well. He said something like "a bootie call doesn't stop the loneliness." What's the difference between a bootie call and a relationship? Do you want to make it a post?