When you go through a messy divorce, the last thing on your mind is the need to form new relationships. Part of that aversion may be due to the fact that you may still feel some kind of attachment towards your ex in spite of everything that led to the divorce. You start hanging out with friends, meeting long lost buddies and generally doing everything you can to avoid the pain of separation. Forming new relationships is usually the least amongst your priorities at this stage. This is especially true if you were the wronged person in the relationship.

When I went through my divorce, it was about as painful as it gets for those who experience it the first time. Being the wronged person, I was suddenly thrust from the familiarity of a happy family into the cold uncertainty of a loveless world where everyone seemed to be having a nice time except me. The only thing that strikes you as strange at this stage is how everyone you know seems to be turning into impromptu experts on relationships. Most of the time, you just want to ask them to buzz off, but they simply seem to exist everywhere you look.

Like in my case, divorce tends to rip open the ugly side of human relationships and makes us believe that our future is indeed really bleak. The fact is, after a divorce, nothing is bleak except your own mindset and it can be corrected with some positive self suggestion. I took charge of my situation immediately after my divorce. I convinced myself that things couldn’t probably get any worse and they didn’t.

I went about trying to understand love, what it is and why it is so important in our lives. I used it as a bit of a research topic which was a good distraction from my loss of love but distraction in a constructive way towards finding love again. Understand the true meaning love and why when you are in love, especially falling in love, why you are transported and given a new lease on life. I gave myself the time and space to deeply connect with these deeper reasons and it helped me enormously in understanding the pain and loss I felt but more importantly how I could find it again.

With all my research and understanding under my belt I felt I was in a good place to hit the dating scene again! I didn’t do it all by myself though. Friends were a huge motivating factor and helped me muster up the courage to begin dating again. The important thing after a divorce is to surround yourself with friends. You start seeing how happy they are being single or in relationships and trust me, it’s infectious. If you’re scared of getting into new relationships, take it slow and easy. I didn’t jump into the dating scene all of a sudden. It was gradual, but I was willing to work on it and I eventually found true love. And this time it really was true love.

A divorce isn’t the end of the world. In fact, more people need to look at it as an opportunity to experiment with new relationships. Granted, it can be hard to forget your ex, especially if you loved her more than anyone else in the world. But that person isn’t in your life anymore and wasting your time there is really unnecessary. Go out, meet people, start dating and sooner than you know, you would have found true love. It worked for me and there’s no reason it won’t work for you. So, throw away your inhibitions and start seeking new relationships. It’s time to let go of the past and go on a renewed quest for love.