This post is also available in: Español (Spanish)
Have you ever had the feeling of emotional emptiness? I know this may sound a little extreme, but I believe this is a feeling the majority of human beings will feel at some point in their lives. Someone might feel emotionally empty for many reasons, and I won’t discuss all of them because it all depends on each individual’s life values. Today, I’m going to focus on romantic relationships and how they might cause feelings of emotional emptiness. When a romantic relationship comes to an end, it may give one or maybe both members of the couple this empty feeling. The reason is simple: Human beings have a tendency to feel emotionally fulfilled when they’re surrounded by loved ones.
Certainly, nothing is wrong with that. I mean, we’re social beings—we need human connection. The only downside of depending so much on others to feel emotionally fulfilled is life’s impermanence. People change, and that’s a fact. Life changes too—that’s also a fact. Even though we want to believe that our most significant relationship will last forever, change is always there to spice up our lives.
My goal today is not to bring you down and blame change for all of our sour moments. Instead, I want to show you a different perspective around emotional emptiness. Before we can jump into my perspective, let me clarify something. I know mental conditions like depression and anxiety take this concept of emotional emptiness to a different level. Please understand that I’m talking here about people who haven’t been diagnosed with any of these conditions.
When I talk about emotional emptiness, I can describe the feeling this way: Imagine your heart has a hole, and all the love you once held in your heart has been partially or completely drained. It’s a weird feeling. If you like to eat like I do (I eat like a baby, every three hours 😂), you might equate this feeling (on a physical level) to extremely painful hunger. By painful hunger, I mean the feeling of not having eaten at all for most of a full day. When this happens, I get headaches and my stomach really hurts. Emotional emptiness hurts like that, and it usually brings you down, mentally. Being emotionally empty makes everything around you feel dark.
I’ve experienced this feeling just once in my entire life. Thank goodness it was only for a brief time because this state of mind is super intense. After I asked for a divorce and my ex finally said yes, I went through all the stages of grief. Please keep in mind that my next comment comes from my own experience and from the many articles I’ve read on this subject. Some people have the false idea that they’ll conquer the mourning stage in the divorce process while they’re still married, but that’s not what really happens. While the difficulties that make a couple choose to get divorced are overwhelming and extremely painful, that’s not even close to the mourning stage. The real mourning stage is felt after the physical separation takes place—that’s when emotional emptiness makes its appearance.
When I entered this emotionally empty stage, the pain was so out of control that I wanted to make my ex-husband feel the same way I was feeling. For that short period of time (in my case it was very brief, thank goodness—less than a couple of days), I didn’t want my ex-husband or his girlfriend to be happy. I wanted them both to be as miserable as I was. I wanted them to feel the same strong pain I was feeling. At the same time, however, I didn’t like the way I was thinking. When I finally opened my eyes and noticed how dark my thoughts had become, I started praying and asking God to take me out of that horrible place. The moment I started praying, I realized my heart was not empty at all. God’s love was there. It was always there, but my situation made me disconnect from it for a moment.
Once I was able to step away from that dark place, I got a new perspective around bad intentions and actions. When people are emotionally empty, they tend to think with bad intentions, and they act according to the emptiness they’re experiencing. I firmly believe that people with hearts full of love never walk around with the intention to harm others in any way. They simply don’t have time for that because they’re busy enjoying the fullness of love in their hearts. Think about it. Have you ever had a bad intention when you are in total bliss and joy? I don’t think so!
So, next time someone does or say something bad to you with the intention to harm you somehow, take a moment and send them love. I know, I know—it’s easier said than done … but believe me, they need it. People don’t harm others when they’re full of love. If they’re acting badly, the probability is high that they feel empty in some way. This is my humble perspective around emotional emptiness, so I’ve been applying the method of sending love to those who try to hurt me from time to time. It might be silly, but it works for me.
Make sure you keep those beautiful hearts of yours full of love, my friends. If you do, I promise you won’t have time to go down to that ugly dark place of bad intentions. If for any reason you feel you are getting empty, ask for help. You can pray if you believe in God, or you can talk to someone you trust and ask for help. You can fill your heart with love in many ways, and you have access to all of them.
Love,
Irene
