Think about all the beautiful work you do on yourself.

The self-love.

All the exercises you do.

Being a god and a goddess.

Loving yourself.

Healing yourself.

It’s all fantastic.

If everybody took the time to heal themselves after a relationship that went bad, we’d all be about 75% ready for our next relationship.

Let me explain why I’m saying 75%.

When we’re alone, the more we love ourselves, the more we write, the more we journal, the more therapy or coaching we get, the more prepared we are and the more healed we are to literally be able to have an unbelievable relationship.

There’s a saying in life that goes like this: “We can only prepare for what’s ahead, but we can never anticipate what’s going to happen.”

So despite all the preparation we have, all the amazing work that we do, all the amazing things that we process… we don’t really know what’s going to happen in the future.

So what can we really do? Be loving, be open, be mindful.

Practice all this stuff daily. Be love.

When things come up, try to find love without an outcome attached to it.

But here’s the greatest challenge that’s coming, which you need to be prepared for.

Literally writing this right now brings tears to my eyes because personally, I’m going through that challenge and for every challenge that I go through, I realize it’s another thing to share with you as you go through this journey.

The hardest time to have love for somebody is when you’re triggered and they’re triggered.

Things will spiral out of control very, very fast. A simple conversation will lead to the black hole, the vortex.

You can’t even believe you’re in this black hole with this person. No matter what you do, it’s not right. No matter what happens or what you say, it’s met with resistance.

Everything that you used to do is now magnified by 1,000. Your sensitivity, your love that you gave them the other day, is now all of a sudden strangling them.

It’s making them feel suffocated, making them feel like they need to run.

It’s because they’re highly triggered from something that happened to them in the past. Something that happened to them with an ex who was abusive, mentally, emotionally, or physically.

So what they’re doing is taking your nice actions or your words and misinterpreting them and running.

They’re running so hard that you don’t even know what to do. You can feel them pulling away by the second, and yet there’s nothing you can do because they’re triggered. When they’re triggered, you’re going to be triggered as well.

They may wave a white flag one day.

And you may reject it because something they did the night before triggered you, as well. And you’re not even sure why, because when two people are in this triggered mode, and two people are constantly insecure and literally battling each other, it’s really hard to see the light of day.

Each phone call turns into a massive, massive battle of words. You’re each trying to get your point across, and you’re both equally as frustrated, so you don’t even know what to say because nothing works.

One may make an attempt to see the other person and that triggers something else.

How can that person show up at this party right now? Don’t they know I don’t want to be around them?

It reminds them of their ex that would put them through all the shit they’ve been through, when all the person did was show up just to say I love you and that’s it.

When these triggers happen, that’s when the real work to the relationship happens.

Are you willing to stay in it? Because that is when the deepest feelings of anxiety come out, those sleepless nights.

The hard-to-breathe feeling.

The over-evaluation of everything.

This is when you look in the mirror and say to yourself, how am I triggered? What demons are still hiding that I missed during my exploration process, and how do I need to take accountability for everything that I’ve done in this dynamic that’s been created?

That’s what love truly is: accountability when shit hits the fan.

Anybody can love themselves when they’re alone.

Anybody can love themselves when things are fine, but accountability only happens when you’re rammed up against their fears and insecurities and all yours come out.

That’s why you’re in a relationship with them: to learn what you haven’t learned.