The best way to successfully make your way through an intricate emotional maze is to arm yourself with useful strategies that can help you to stay on the right course. Keep in mind, however, that simply knowing the strategies is not enough; they will not be effective unless you actually put them to use.

1.  Give yourself and your environment a makeover. Since you are now embarking on a new beginning, it is only right that you infuse as much novelty into it as possible. To give yourself a fresh, new look, consider changing your hairstyle/hair color or perhaps even spice up your wardrobe a little bit if you can afford to. Since moving into a new place isn’t always a reasonable option, you can alter your environment in simple ways. Paint the walls a new color, change the bedspread and move some furniture around. You’ll be surprised by how much of a difference even the most minor of changes can make in your environment and in how you feel while you are in it.

1. Confront and work with your emotions. Even though it is natural for you to want to avoid and/or deny negative and painful emotions, doing so is not going to help you heal any faster. As a matter of fact, it will usually have just the opposite effect. Remember that every emotion serves its own purpose and as such, should be accepted for what it is and then released. Throughout the course of life, you are constantly moving from one emotional state to another and it is important to note that while some of these states might be more pleasant than others, each one plays a crucial role in shaping the person that you are. By using some of the strategies suggested below, perhaps you can begin to process negative emotions in a healthy and positive way.

   1.  Sadness/Grief: Because it is often such an unpleasant emotion, you will probably be tempted to try and avoid or disguise the feeling but until you allow yourself to properly grieve, you will continue to remain stuck in a perpetual cycle of sadness. The first and most important thing you can do to deal with sadness and grief is to acknowledge it as a natural part of the healing process and give it permission to run its course. As hard as it might be to believe in the beginning, the seeds of happiness are very often sown during times of intense sadness.

2. 1. Let yourself fall apart. Although doing so will surely bring about a frightening sense of vulnerability, to fall apart at the emotional seams is exactly what you need to allow yourself to do so that you can then begin the process of putting yourself back together again.

   2. Go ahead and cry when you feel the urge. Play a series of sad, tear-jerking songs so that the music will draw out your tears and work to cleanse you of your grief. It might even be necessary to spend a few hours sobbing violently until you literally run out of tears. Don’t be ashamed to let the tears flow. As you release them, you will also release much of your sadness and grief.

   3. Let it out by talking or writing it out. Reach out to a trusted friend or family member who is good at listening to you without being judgmental. You can also keep a journal in which you regularly record your thoughts. Whether done verbally or on paper, getting it out of your system will surely prove to be a huge relief.

   4. Conduct a relationship funeral. Although your ex is still alive and well, the relationship that you shared with him/her has died and therefore needs to be properly mourned so that you can achieve a much needed sense of closure and move on with your life. Whether you decide to make it a private affair or to invite a few close friends or family members, a relationship funeral can really help you to accept the relationship’s demise and prepare yourself for a new life without your ex. Set a date, time and place, gather some pictures and mementos from the relationship, take some time to reflect on both the good and bad aspects of the relationship then with a few parting words, say goodbye to your ex and to the relationship before burying or safely burning the pictures and mementos. The act of burying or burning the relationship souvenirs is a symbolic gesture that will likely have tremendous psychological benefits for you as you work to release some of your grief and ultimately achieve a sense of closure.

   5. Volunteer for a local charity or nonprofit organization. Sometimes helping somebody worse off than you to feel better can help to alleviate some of your own sadness.

    

3. Anger/Rage: Along with sadness, anger is one of the two most common emotions that you can expect to be dealing with when trying to heal a broken heart. Sometimes you might even feel both sad and angry at the same time, which can be particularly confusing. It is really important to remember that your anger is yours and yours alone. In other words, while you should definitely try to release your anger, you should never try to let it out on anybody else (no, not even your ex regardless of whether or not he/she might deserve it). Anger, like all of your other emotions, serves a purpose and is a vital part of the healing process. But since it can often be toxic, if you fail to release it there is a good chance that it will slowly eat away at you from the inside, which can prolong the healing process dramatically and in some cases can even lead to the manifestation of physical illnesses.

1. Get it out of you and onto paper. Even if you are not particularly good with words, take a piece of paper and write a letter to every single person or thing that makes you angry. Don’t try to censor yourself during this process just write every little thing that comes to mind. You might even try writing a letter to your anger itself or to any of the other emotional states that you might be unhappy with at the moment. The trick is to simply transfer all of that raw emotion out of you and onto the paper. When you are done writing, destroy and discard the letters. The point is not to send the letters out but rather to let them absorb the anger so that it won’t poison you or anybody else. The act of writing will serve as an enormous relief but actually sending said letters will totally defeat the purpose (not to mention probably backfire on you) so do try to resist the temptation.

2. Work it out. Release your anger and rage through physical activity. Whether you choose to exercise at a gym, go for a swim/walk/run or get involved in a particular sport, doing something that requires physical energy works wonders for most people who are dealing with anger. Not only will it help to release your anger but it will also keep you healthy and increase the endorphins that improve your overall mood.

1. Fear/Uncertainty:  It is fear and uncertainty that are often responsible for paralyzing you and preventing you from taking control of your life and charging bravely forward into the great unknown. No matter what your fears might revolve around, if you are truly honest with yourself then you will probably have to admit that holding on to those fears hasn’t done you a whole lot of good so far. Maybe it is time to challenge that fear and regain ownership of your own life. It is undoubtedly scary but once you see that your fears were more than likely exaggerated if not completely unfounded, you will end up wondering why you hadn't done it sooner. 

1. Admit that you are afraid. Acknowledging the fear is the first step toward releasing it. Allow yourself to feel the fear and to accept it for what it is.

2. Once you have admitted that you are afraid, do some soul searching to determine exactly what it is that you are most afraid of and then examine the fear. Try to figure out where it came from and what purpose it has been serving in your life.

3. Face the fear. How you do that depends on what you are afraid of. For example, if you are afraid of being alone, do some self-development work that will help you to embrace the single life. If you do this properly, you will find that you never have to be alone again because those who learn to love themselves are very rarely lonely.

1. Guilt/Remorse:  Regardless of whether you were the dumper or the dumpee, break ups and divorce can often produce feelings of guilt about the relationship. Again, this is simply part of the process so all you need to do is allow it to surface so that it can be resolved.

1. Identify it. Exactly what is it that you feel guilty about? Ask yourself to describe the personal role that you played in the relationship and the contributions that you made to its demise. Don’t sugarcoat it. Be as objective as possible. 

2. Forgive yourself. Know that no matter how many mistakes you might have made during the course of your relationship, the whole thing was a learning experience and will help you to avoid making those same mistakes in future relationships. Don’t beat yourself up for what you did or did not do during the relationship. As cliché as it might sound, you should trust that things really do happen for a reason and that if you let yourself learn from the mistakes that you made in the past, they will only serve to make you wiser and stronger in the future.

1.  Focus on you. Resist the urge to wallow in misery and instead make a commitment to work on developing your own personal growth. Find a new hobby to get involved in or resume one that you enjoyed in he past. Take a vocational class at your local college or maybe even sign up for that yoga session that you’ve been thinking about trying out. Get a massage, take a long hot bath or buy yourself something special. Whatever you do, make it about you and remember to be good to yourself as you go through the healing process.