How To Get Over Your Crush

Have you ever liked someone for years on end? Do you swoon every time you see them but then you feel awful because nothing is progressing? Don’t be like Martha in Dr. Who. She pines for the doctor, and it makes their adventures — that would otherwise be awe-inspiring — laborious chores. Martha eventually says adieu to the doctor; she picks a life for herself where love and happiness are involved.

Moving On

You have to have the right mindset if you want to move on from someone. The only way to get over someone is to break the addiction your mind has in relation to the person. I’m giving you a guide on ways you can set yourself free and to break your pesky addiction.

My advice? Be excited for this stage of “lost love.” Throw on the jams from Nickel Creek’s Why Did the Fire Die or Royksopp’s The Inevitable End. Go old school and surround your ears with the broken-hearted smash hits of Fleetwood Mac.

There are more great songs about breakups and unrequited love than there are about love. They’re usually darker, a bit more realistic, and sometimes they have a really good bass line.

If you’re a creative type, unrequited romance might be the muse you’ve always needed. For those of you who want to hit the fast forward button and to cut out the nonsensical crushing, keep reading.

Time for A Deep Cleansing

Sure, the term “cleansing” sounds witchy. It might be — who knows? But what I’m going to list is more about cleaning and using the right ingredients in your kitchen to make yourself feel better. If you want to frame that as though it is witchcraft — okay, go ahead — but religious beliefs, worship of deities, and the like with spells are not going to be the foreground of the message here, or even necessary.

Below I’ve listed several methods on how you can do a cleansing on your life, so you can relax and find new purpose.

Clean Your Living Spaces

1. Clear your room. Get rid of any attachments you might have to your crush. Get rid of old papers, make your bed, take some Windex to the windows, fold up your laundry, take out the trash, and vacuum. Your room is your sanctuary and gives people a glimpse into your mental state. What does your room say about you?
2. Clean out the fridge. No one really likes this chore. It’s great right now because it’s time-consuming! When you clean out your fridge, think about what silly things you’ve been holding onto in romance… and the mold that’s grown because you’re refusing to move on. Wash down the drawers, get rid of old items, get rid of gunk in crevices, and organize your fridge.
3. Organize your closet by color. You can also organize your closet by clothing type. Organizing it by color can help you to speedily get the kind of color you want in your life. If you come across something that reminds you of your crush, donate it.
4. Deep clean the bathroom. Scrub down the toilets, bathtub, and shower. Add a plant that’s appropriate for the bathroom and likes humidity and will help purify the air.
5. Deep clean the kitchen. Grab a sponge and scrub down the counters, microwave, stove, and yes, fridge. Get rid of items you no longer use, donate them. Organize your pots and pans.
6. Burn some sage. A proper cleansing comes with sage. Burn some sage and unlatch yourself from your unseen demons.
7. Throw some lemon or orange peels into your garbage disposal. Hit the garbage disposal button while water is running. The peels will clean your garbage disposal and make things smell better.

The Perfect Bath for a Cleansing

1. Wash your hair with coconut milk. Buy fancier shampoo and conditioner that makes you feel like a god or goddess. Giving your hair better treatment might help you to find a new lease on life.
2. Make a skin scrub with olive oil and sugar. This will help remove dead skin cells, giving you a more radiant look. Plus, it softens your skin. Add lavender, vanilla, or rose to your olive oil mixture. Don’t add cinnamon which can harm your skin. Epsom salt scrubs also work.
3. Throw in some tea into your hot bathwater. Earl gray tea is good for your skin. Jasmine smells nice. Green tea has antioxidants.
4. Candles. Take a bath in the dark with only candles.
5. Facial mask. Give your face a spa treatment with a store-bought mask. Revitalizing your skin might make you feel younger.
6. After your bath, place a clean, new towel on your pillow. Silk pillow sheets often help produce bacteria. A fresh towel can help slow down the growth of unwanted microbes.

Mental Cleansing

You may have obsessively thought about your love interest for a number of weeks, months, heck years. Now it is time to rewire your brain.

Being in love, even if it is just unrequited, is like a drug. The first few days may be easy, but you’re bound to have withdrawals. Scientists have done studies where the brain scans of those in love are similar to those on addictive drugs. It may take time to get over someone, it may even hurt, but try to calm your brain. Getting over someone will help you to take control of the wheel to your life.

1. Try listening to meditative music, binaural beats, or an audiobook. Try bringing new ideas to your mind to take your focus off your love interest and to uncharted waters.
2. Disconnect from social media. You may want to snooze him/her/them on Facebook (deleting might be too strong, and may signal the wrong message to this person). You may want to unfollow his friends or family — that way you don’t come across his name by accident. Don’t follow her on other social media websites. Try to create a different path for how you surf the Internet. Stop trying to track them.
3. If you follow a religion, now might be the time to get more involved. Curl up with a book that’s important to you. Meet people who have similar views. Get involved in community projects. Approach existential questions rather than run from them.

4. In private, talk directly to your mind. Tell it that you’re not going to hang onto this person anymore. That you are okay being single. You know there is someone who is better suited for you, and you just have to be patient for the right time to come. You don’t need your crush anymore. Take your hands in a triangle and push away the bad thoughts — it may sound weird, but this physical action can help reset your brain.

5. Cleansing comes with creating more positive emotions. Do what you can to laugh. Get out of bed — you don’t need to sit there like a lummox. Be creative. Follow your passions. Life is too short to waste it focused on someone who doesn’t spend time with you, isn’t going to be there for you, or just plain isn’t involved in your life. Learn a new language, learn a new musical instrument, take up dancing, pottery, or poetry.

6. Try making an intentional space that you use to refocus yourself on cleansing. This does not mean that you force a new love interest into your heart. Be patient. It may take time, but the right one will come, so focus more on cleansing.

7. Water is your friend. Drink lots of water. Take showers and baths. Go to the ocean. Play in the rain.

8. Try washing your sheets every two weeks. Keep cleaning to get rid of dirt and to help your mind focus on cleaning and moving forward, rather than feeling stuck and apathetic. Don’t be afraid to do spring cleaning in a completely different season.

Make New Friends

Don’t be by yourself for three months in order to do a cleansing. Go out with your friends or make new ones. A new social atmosphere will help you gain momentum. Cleansing usually happens in social exchange: if you have a new group of friends you’ll be presented with new opportunities.

Your friends will want to bond with you, encourage you, and bring joy into your life where you might not have appropriately been receiving those blessings.

Friends will help ask the right questions, they’ll keep you busy, and they might help you to find someone new when the time is right.

Things You Shouldn’t Do

1. Don’t drown yourself in alcohol. A lot of people try to get over someone by marrying the whiskey bottle, and it generally just brings out all the wrong emotions and can even worsen any existing problems.
2. Don’t get into smoking, especially if you haven’t been smoking already. You don’t need to take up a new addiction, you need to take up a new sense of cleanliness.
3. Don’t go bankrupt on buying a new wardrobe. Often people buy new clothes to feel a new sense of self. Don’t go overboard buying new clothes that you can’t afford.
4. Don’t text him angry messages. Your crush doesn’t need to know how you really feel. Don’t act like they’re missing out on something. Don’t be a drama queen. Don’t lower yourself to petty standards.
5. Don’t try to see if he is interested in someone else or stalk him when he is in a relationship. Get a hold of yourself! Don’t stalk someone when they’ve coupled up. You have to teach yourself to not care.
6. Don’t message his new girlfriend. You may have questions, you may have lingering feelings, you may wonder what she has that you don’t — but don’t reach out to her, even if you’re just trying to “friend” her.
7. Don’t drive by where he lives, works, and hangs out in hopes of coming across him. You’re not over someone if you’re hoping to bump into them.

The Five Stages of Grief

FIRST, you may experience denial. You may be in serious denial that he/she/them got into a relationship with someone else. You may deny that things are not as bad as they seem. You might be here for a while, but eventually, it will sink in, and you will move onto stage two.

Stage two is all about anger. You might suddenly find yourself… boiling with rage. You might secretly want to strangle him, but don’t do anything drastic. They don’t need to know about your anger, so don’t send angry texts or big group messages to express your red hot feelings.

Instead, relax. Take it easy. When you have the chance, think directly about your anger in a private place. Sort through your thoughts, acknowledge them, and move on.

Three: bargaining. You may try to regain control of the situation. You may try getting his opinion again. You may try changing the way you look to see if that will help. Just know this is another stage of grief.

Then comes stage four: depression. You’ll be really sad. You’ll listen to sad songs on a neverending loop. You’re almost done with this whole grief process, so just know this is a phase. Draw, paint, sing, and dance out those emotions. Make sure you have clean sheets and a really nice blanket or two if you are going to be stuck in bed… at least try to have clean sheets.

Then, at last, the final stage: acceptance. Eventually…. your brain and heart are going to let go of Mr. Handsome. And you know what? Hallelujah! Your heart is strong enough to break and recover! So, move on! Get over that lazy butt you thought was a Divine God or Goddess, and be the more happy, rejuvenated you.