Haunting exes

• You glimpse a man who looks strikingly like a past love.

• In front of you at Starbucks stands a guy wearing your former sweetie’s cologne.

• The song plays on the radio that you slow-danced to with your ex, naked in front of the fire on New Year’s Eve.

Snippet reminders of a past beau waft into your life. You’re transported to a special time with a special man. You linger a moment, smiling, before remembering why you are no longer together.

These memories are apparitions of lingering love. They represent a wonderful feeling of when you were in love and felt love in return.

Depending on where your mind drifts after that glimmer, you will either enjoy these reminders or despise them.

If you use them to jog feelings of love, and know it’s possible to have that warmth again, you see these as omens of what’s ahead for you.

If you are drawn into memories of disrespect, fights, infidelity, or worse, you will curse these emotional triggers. If they cause you sadness because a special person isn’t in your life now, or a longing to reunite with an abusive or unfit partner, then you need to stop that thinking and turn it into thoughts that serve you.

It’s not easy to control our thoughts, especially when emotional triggers cause us to be “out of our mind,” even momentarily. Yet we must control our reactions to these triggers and choose to dwell on thoughts that help us rather than detract from what we want.

You can use haunting thoughts of your ex to hold you back or propel you forward. It’s your choice.

How have you framed recurring triggers from exes — as positive signs or negative?
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