Daria Nifontova

twodoorcinemacunt:

This is why I no longer travel by fire.

В книге Born to Run больше всего мне понравилась 25-я глава, я прочитала её дважды. Там - про историю кроссовок и обоснование бега босиком. 

Вкратце: совсем давно люди бегали без обуви. До 1970-х годов люди бегали в очень простой обуви, холщовых кедах на плоской подошве. Статистика показывает, что процент острых и хронических (как плантарный фасцит) травм был гораздо ниже, чем сейчас. Более того, каждый год появляются новые кроссовки, с всё лучшей амортизацией и чуть ли не компьютерной подстройкой под ногу, но это не способствует уменьшению числа травм; наоборот, того же плантарного фасцита становится всё больше. 

Другие исследования показали, что, например, бег в старых кроссовках, у которых амортизирующий слой уже истончился, намного безопаснее, чем в новых. Почему так происходит?

Во-первых, чрезмерная поддержка приводит к тому, что мелкие мышцы не тренируются; в книге написано “атрофируются”, я, как врач, против этого термина, потому что с точки зрения анатомии и гистологии атрофии там, конечно, не будет. А вот слабость и растренированность - запросто.

Во-вторых, когда ты бежишь босиком или в обуви на тонкой подошве, то просто напросто боишься падать на пятку; это больно. Один исследователь снимал спортсменов, бегущих босиком, а потом смотрел в замедленном режиме; оказалось, что ступня вела себя, как живое существо, она изгибалась и двигалась, будто выбирая, куда и как приземляться. Когда тело не защищено, оно само заботится о безопасности тренировки. 

Теперь мой личный опыт. Я очень много (15-20 тысяч шагов в день) хожу в кедах на плоской подошве, и совершенно не устаю. Когда 4 месяца назад я начала бегать в обычных беговых кроссовках (Nike какой-то), на дистанции не больше 5-6 км, меня слегка беспокоили колени. Ничего особенного, даже не боль, а какие неприятные ощущения, точечно, справа и слева от коленной чашечки. Я думала, что это связано с недостаточной тренированностью связок и пройдёт по мере привыкания.

Потом я пару дней просто в них походила (были поездки, а кроссовки занимали полчемодана, пришлось лететь в них). Жуткая усталость, желание разуться и - неожиданно - боль в коленях при подъёме по лестнице. Парадокс? В простых кедах ничего не болит, в беговых кроссовках болит. Тут у меня сложилась картинка, как раз после прочтения книги: чрезмерная амортизация ступни, ставишь ногу как придётся, в итоге перегрузка коленок.

После этого я купила Nike Free 2.0, ну то есть совсем лёгкие и защищающие разве что от абразии при контакте с асфальтом. Не нарадуюсь, пробегаю в них 12 и даже 15 километров без неприятных ощущений. Возможно, со временем попробую тапочки с пятью пальцами, которые практически полностью имитируют бег босиком. А ещё пробовала босиком по пляжу - очень здорово.

Вот такая история. Вчерашняя пробежка отменилась, потому что я прилегла на часок в шесть вечера, а проснулась в восемь утра. 

Daphne Groeneveld for Dior Addict

Можно использовать как список тем по которым надо копать дальше. Тут явно не хватает информации про каденс, про техники бега и музыку :)

More Health and Fitness News & Tips at Greatist.

blackeyed-blonde:

Self Portrait on the Borderline Between Mexico and the United States

by Frida Kahlo, 1932

Okay, so in response to some reader requests for an equally-as-judgmental comparison of women to wine, I did some field research and have come up with the following analysis. Though I’m no seasoned lez, I still have a va-jay (and I’m positive we’re all bi) so I feel pretty comfortable with the topic (of wine.) Additionally, I have my guy roommates sitting in the room with me. So, blame them.

Muscat

The muscatel is our California sweetheart. She’s fitted perfectly into a pair of daisy dukes or a sundress and her long, sun-kissed legs can, interestingly enough, be found bouncing around the dessert table most evenings or laying poolside with some fresh fruit. She’s super cute, but so totally ditzy, too. Though you may have to keep the conversation light with this wine, it’s always worth it to end the night with her.

Boxed Wine

You know the deal, friends. Everyone’s rode the tour de Franzia. Everyone’s slapped the bag! This limitless wine is the life of the party. She’s probably in college and it’s likely that your roommate, or entire frat, knows her very well. Most guys enjoy hanging out with boxed wine, and for a reason. She goes out every night and gets the whole party going. She’s a number one seller for a reason, right!?

Merlot

Remember your 7^th grade girlfriend? Or, whoever’s V-card you stole? She’s a merlot. A starter wine, if you will. She was your introduction to poisoned grapes the lovely world of fine and balanced wines, and she captures effervescent innocence in a glass. Easy on the palate, the Merlot will always have a place in your heart.

Red Zinfandel

The Duchess. This wine is sharp-tongued and sexy and usually accompanied by some piercing eyes. She’s most likely to make you feel three feet tall and/or be your boss. She’s also closet crazy. Calculative and daring, you better be sure you want to date this wine before you drink too much because, have no doubt about it, she will slip some arsenic in your next glass.

Pinot Grigio

Pinot Grigio is the wine you can relate to. At first. She’s sweet and caring but unfortunately gets attached easily and is most likely to want “closure” after the two dates you went on. Not quite as pretty as Muscat and too smart to be Franzia, the Pinot Grigio is the wine who you always email to get the notes from the class you always miss. And she always sends them to you. *Potential Stage Five Clinger Warning*

Rio-Ja/Malbec

Exotic and sassy, this wine is certainly not for the faint of heart. She’s pepper jack cheese’s sexy sister and has the same zesty amount of zing! She loves to dance, definitely has a nice ass and may not shave her cho-cha. At all. This wine is best paired with the adventurous and confident man as she refuses to be tied down.

Chardonnay

Chardonnay is the girl next door. As she may not have bloomed until high school or college, you can bank on finding a charming character behind this wine’s beautiful appearance. The chardonnay is a tom-boy/adventurer at heart, so she might be a classic rock fan or have an off-beat, artsy streak. She will steal your heart just by wearing her favorite team’s sports jersey and enjoying a cold brew whilst watching the game (that she actually can understand). Warning: watch out for other white wine bimbos disguised as Chardonnay. They’re the ones who Google sports statistics before the game.

Two-Buck Chuck

See boxed-wine. But, ten years later and disguised as your first-grade daughter’s PTA President.

Pinot Noir

Versatile and intellectual, a Pinot Noir is the type of wine you want to bring back home to mom. She’s a classy fox and can rock a center parted pony-tail and a LBD (little black dress) like nobody’s business. Take this wine out to a nice restaurant or a cocktail party, though, not to the bars. She shines at dinner parties or any +1 events, and is one of the few wines who can chat up anyone without embarrassing you. #Wifey

Bordeaux

Full-bodied.

Chocolate Wine

Need I say more? Yes, it exists. (I found it at a CVS) Yes, I drank it. And duh f-cking duh, it rocked my world.

Champagne

Vueve Clicquot, to be precise. None of those wanna-be Korbel hoes. So middle-class. This wine is either a blonde bomb-shell or a fabulous Jewish-American Princess (Oh, please. Don’t give me that look.) This sparkling wine is going to cost you a pretty penny, but that’s probably why you’re dating her. The queen of high-maintenance, champagne is restricted ONLY for high rollers. A night out on the town may consist of being followed by the paparazzi and/or visiting Tiffany’s. To snag Champagne, all you have to do is purchase a rooftop flat in Chelsea, have silk robes on hand at said flat, and most importantly, book VIP reservations at the sexiest brunch spot in town.

So there you have it, folks. And in closing, as one previous commentator put the comparisons perfectly, cheese might give you a stomachache, but wine will kill you. 

You should follow Thought Catalog on Twitter here.

image – Shutterstock

via http://h-e-r-o-i-n.tumblr.com/post/12520798715/photoset_iframe/h-e-r-o-i-n/tumblr_lucwu6qUfF1qkdeza/500

“Причина моего провала очевидна: я мало тренировался. И кроме того, я мало тренировался. И еще — я мало тренировался. Это если так, вкратце.”

-  Харуки Мураками  О чем я говорю, когда говорю о беге.

via http://www.flickr.com/photos/ilovedoodle/6817541630/in/photostream

If you Instagram every cocktail and basket of fries you order with this person, you need to have sex. No one Instagrams food they eat with people they don’t want to have sex with. In fact, if you tag each other on Facebook consistently when you’re out doing things together, even things as pointless as going to the post office, you’re basically wearing a massive I WANT TO HAVE SEX WITH YOU AND I WANT THE WORLD TO KNOW sign. It’s the ultimate declaration of modern romance.

If you keep poking each other on Facebook knowing full well that a) no one does that anymore, and b) everyone knows what that means, you need to have sex. Similarly, if they’re the only person you ever want to talk to on Facebook chat, which no one ever willingly uses, you need to have sex. If they post hilarious and timely memes on your wall, by all means have sex, but under no circumstances should you have sex with them if they keep writing “miss u” or “<3 <3 <3 <3” because it’s clear they obviously have some attachment issues. There’s a delicate balance.

If they favorite everything you tweet, you need to have sex. People only retweet things when they’re particularly funny or interesting, basically being like “This is cool enough to belong on my Twitter feed too, so why not,” but favoriting someone’s tweet is like saying “I love this thing you said, but it’d be kind of weird and too personal to put it out there for everyone to see so I’ll just save it here to read fifty times more later.” This doesn’t apply all the time, but favoriting is like internet pheromones: you just know. 

If you interact in any way on Tumblr, you obviously need to have sex. But then again everyone on Tumblr just needs to have sex with each other. Just a massive internet orgy of political correctness and hipbones and love.

If they know about random nerdy things you’re obsessed with, that’s also a clear indicator that you need to have sex. For example, if a light starts flickering and they make a reference to Kant, you need to have sex. If you’re going to the store for flowers and they quote Mrs. Dalloway, you need to have sex (or not, if you hated that book, but probably have sex anyway just for the sharp pickup). If you blow out a candle and they start quoting Macbeth, have sex right then and there, they’ve earned it. You get the idea.

Also, if they’re the only person you consistently drunk text that is not your ex (but it’s possible that they could be your ex; if the English language hadn’t intended that sort of thing, those words wouldn’t rhyme, duh), you need to have sex. That’s just how it goes. Plus, if over half of your text messages contain various combinations of <3 and ;), stop technologically masturbating and have sex already. No one sends that many winky faces for no reason, unless they’re not from this country and just think it’s cute. But even then you can’t be too sure.

If they give you backrubs without complaining it’s because they want to have sex with you. Seriously — if you’re ever curious if someone wants to have sex, ask for a backrub. There’s a point at which even your significant other stops giving you backrubs. No one ever wants to give anyone a backrub unless they’re doing it for money or they want to have sex. And if the backrub lasts more than five minutes, that means they also deeply care for you as a person.

And if they go out of their way to bring you snacks, you absolutely need to have sex. Bonus if they bring you snacks when you’re hungover. Double bonus if you’re hungover together and they actually volunteer to get out of bed and get the snacks — forget the sex, it’s true love. Also, if they know your Starbucks order by heart without having to ask you, you need to have sex. If they know it changes by season, extra sex. And if they know the difference between a cappuccino and a macchiato, that’s a marriage situation. 

You should follow Thought Catalog on Twitter here.

image – Cruel Intentions

• When watching in horror as someone pours ketchup on a hot dog.
• Same deal with corned beef, mayonnaise being applied to it.
• When discussing the fact that no, “Oliver Andrew Miller” isn’t a very Jewish name.
• “The reason for that is that I’m a secret Jew.”
• When saying for the millionth time that no, I haven’t seen Schindler’s List. Didn’t realize that that was a requirement. Does the Holocaust end any differently in that one? No? Okay then.
• When watching five minutes of The Passion of the Christ.
• When arguing that Mel Gibson is really anti-Semitic.
• When having to wait years for audio recordings to prove that Mel Gibson is anti-Semitic.
• When I sweat too much. Not sure why I associate the two things, but whatever.
• When explaining that I’ve only been to temple once in my life.
• When explaining what “lox” is.
• When explaining that the Holocaust did really happen, and was not made up by the liberal media.
• When thinking about how ugly yamakahs are. Could we have come up with an uglier item of clothing? A worse hat? It seems impossible.
• Ditto with the corkscrew hair thingies. We truly lack style.
• When feeling guilty for thinking these things.
• When I rearrange furniture obsessively.
• “Did you ever hear the one about the Jewish mother who ran along the beach, shouting, ‘Help, help, my son the doctor is drowning‘”? …Long pause. “No, that’s the entire joke. That was the punchline. …Never mind.”
• “How many Jews does it take to screw in a light bulb? ‘…Oh, don’t bother about the light bulb; don’t worry about me, I’ll just sit here in the dark.’” Pause. “No, that’s the entire joke, agggh.”
• “It’s called ‘Passover’ because the Angel of Death passed over and killed all of the firstborn. No, it’s actually one of our more upbeat holidays.”
• “Because we didn’t have time to wait for the bread to rise, hence, Matzoh.”
• “I love horseradish, actually.”
• When having sex and realizing that I still feel neurotic.
• Every time I realize that I hate dancing, can’t dance, and will never be able to dance. It’s like being white but worse than white.
• “Da, da, yeinu. Da, day, yeinu. Da, da, yeinu. Dayeinu, dayeinu!“
• “Miller is my dad’s name. I’m actually, Jewish, German, and English. It’s like World War II up in here, ha ha.”
• When explaining how Orthodox Jews and Israel both suck, suck beyond belief. “It’s cool; I can say that because I’m Jewish.”
• “Yes, I lived in Washington, D.C. for four years and never went to the Holocaust Museum. Does it have a different ending in the museum? Okay then.”
• “Sorry, was I supposed to wake up and have a day where I was like, ‘I’m in a sort of Holocaust-y mood today‘?
• “Can we talk about something else?”
• “No, I don’t celebrate Hanukkah.”
• “Because it sucks, that’s why.”
• When telling the story of all the Hanukkah presents that I ever got.
• “Socks. I got socks.”
• “Also I got The Big Book of Jewish Sports Heroes. From my uncle. It was twenty pages long, ha ha. No; but that’s true. That’s how long it really was.”
• When getting strip-searched in German because they thought I was carrying drugs. I was not carrying drugs. The guy who searched me was wearing a miltary-ish uniform and looked very Nazi-lite. I employed one of the only German terms that I knew. ”Juden, eh?” I said in a sneering tone as he searched me. I pointed to myself. “Juden.” Later on I felt guilty for doing this.
• Whenever I feel unreasonably guilty for doing something that probably not guilt-worthy.
• “I’m Jewish because my mom is Jewish. That’s the law, that’s how they get you.”
• “No, I never saw Schindler’s List. I have seen Life Is Beautiful though.”
• “Boy, that movie sucked.”
• When dating a South African girl for some reason. She was really Aryan-y.
• “…Christ-killer, ha ha. The Romans actually killed him. But thank you. And then Christians did their best to put all the blame on the Jews, because they needed to suck up to the Romans. But that’s clever. Never heard that one before.”
• When explaining that I’m not kosher and that I don’t even know what being kosher totally involves. Are diary products in play? What is the deal with mayonnaise?
• When I used to go to ska concerts and have to mingle with skinheads.
• When feeling weird about liking certain Sex Pistols songs — i.e., “Belsen Was A Gas.”
• When disliking most of my Jewish relatives, and then wondering if I was anti-Semitic.
• When hanging out with my Jewish relatives who were all doctors.
• Doctors who would show off their new BMWs to each other.
• “…The girl version of it is called a Bat Mitzvah. No; I didn’t have one. Because my family isn’t tacky and didn’t give a shit, that’s why. Only my great-grandmother cared, and she died. We were worried we’d have to do it for her sake, but she died. It’s cool. She was re-eaaaally old. So, so old.”
• When having to hear the Adam Sandler unfunny Hanukkah song again.
• When explaining that yes, we do sort of control the media.
• “Yahweh means ‘I AM HE WHO IS.’  …I think. The original name of God was probably ‘Yahu,’ which is dopey. ‘…Yahoo!’ …Yes, I say God’s name aloud. No, we’re not supposed to, I don’t think. Because I don’t believe in God, that’s why.”
• “…The reason that we started lending money is that we weren’t allowed to enter most other professions in the Middle Ages. Lending money was considered a sin by Christians. But they needed someone to do it. And it was okay for us to do it, because we were Christ-killers, ha ha. So we did it because we weren’t allowed to do anything else.”
• “And then they would round us up and burn us for being greedy money-lenders, ha ha.”
• “History sucks.”
• When explaining that Schmuck actually really means “Testicles.” …I think.
• When explaining that you can call me “your Jewish friend” if you want, but that it’s not a requirement and is also deeply weird.
• When explaining that I’ve never read the whole Old Testament. Try reading the Book of Numbers sometime. See how far you get before you kill yourself.
• When explaining that my kid, should I have one, won’t actually be Jewish unless I marry a Jewish girl. So if I don’t do that, my kid can live a life without a bunch of this weirdness, although I will mock him/her forever for being a goyim. “Can I get you some more mayonnaise for that?” I will say. “I hope it’s okay with you that I killed your savior. …Is that okay?” Thus, my child will be forever confused, isolated, and guilt-ridden, and thus will be an honorary Jew.
• L’chaim.
• Shalom.

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image – Chisinau jew

pre10tious:

Miller Under a Black and White Flag

croesus:

Drank (Taken with Instagram)

Emotions are difficult to materialize in visual representations.

The ‘Love’ project by SeeByTouch focuses on emotions and relationships turned into simple, minimal diagrams.

 

via http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_F9OgnxeZ9LU/S3S4fMDG1JI/AAAAAAAAKJo/_H_mBpQfcWQ/s1600-h/nick_meek2.jpg

Kittens on the HMS Hawkins, circa 1919.

Cat on the HMAS encounter, sitting in the muzzle of a 6-inch gun. Taken during the First World War.

Outdoor cat wants inside, in the 1930s.

Kitten in a bonnet, circa 1885.

Cat posing for portait, circa 1875.

Cat enjoying jazz music in New York City, circa 1946.

Cat helping its owner nurse a sick swan back to health, circa 1950.

Mexican cat posing for portrait, circa 1868. Provided by Southern Methodist University, Central University Libraries, DeGolyer Library.

Cat enjoying radio, circa 1930.

Cat with funny facial expression, circa 1910.

Cat watching two lovers part, circa 1939.

Kitten navigating ice ship, circa 1902.

Cat stealing beer in a bar on the Bowery in Manhattan, 1947.

Charles Lindbergh playing with kitten, circa 1930.

Cat resting in broken cargo box, 1940s.

Cat learning how to sail, date unknown.

Stately cat is stately, circa 1910.

Uncomfortable cat, 1930s.

Cat on a leash, being walked with a dog. Poor cat. Date unknown.

Young cat trying to figure out how to eat a bird, circa 1880.

Sailors enjoying black cat, 1940.

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via http://pinterest.com/pin/256518702/

Kiss them with hate. Imagine your tongue is a dagger and you’re slicing away. Snip snip. Smash smash. Are you tasting their blood yet? It should come trickling in any minute now. Kiss them violently. Bump heads. Get lock jaw. Avenge their wrongs under the guise of sweet affection. Think of unreturned phone calls, unanswered texts, cold remarks said in bed, and start biting their lip. Oh, yeah, it’s sexy. Sure. But they’re going to know why you’re biting down so hard. They’re going to know this isn’t for you. It’s for them. You’re in control now and they’re vulnerable. Take it as far as you can go and trust me when I say they won’t stop you. Assholes like to be punished with a kiss because they’re still gaining something. They still get to taste your tongue thrashing against theirs and it’s enough to keep them going.

Kiss them with trepidation. Have them rub your arm while you’re on the phone and feel a shiver go through your entire body. You’ve been touched. You were expecting it but now it’s here and you will be naked with this person in 20 minutes. 10 if the kissing bores you. It won’t though. The kissing never bores you because it’s always more than “just” a kiss. It’s a little bit more than “just” sex too. It’s always going to feel a little bit more than casual but not serious enough for you to run away, for you to get out and leave the kiss behind. You’re going to bed with this person. It’s going to start with this kiss and end before you know it. It’s always going to end abruptly and you will always be left lying naked in bed, wondering where it went. Don’t you get it by now? The kiss doesn’t need permission. It comes and goes whenever it pleases. Just close your eyes and pray it’s still there when you open them.

Kiss like you’re a starved animal. Imagine you’re kissing a birthday cake, a sno-cone, a Ryan Gosling. Pour all of your attention into the kiss like you’re a conductor leading a makeout orchestra. What way do you want it to go? Oops, not there. You made a wrong turn. Time to go back. Oh, now this is nice. This you can get used to. Grab the back of their head and stroke their skull. Tickle it. Run your fingers up and down the neck. Kiss the sides of the mouth. Kiss the bottom. Kiss the top. Land in the middle. There’s a rhythm to this and you want to make sure you got it down. You got it under control. You’re going to conquer this and make it the ultimate make out session. If you can master Excel and Photoshop, you can certainly master someone’s mouth.

Kiss like this is your last shot at getting someone to love you. It will reek of desperation and yearning but, you know, some people respond to that kind of thing. Start out with robust energy. Hit all the right marks and when you’re not getting the reaction you want, when you realize you’re kissing a limp doll, feel your mouth start to deflate. Push their mouth off of yours and collapse on to your side of the bed. You’ve given up. You felt everything and they felt nothing. You can only kiss someone for so long who doesn’t want to kiss back. You can tell yourself lies that’ll keep you company but even those will have an expiration.

Don’t kiss anyone for awhile. Watch movies instead. Form a close relationship with bread. Drink heavily. Sit on park benches and pretend you’re deep. Then, in a moment of pure loneliness and curiosity, make out with your hand in the shower. This will scare you. This will be the jolt you need to get back out there. Leap out of the shower and into a bar full of hot people. Make out with all of them.

When you’re kissing, make note of how intimate it feels. In some ways, it’s more personal than sex. You’ve had someone inside of you while doing your nails. You’ve gone to sleep and let them still finish on your stomach. “JUST DON’T WAKE ME UP.” But you always feel a tinge of nervousness, your body always shakes the first time you kiss someone. We constantly look for ways to feel young again, to feel untouched and curious, and this is it. It will always be brought out of you with a kiss. It will always have the power to make you feel 17 again.

You should follow Thought Catalog on Twitter here.

Sometimes you have to be your own hero.

Мы рады поделиться с вами вдвойне хорошей новостью: В магазин Sneakerhead на Пушечной, д.4 пришла беговая коллекция Gyakusou сезона весна-лето 2012, и впервые за двухлетнюю историю Gyakusou в линейке представлена женская коллекция. О проекте GIRA Gyakusou мы уже писали ранее, но, на всякий случай напоминаем, что это совместный проект токийского фэшн дизайнера и бегуна Джуна Такахаши (Undercover) и Nike Running. Существует всего 10-15 магазинов на всю планету, где можно купить одежду этого тандема, теперь к этому списку присоединился и наш штаб – Sneakerhead.

Highly recomended!

 

 

Dear 20-somethings: stop complaining about being old. You probably have three-quarters of a century before you’re dead. Let’s all relax. Here are 25 age-specific things 20-somethings can do instead of complaining about being old. You’re welcome.

1. Eat a lot of pizza with minor effect.

2. Live with your parents to save rent, for home-cooked meals, and blame the economy for everything when anyone asks.

3. Own your first home. Even if it’s 400 square feet, it’s yours. Get one of those shows to decorate it for free. It will be wonderful.

4. Date someone twice your age.

5. Take a year off from serious relationships to be single (read: free).

6. Attend a legal same-sex marriage.

7. Boss around the interns. Or date one of them. You’re too young to be a cougar. You, my friend, are a tiger.

8. Work hard. Get a new job every year or two.

9. Start your own company.

10. Follow random kids on Halloween, pretending they’re yours and get free candy as a result. Or just ring the doorbell — some of you still look 15.

11. Train (for as many years as it takes) for a marathon while your legs are still functional.

12. Dance all night in London. Ride a bike around Paris during a summer sunset. Climb Lion’s Head in South Africa. Compete in a rickshaw race across India. Relax in a hot spring in Iceland. Put up a piece of street art in Argentina. Live in New York City. You get the point.

13. Take a loan to do whatever you really want to do. You have a long time to pay it off. It’ll be fun!

14. Change your career more than once. Make sure one of the careers involves the circus, another country, or publishing a novel.

15. Go back to school for personal reasons.

16. Thank the universe Facebook wasn’t around when you were in high school.

17. Invent the next Facebook.

18. Become a YouTube sensation for your sensationally entertaining skills or otherwise generally useless abilities.

19. Couchsurf with strangers without it being creepy.

20. Stay for free with the friends you made in college that now live in different cities. Freeloading is still allowed!

21. Don’t worry about your keys, your remote, your sanity and whatever else you’ve lost — you’ll eventually find it.

22. Do all the things Steve Jobs says.

23. Stop complaining.

24. Start doing.

25. Take your time.

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First and foremost, realize that it’s over. Realize that, no matter how charming you might be towards authority figures and when meeting new people for the first time, you’re not going to talk your way out of this one. As you tend to do, you had briefly convinced yourself that you could push, and push, and the time would never come when the other would say “enough” and really mean it. But they do mean it, and no amount of sweet-talking or makeup sex or conversations that last until three in the morning and involve crying, laughing, and just a bit of shameless begging are going to help it. They are right — you two aren’t right for each other, and staying together isn’t going to help anyone. But it’s over, and it wasn’t your choice.

And maybe that’s the worst part, that you didn’t choose this (which is rather sickening to acknowledge). No matter how much was going wrong, how deeply you two were capable of hurting each other, at the end of the day, the decision to separate was forced upon you. You briefly don’t even want to get back together, only that you could re-do the night of the breakup with the knowledge that no matter what you were going to do, they weren’t going to give in. You would have been cool, and dignified, and would have ended things with a bit of dignity and maturity, instead of throwing a tantrum like a child in the face of inevitability.

In any case, it’s over now, and save for a bit of humiliation about the circumstances of the ending, there is nothing left to do but mourn. Suddenly, every time you get within a few feet of your phone, the urge to call them and hang up or send a cryptic text message becomes overwhelming. You keep waiting, hoping against hope, that whenever the little tinny buzz of a message goes off, it will be them. Of course, it’s never them, because they are capable of being mature and actually handling this separation with the space that is required. But you hope that they’re struggling not to talk to you, too. You watch them sign on and off of Gchat and for each stretch that they’re online, you hold your breath. You let your mouse hover over their name. You start a million messages before erasing them like a coward. You will them to talk to you, but they don’t.

Every song you listen to either makes your chest swell with nostalgia, or makes you burst into tears. You’ve had to pull over while driving several times because you could no longer see, and even in your state, you realize that driving while sobbing uncontrollably is a safety hazard. You resign to not listen to music, or only listen to happy music — but it comes at you from all directions. Even standing in a bar with friends who’ve taken you out, insistant that you “get over this” and “get back out there,” you’re not safe from the kind of beautiful, painful song that cuts through the ambiance like a laser and destroys your night. One moment, you are almost having a good time, making small talk and swaying to the music, well-lubricated by alcohol but not drunk enough to start making ugly calls, the next, you are dashing into the bathroom as tears well up hot in the corner of your eyes, hoping no one saw your minor breakdown over the song you two used to sing to each other.

Time passes, and passes, and the pain of not being with them becomes more of a dull ache, something that is uncomfortable but can be lived with, like a still-serious prognosis that is mercifully no longer terminal. You begin to feel capable again, like all of your successes and joys aren’t palpably dulled because they can’t be shared with the person you love. Even the sweet, if distant, concept of loving another person becomes a possibility — something you couldn’t do right now, but one day might be able to, and the idea is pleasant and comforting. Everything is turning up, and though things are difficult, the pain is no longer completely obscuring the beauties of your life. That is, of course, until you see it.

There are many ways to find out, and none are pleasant, but you see it. It is in seemingly innocuous exchanges on social media, your friends know about it but don’t discuss, it suddenly renders their silence completely understandable — they’ve found someone else. And now, above all else, you are filled with a blind rage. How dare they, you think. How could they. How are you so irredeemably in love that you can barely go out to a restaurant for fear of seeing their favorite food, and they are off, having the time of their life, kissing and laughing f-cking all over the city like some kind of god damn movie cliché. Do people have no dignity? What does this new person have that I don’t? What could they possibly be providing? Your entire worth is called into question, and you want to know everything about this new person, yet every new bit of information is brutal to discover. They are good-looking, well-rounded, intelligent — everything that you cannot yet admit to yourself that your old love most likely needs. And though they seem objectively wonderful, your fragile, bloated ego must convince itself that you are special, that you two had that something that this new person will never be able to recreate. It’ll be over in a week, you tell yourself.

And you allow yourself the occasional moment of spite, of venom, on the times when you talk to your old love. You make them feel guilty, feel stupid. You make snide comments about their new relationship, and inappropriate ones about your old one together. You have shed every ounce of self-awareness and long only to hurt, to hurt them the way you are hurting, no matter how fleeting the satisfaction is. You’ve become a child.

But it becomes clear, as time passes, that they are not going to break up in a week. No matter how much you loved them, this new person may have the one thing you two never did: compatibility. Love cannot replace irreconcilable differences, and no amount of passion can sustain endless fighting and mistrust. You acknowledge that you two might have burned very hot, but that it may have been too hot. Though the wound clearly still exists, seeing them together no longer pours salt in it. You can even go out with them and maintain composure — the concept of “being friends” that at one point seemed so insulting and pitiful, now seems like a real possibility, if only you are granted enough space and time to fully heal.

Life gets in the way, though. You both move, or change jobs, or change friends. That new relationship of theirs might have ended, and you might have started a new one yourself. You buy furniture, you paint walls, you try new recipes and go to happy hour — you live. And you live in a way that takes no account of how they might think of you, or what they’re doing at this very moment, or even who they’ve become. You think of them rarely, and only in a vague wish that they’re doing well. Reflecting on the relationship is no longer a part of your day, it’s no longer something you draw energy and purpose from. You can appreciate happy memories like all the others in your life — something that was wonderful, but that is gone. And before you know it, it’s been years.

Years.

One day you two might see each other, crossing paths in your old city or on a train platform or in a grocery store. You might not, though. You might go your whole lives and never cross paths again, but that is okay. You have your whole life to live anyway, and a heart to get broken again.

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