Why your brain CAN’T move on after a breakup?

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If you've ever gone through a breakup — romantic or platonic — and found yourself stuck in endless mental loops, replaying conversations, hoping for closure... you're not alone. And you're not broken.  This is the Zeigarnik Effect at work — a psychological bias that makes our brain obsess over unfinished emotional business. 🧠💔  In this video, I’ll share science-backed ways to give yourself closure (yes, even if you never got the apology, goodbye, or explanation you hoped for):  ✅ How to trick your brain into healing ✅ Closure rituals that actually work ✅ How to remember yourself without them  This isn’t just science — it’s liberation. If you’re ready to finally let go, hit that play button. 🔔  👉 Don’t forget to follow for more trauma-informed self-growth content.

Transcript

00:00You ever go through a breakup, romantic or platonic, and even after it's over, your brain

00:04will just not let it go? Like, you want to let it go, but your brain is refusing to. You keep

00:08replaying the last conversation, what you said, what they said, and you're just hoping that

00:12they'll reach out and want to tie this all up with a bow. But don't get it twisted. That does

00:16not mean that you're being clingy or that you want to get back with them. That's actually just

00:20your brain doing what your brain is wired to do. It's called the Zagarnik effect, and it's a

00:24cognitive bias that shows that our brains are wired to remember unfinished business, both small

00:29tasks and like big emotional experiences way more intensely than we remember finished

00:34business. The psychologist who discovered this noticed something super weird. Waiters at a

00:37restaurant could remember every unpaid order, but the second that an order was paid, it completely

00:42left their brain. The Zagarnik effect shows that our brains crave resolution, and when we don't

00:46get it, we leave a tab open that says, wait, wait, not done, leave this up. And that is why

00:50closure feels so essential. It's like our brain saying things are not over and we need to finish

00:54it. So if you're like, cool, thanks science. Now what? I hear you. I wish that the past me

00:59that craved closure after a lot of breakups would have known that sometimes closure doesn't

01:03have to come from the other person. It can come from yourself. You're not always going

01:06to get the apology, the conversation or the perfect goodbye that you want. You just won't.

01:10Instead, here are some science back ways to help you create closure yourself. First, you

01:14can write your own ending. You literally write a story out with the beginning, the middle,

01:18and then the end. The end that you are saying is the end, and your brain can start to understand

01:23that as the end. It can close the tab for you. You can focus on rebuilding your sense of self.

01:27So a really hard part about not getting closure is that you feel like when that person leaves

01:31your life, they take a version of you with them, which they do, but that doesn't mean

01:35that you're not still your own person and that you didn't exist before them. So remembering

01:39and rebuilding the things that make you uniquely you without them in the picture.

01:43And lastly, this one I love. You can actually hold a closure ritual. I just learned that our

01:47brains really love and respond well to rituals. So maybe write a letter that you're never going

01:52to send, archive all the texts, delete the photos, have friends over, burn some shit.

01:57I don't know. Have fun. And just have a ritual that tells your brain, actually, this is done.

02:01This is the moment that it's over. In all, don't let them hold you up. Don't let them be the one

02:06that gets to decide when you move on or don't. You are very much allowed and encouraged to move

02:11forward without waiting for someone else to close the door for you. Good luck out there.

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