While watching one of my guilty pleasures, also known as reality TV, I heard one of the starlets ask another, “Girl, it is really over between you two?” The starlet in question batted her lengthy lashes and said in an unconvincing southern drawl, “Yeahhhhhh, gurrrl. It’s ova.”

I thought about it. How do we really know when it’s over? “Over” is a process that’s often a long journey to take. Anytime we invest our hopes, dreams, prayers, money, energy, family, our own lives and our time into another it simply takes time to get over. 

Forty-two years of living have provided me with one sure-fire way (amongst a few others) of knowing when we’re over what is over. One way to know we’re over it is when our actions aren’t begging for a reaction. What do I mean by that? Glad you asked.

A few ways to know we’re over what’s over is when:

• We don’t strategize ways to entice. (In other words we don’t have to dress up when we know we’re going to see him, bathe in the perfume he liked, flaunt our new “boo”, cook his favorite casserole when he comes to get the kids or spend time entertaining that one friend who is capable of coming up with far more crafty ways to entice him than we are with hopes of luring him back in.)
• We don’t strategize ways to infuriate. (In other words, we don’t press his buttons to provoke an angry response by withholding the children, speaking badly of him privately or publicly, contacting his new “boo” or definitely not by spending time entertaining the thoughts of that one friend who is capable of coming up with far more cunning ways to infuriate him than we are with hopes of ticking him off or firing him up.)
• We don’t monopolize our conversations with details of the situation. (In other words, we aren’t trying to garner sympathy or soldiers to join us in our personal battle.)
• We don’t challenge him in a game of “memory”. (In other words, we don’t always remind him of the good times we had every chance we get hoping it will reignite that extinguished flame. Note to my girls: If the times were so good they would still be.)
• We don’t wake up or spend our day thinking of him good, bad or that muddy-ness in the middle. (In other words, we aren’t monopolized by thoughts of him one way or the other that often cause us to do something, think something or feel something we shouldn’t.)
• We can function at functions. (In other words, the thought of seeing him at a wedding, class reunion, birthday party, church or Church’s Chicken on 3rd Avenue West doesn’t send our stomachs into a tailspin or our minds spinning out of control.) 
• We don’t desire bad for them because they are without us. (That one speaks for itself.)
• We don’t align with their enemies or the casualties. (In other words, we know and accept that joining forces with the boyfriend of the girlfriend who stole our boyfriend eventually adds nothing but more pain to our plate.  We stay away from partnering up with people who feel negatively about him knowing it will not help us feel positively about us.)
• We can sincerely pray for them, regardless of how those prayers will benefit us. (In other words, can we pray for their personal advancement, prosperity, health and finances to be blessed regardless of whether they owe us alimony, child support or half on Junior’s Christmas list?)

@AngelaMMoore316