Here’s my approach, based on what I’ve found on the net and some of my own thoughts:

• Remember: It’s a natural part of human life
  Breaking up and feeling terrible afterwards is nothing unusual. Billions of people have had this experience before, and it’s one of the most common causes of emotional pain. So remember two things: (1) you are not alone and (2) breaking up is a natural part of human life.
• Remember: Time heals all wounds
  No matter how bad you feel now, it will go away eventually. While knowing this may not reduce the pain directly, it may give you strength during the “shitty phase.”  

• Do something good for yourself
  You’ve taken a punch, and now it’s time to take care of yourself. Do something you want to do: watch a movie, read a good book, exercise (!), start a new hobby, buy the cool gadget you’ve always wanted, etc.

• Spend time with family or friends 
  Part of your “relationship life” took a hit. The solution? Take care of your other relationships. Spend time with family or friends and plan enjoyable activities with them ahead of time (especially on weekends). 

• Let yourself grieve, but not for too long
  It’s okay to feel sad. Cry, sob, and lick your wounds. However, after a couple of weeks or so, pull yourself together. Look to the future; don’t cling to the past.

• Make a clean break
  After the grieving period, don’t think about your ex. Remove things from the house if they remind you of him or her. Erase your ex’s telephone number from your mobile phone and delete all emails. It’s over, and it’s time to move on.

• Think: Better now than later
  Imagine what might have happened if you didn’t break up, but instead had got married, had kids, and then discovered things wouldn’t work out. What a mess that would have been. It’s better to set switch lanes now, even though it hurts. 

• Learn from the experience
  “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” This saying has proven to be entirely true for me. Gathering new experiences is crucial for personal growth, although the process may not always be pleasant. 

• Don’t start dating again too soon
  As mentioned above, allow yourself some time for grieving. Don’t starting dating immediately after the break-up, or you’ll risk trying to replace your former boy- or girlfriend with someone else. This rarely works and it will make your new partner unhappy. Take your time, and you will be dating again soon enough. 

• Don’t blame the break-up for everything
  Sometimes we tend to channel our negative feelings in one direction, making them even more painful. A break-up provides a tempting invitation to do this, but don’t. If you feel bad, the break-up may not be the only reason. Make a plan for how to tackle the other areas you need to work on (e.g., identify your purpose in life, find a fulfilling job, etc.). 

• Write about it 
  Putting your thoughts down on paper can help. I’ve followed the recommendation to write a letter to my ex, but not send it. This gave me a lot of relief. I’ve also decided to blog about it – let’s see if it helps.  

• View the break-up as a new beginning
  A break-up allows you to take a fresh look at your life and to kick habits that previously held you back. It’s a new beginning, with great opportunities and new loving relationships waiting you!

Have I forgotten anything?

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Imagine the following (dramatic) scenario: it is wartime, and you are a military general. You know you can end the war with a final strike. You have two options:

1. You can invade your enemy's territory, which will most likely lead to the death of 10,000 people, or
2. You can drop a big bomb on a remote village, leading to 11,000 deaths (demonstrating your military strength and causing your enemy to surrender)

Assuming you had to choose one of these two (horrible) options, which would you choose?

This article does not intend to answer this question, but rather to highlight effects which are relevant in the context of happiness and which may not be considered in practice if such a situation should arise.

These effects include:

• Happiness of the Victims’ Relatives
  In Scenario 1, the victims will most likely represent different families all over the country. Their death will make many relatives fundamentally unhappy for a long time; many of the victims’ parents may never become fully happy again.

  In other words, there are high “multiplier effects” of unhappiness in this scenario: one victim’s fate leads to the unhappiness of many other people.

  In Scenario 2, the multiplier effects are not as strong, because presumably the victims’ relatives are victims as well (they lived in the same village).

• Physical Injuries
  Scenario 1 will most likely lead to more injuries than Scenario 2. Let’s assume for a moment that Scenario 1 will lead to 10,000 injuries while Scenario 2 will lead to 1,000. How should this information be incorporated into the decision? How do the 1,000 additional deaths in Scenario 2 compare to the 9,000 additional injuries in Scenario 1?

  We face an impossible task: to weigh one goal (saving lives) against another (preventing injuries). It’s an ethical dilemma, but we must answer this question, as our decision (either for Scenario 1 or Scenario 2) implies an answer – we cannot negate the question.

• Traumatisation
  As with a physical injury, traumatisation can impact the victims’ future happiness considerably, and may even lead to suicide in some cases.¹

  Traumatisation is most likely less prevalent in Scenario 2 than in Scenario 1. How can this information be incorporated into the decision-making process?

As stated above, I don’t advocate opting for Scenario 1 or Scenario 2. This is only a thought experiment which illustrates important effects on happiness which may not be taken into account if such a situation arises. I am not familiar with the military’s decision-making processes, but I’d be very surprised if they included a detailed analysis of happiness.

Beyond this example, there are many other decisions in which a detailed analysis incorporating (un)happiness-spreading effects would be useful. Basically, every decision which directly impacts people’s happiness could benefit from such an analysis. For example, consider the following decisions:

• (Everybody’s) decisions on financial donations and which organizations should receive those donations
• (Health organisations’) decisions on who should receive scarce medications and treatments
• (Governments’) decisions on which national conflicts merit intervention
• Etc.

Conclusion and Proposals

Based on the example above, we may draw the following conclusions:

• Some effects that are relevant for happiness are not obvious. Time must be dedicated to identify those effects and then include them in the decision-making process.
• It seems doubtful whether any such analysis is being performed today for all the “big” decisions impacting many people’s happiness (e.g., governmental decisions).² Therefore, “think tanks” could be engaged to perform this analysis and perhaps provide fresh perspectives.
• Sometimes we face situations in which one worthy goal has to be weighed against another (e.g., saving lives vs. preventing injuries). Decisions made today imply a response to this dilemma, but are not made explicit in terms of rules or guidelines, leaving the decision up to the personal preferences of the decision-maker (e.g., the military).

  The logical proposal resulting from this conclusion would be to develop a methodology which serves as a guide in case of conflicting goals. However: 

a.) Reaching an agreement on such a guide would be very difficult, and
b.) Even if such a guide were in place, it would be difficult to assess the input variables (which we took for granted in the example above) objectively

Nevertheless, developing such a guide would be a step toward better, less arbitrary decisions.

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1) Suicide is just the tip of the “unhappiness iceberg”: you have to really, really suffer to take such a tragic action. We can assume that many more traumatised victims are considerably less happy with their lives, even if they are not driven to suicide.

2) I believe most western governments do try to maximize happiness implicitly (of course, this also depends on which government we are talking about), but if it is not made explicit and analysed ”on paper,” there is a risk that some (un)happiness-spreading effects are missed and a suboptimal decision is made. 

We all live through moments of happiness and unhappiness, each varying in intensity. Which experience, would you say, can be the stronger of the two?

Before you answer, let’s clarify first what “strength of an emotion” means. In accordance with the definition of happiness in a previous post, I propose that one “happy moment” is of equal strength to one “unhappy moment” if we would be indifferent to re-living both of them (if offered as a “package”), i.e. the positive moment exactly compensates the experience from the negative one. 

With this in mind, I believe most people would say that being in a state of maximum unhappiness (which would most likely be a state of severe pain) can considerably outweigh maximum states of happiness (be it sexual pleasure, feelings of success, etc.) of same duration. Do you agree?

Evolutionary Perspective

We may also try to explain this subjective assessment from a more “objective” and evolutionary perspective. As both pleasure and pain are nature’s tools to motivate us to do what is best for our (genes’) reproduction, the question is: Does nature steer us more by telling us what not to do (punishment), or by actively rewarding us for what nature understands as positive actions or happenings?

This post does not aim to provide a comprehensive answer, but rather seeks to look at the intensity of the emotions, and the question: Which can be stronger? And here a phenomenon comes into play which may be regarded as one of the most unfortunate for humanity (and for any other species capable of feeling pleasure and pain): Negative happenings can be much worse for reproduction than positive ones can be beneficial.

For example, the act most clearly directed at reproduction, having sex, is only one “shot” at reproduction. On the other hand, negative events which may lead to death (i.e. getting wounded) pose a potential threat to all our future reproduction efforts. In this light, it would be logical for nature to develop stronger punishment mechanisms than those for reward.¹

Of course, nature may also reward us (i.e. positive emotion) for avoiding negative events. For example, if we build a house and feel protected from weather and enemies, it may give us a feeling of security, which is a good feeling. However, as we are primarily concerned with the intensity of emotions here, I believe these positive emotions cannot reach the same level of intensity compared to those where nature is very “sure” they have a direct negative impact on our reproduction chances.

The Uneven Happiness Scale

The implication on the “happiness scale” put forward in the mentioned earlier post would be that the positive part of the scale (“happiness”) is shorter than the negative (“unhappiness”). For example, if we assume for a minute that a moment of maximum pain can be compensated by 5 moments of maximum joy, the scale would look like this:

Does this mean that on average we are more unhappy than happy? Not necessarily, as we may be longer positivitive than negative states (the scale only reflects one moment of a set duration). However, it’s true this scale does not make the picture look more positive…

Is this thinking correct?

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1) Another way to demonstrate the potentially higher strength of the negative emotions may be by combining the “good” and the “bad” experiences, and seeing which is stronger. Taking the example from above, if we get stabbed in the back (“bad”) while having sex (“good”) to me there is no question as to what emotion the mind focuses on… unless the sex is really good (just kidding).