The Complex Reality of Missing Someone: Love vs Belonging

Missing someone can feel incredibly heavy. It settles into your chest, lingers in quiet moments and shows up when you least expect it.

And often, that ache convinces us of something dangerous: If I miss them this much, maybe the relationship was right.

But that’s not always true.

One of the most important reminders I share with my clients and one I’ve had to learn myself- is this: Missing someone doesn’t mean you belong together.

Why Absence Feels So Powerful

When someone leaves our life, the absence creates space. And the mind has a way of filling that space with memories, usually the good ones.

We remember connection, laughter, familiarity. We forget the misalignment, the exhaustion, the parts where we had to shrink or compromise ourselves to make things work.

The heart aches for what’s familiar, even when it wasn’t healthy. Longing doesn’t always mean love.Sometimes, it simply means habit, attachment or unfinished emotional business.

Love and Compatibility Are Not the Same

This is a truth many of us struggle to accept.

You can love someone deeply and still not be right for each other. You can feel drawn to someone and still know - logically and emotionally - that the relationship didn’t support your growth.

I’ve been there. Confusing longing with alignment. Believing that the pull backward meant I was losing something essential. What I eventually learned is this: Love is about feeling. Compatibility is about how life actually feels with someone in it.

And those two don’t always overlap.

Nostalgia vs. Truth

Healing often requires us to separate nostalgia from truth.

Nostalgia softens the edges of reality. Truth asks harder questions:

• Did I feel safe being myself?

• Was I growing or constantly struggling?

• Did this relationship add peace or drain it?

  
  

Honouring what you felt doesn’t mean returning to what hurt you. You’re allowed to appreciate the role someone played in your life without reopening a chapter that no longer serves you.

When Missing Someone Isn’t a Sign to Go Back

Missing someone is human. It doesn’t mean you’re weak. It doesn’t mean you made the wrong choice.

It simply means they mattered. The real work is learning to sit with that ache without letting it pull you back into something that no longer aligns with who you are becoming.

Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is miss someone and still move forward.

A Gentle Question for You

Have you ever mistaken missing someone for a sign to go back?

If so, you’re not alone. This is a pattern I help many clients work through - learning how to grieve, let go, and trust themselves again without self-judgment.

Because healing isn’t about erasing love. It’s about choosing truth, even when nostalgia whispers otherwise.