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Keeping in touch after a bitter breakup contains elements of both selfishness caring. When two entities that were once conjoined part ways, both sides go through chaos. It's a complete falsehood that the person that does the breaking up just goes on their merry way and yells "I'm free! I'm free!" That person is essentially in the same position as the person being broken up with: they've lost a connection they've built up over time. They can't just go out and handpick another one off some tree of love. Both people now have work to do and lives to rebuild. The selfish side wants to stay in touch with the old life just in case things don't work out in the new one. It's a kind of insurance policy. If things go sour, well, then you're friends who just call each other up. I think most of us have had relationships that break up, reconnect, and on and on. We're not sure what we're doing. Perhaps breaking up is a mistake? If so, then why cut all ties? Caring comes into it because the person breaking up can't just turn off every emotion they ever had for the dumpee. So it's a bizarre array of emotions that makes people want to stay in touch. The reasons vary from person to person and situation to situation. There are no hard fast rules.
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