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Do not make a public spectacle of yourself. Control your emotions when in public. Even though you may feel like a fool, this is no reason to convince everyone else of it. Fake it 'til you make it.
Stay away from things that could "accidentally on purpose" injure you. Lock up the firearms or put them in the safekeeping of friends. Do not drive for a few weeks. Do not undertake anything that would ordinarily be considered dangerous: skydiving, bungee jumping, mountain climbing.
At one blow, you have been reduced to the condition of an injured animal. With neither warning nor intent, you are liable to lash out at anyone or anything near you, even if the intent is only to help. The most likely victims are your friends and family--those you least want to hurt, but who may just be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Your humanity and civility will return to you in time. Meanwhile, be exceedingly careful in your behavior.
Your dearest possessions may suddenly become repulsive to you. Do not act hastily, divesting yourself of things that have deep emotional significance simply because you can't tolerate any emotional stimulus. Don't give things away, don't sell things, don't break things. Do not go through your possessions throwing things out. Wait at least six months.
Do not buy a red sports car. Do not buy a motorcycle.
Do not make substantial changes in dress, hairstyle, or associates.
Remember that you are not yourself. Take care. Pay attention to what you're doing. Ask your friends frequently, "Am I acting okay?" If they say, "No," then do what they say.
Do not try to make her sorry she is no longer with you.
Do not try to punish her by punishing yourself.
Do not try to make her feel sorry for you.
Make no serious plans.
Do not communicate with your former lover without asking the advice of friends. You are not a competent judge of your actions.
Do not try to get even. Do not be vindictive.
Do not speak hatefully of your former lover, nor of her present lover.
Do not try to divide up friends. There is no "bride's side," or "groom's side" in a breakup.
Mutual friends cannot take sides. It was not their relationship. Do not try to make allies of mutual friends. Do not try to make mutual friends into her enemies.
Do nothing that cannot be undone. (plastic surgery, tattoos, joining the French Foreign , suicide)
Do not join a cult.
If there is property to divide, be fair. Anything that was hers is still hers.
If young children are involved, prepare to take up residence in Hell.
Do not make things worse than they have to be. Seek the assistance of a competent attorney if necessary. If she has a competent attorney, it is necessary for you to have one, also.
Remember, she's probably having a terrible time, too.
The only way to get through it is to get through it. Do not use drugs or climb into a bottle.
Get your work done. Fulfill your obligations.
The real pain will lessen over the period of about a year. This is also about how long it takes to get over the physical aspects of a drug, tobacco or alcohol addiction. This should give you a clue about what goes on when you become dependent upon the love of a woman. Treat love exactly as though it were a habit-forming drug, and you're going cold-turkey. Try to find another supply from a reputable dealer.
It will take you half as long as the relationship lasted to get over it.
If there was no proper closure, you will not get over it until there is. If there never is, you will never get over it. Try to find closure.
Marry in haste, repent at leisure. Upon meeting the Ideal Woman, do not get married for at least a year, preferably three.
Insofar as it is possible, do not pick the same kind of woman again. Of course, since you're inevitably seeking a younger version of your mother, this is probably useless advice.
The heart renews itself.
Scars will fade.
Believe it or not, you will be loved, and love, again.
Try to do better next time.
Keep Breathing.
Yet if it pleases you that I should undertake this task let it at least be on the same conditions as these gentlemen obtained, namely, that anyone may contradict me when he wishes to, and I shall regard this not as a contradiction but as help; and perhaps, through the correction of my mistakes, we shall discover the perfection that we are seeking.
-- The Courtier, Book Two
In joining the worthy company of Baldassare Castiglione and Giovanni Della Casa, I continue here a tradition of "courtesy books," which by attempting to codify manners and ideals reveal a good deal about the writer and his age. Similar works were written by Aristotle, Theophrastus, Plutarch and Cicero.
"What all such books have in common is the belief that men can improve themselves, that human beings naturally desire to subscribe to an ideal and that the ideal is attainable. Also, there is the assumption that external manners are expressions and manifestations of internal qualities: good men exhibit good manners."
(Il Galateo, translated with an introduction and notes by Konrad Eisenbichler and Kenneth R. Bartlett,
Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, Victoria University in the University of Toronto, 1986, page xvii)
My references to The Courtier, by Baldassare Castiglione (1478-1529) are from the edition translated and with an introduction by George Bull, Penguin Books, 1967
A Renaissance Courtesy-Book, Galateo of Manners and Behavior, by Giovanni Della Casa (1503-1556), was published in 1914 by the Merrymount Press, Boston, with an introduction by J. E. Springarn
Il Galateo was written between 1551 and 1555. Il Galateo was subsequently translated into all major European languages. The first English translation, by Robert Peterson, was published in 1576 as Galateo of Maister Iohn Della Casa, Archbishop of Benvenenta, or rather a Treatise of the Manners and Behaviours it behoveneth a Man to use in his familiar Conversation. The English of 1576 is alien to the modern ear, and I have taken the liberty of modifying it from that printed in the 1914 Merrymount Press edition.
Whereas The Courtier is a general treatise on manners and emphasizes the conventions of gentlemanly behavior within the context of romantic love, Il Galateo is the plain nuts-and-bolts of day-to-day social intercourse. The Courtier discusses the complex roles of men and women in polite society; Il Galateo tells you how to blow your nose. Ad astra per aspera.
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