In Part One of this post, we looked at how loneliness can be confused with wanting to reach out to a particular person you were close with in the past.

This week - why do you want to be in touch with this person, and what are you hoping to achieve?

It helps to have some clarity with your reasons for reaching out, and also your goals in doing so.

If you want to regain contact and make some steps toward future reconciliation, then sometimes this is a sufficient plan. However, there needs to be some sort of concrete resolution in your mind, and not a general drift into “I don’t know what this relationship is” territory.

You need to be realistic with what you want from the relationship, and this can only be based on the relationship you once had. If the original pattern was one of co-dependency, one that required you to give more than you received, or something that was fundamentally unhealthy or dysfunctional - expecting all these issues to magically disappear is hugely unreasonable.

On the other hand, people can also grow and perhaps something has shifted and there is some good thing shining through the cracks. A little hope that you’re both now willing to work on improving things, perhaps.

If you are unsure as to what you want to attain through renewing this particular relationship, it’s probably just your loneliness talking. This needs to be addressed in a healthy way, but probably not with this particular person.

Generally, if you have no idea what you want, don’t jump in. No matter the person, they aren’t collateral damage for your own personal growth. Think hard about re-opening potential wounds and heartache - is it worth it? Will it be beneficial? Will it do you both good?

Having done all the hard work of self-examination and knowing what you want to achieve from reconnecting, there is one more thing to consider.

We’ll look at what this is in Part 3 next Friday.