Every Song has a F&%k You Moment

When I began songwriting years ago, a renowned songwriter told me that I was a wonderful writer but that my songs were missing the f you moment.

But what is a F&%k You moment?

Here are some of my personal favories:

The classy one:

Never mind I’ll find someone like you

The not so classy one:

Fuck what I said it don’t mean shit now

Fuck the presents might as well throw em out

Fuck all those kisses, they didn’t mean jack

Fuck you, you ho, I don’t want you back

The positive one:

You won’t be lost, hurt, tired or lonely

Something beautiful will come your way

The heartbreaking one:

I’m loving angels instead

The ‘advice for next time’ one:

If you like it then you should’ve put a ring on it

The subtly threatening one:

What goes around, comes back around

The ‘I am so much better than you’ one:

You must not know ’bout me

I can have another you by tomorrow

The ‘let me illustrate it for you’ one:

I took a Louisville slugger to both headlights

I slashed a hole in all four tires

Maybe next time he’ll think before he cheats.

The ‘you get what you deserve’ one:

So sad, you’re hurt

Boo hoo, oh, did you expect me to care

You don’t deserve my tears

I guess that’s why they ain’t there

The ‘I’m so much better off without you’ one:

But since you been gone

I can breathe for the first time

I’m so moving on, yeah, yeah

Thanks to you now I get what I want

Thanks to this advice at the time I wrote a great F You moment for one of my songs and it goes like this:

You think you’re a better person

You’re more than God you’re more than me

But let me tell you, you’re just one more

Just another fish in the sea.

And another of my self-written favorites:

You’ll think of those days

‘Cause you know you will never feel this way

You’ll miss the girl who held you close when you were lost

Who turned your hell into a song

Into this song.

This got me thinking: what kind of F&%k you moment do we need in real life that allows us to move on?

Could it be that we get so stuck on the lyrics of the song talking about how much we loved that we forget to write that middle section with the ‘so what’ lyric?

How to write the F&%k You moment in real life

Once in a while it all comes up rushing back.

Today was one of those days. I hopped on a bike, headed to my workout and passed right in front of his flat. I do this pretty much any time I head in that direction.

I cycle by his flat, pretending not to look up at his windows but in reality all I want to do is know whether he is there. Is he alone? Why is he no longer going to the pub he used to go to every Friday? The pub where we met, where he asked me out.

One evening I saw his date night set up. Lights were dimmed, blinds quite closed. He has someone new, I thought.

I knew there was no need to be jealous, I knew she would be killed off in the same way I was: showered in what felt like love and trips around the world and then compared to an imaginary woman he is expecting to meet in his own head. No one can match the perfection of that image.

No need to be jealous, no need to be sad.

In reality I don’t know if he has someone new or not, but for the life of me I cannot understand how he doesn’t miss me, partly because I put so much effort into him, into me and on us that I’m still baffled he left me, partly because I still desperately miss him (only sometimes, I swear).

Friends remind me ‘you miss how he made you feel when things were good, not him’. Sure, I do. But actually at the moment I miss it all. I miss the stability coupled up life gives you. I miss a snuggle. I miss leaving events early. I miss dancing to music I hated just because he wanted to and it made me feel like the lead of a romcom.

I miss his feet over mine during dinner to comfort me when I felt sad.

I miss sex at 6am before I had even opened my eyes.

I miss leaving his place at dawn because he was also ready to start his day. I miss my first time being with a morning person.

I miss see him him and thinking — that’s mine. I miss him holding my hand at dinner across the table. I miss his hand as I walk around our hood.

I miss thinking I was building the next phase of my life.

I miss the sense of pride I had to be the chosen one every time I saw him.

I miss him putting effort with my brother. I miss him holding me close with his hand on my head and my cheek on his chest. I miss seeing him listen to my songs, to every lyric.

I miss brushing my teeth with him next to me, I miss him hiding in the shower to floss. I miss putting on make up and him walking in to bring me a cappuccino made exactly like I like it.

I miss checking out hotels for our vacations with his arms around me and him standing behind me.

I went to pilates today and they played all of our songs. Fuck.

There’s only one thing that I can keep telling myself: it’s over. It’s over.

For a delusional part of me it’s not. Does that happen to everyone or is it just me?

AAA: searching for your F You moment in real life

Maybe the F You moment in real life is but a motto that we write for ourselves. A one liner that we can add as background on our phones to remind ourselves of why this entire ‘I miss you’ crap is just that, crap.

Maybe that F You moment is in the activities we choose to do for ourselves to make ourselves just 1% happier, like workout or drinks with friends.

Maybe it’s in those small moments of self love, when we light a candle and draw a bubble bath, when we feel serene even in the midst of all the feelings that just won’t fade away as quickly as expected.

Maybe it’s in meeting your ex again when you’re at the top of our game, (though I have tried and succeeded at this and it still didn’t give me the serenity I thought it would).

Maybe it’s none of this at all.

The ‘one drop at a time’ method

When we are at a tough spot in life we experience lower energy, we feel like it’s hard to stay afloat and because we are tired and sad we typically cut out the activities that make us happy. We begin erasing all the positives from life.

Imagine a vase filled with water. It’s all transparent. It doesn’t have any happiness to it.

Now imagine adding one drop of something we actually enjoy doing.

A purple drop.

One drop won’t change the color of the water, it will still appear to be transparent. However, if the next day we add another drop and then another, slowly one day at a time, we begin to get out of the rut and turn our life around. One drop doesn’t change color of the water, but drop after drop, the vase begins to look purple and all of a sudden out life begins to change.

How to write your personal F You Moment

It turns out that there isn’t one single action you can take that will completely revolutionize how you feel. There isn’t a one liner in real life that will make you feel better instantly, that will make you not miss your ex partner ever again.

It won’t be a Hiit class nor a box of chocolates that will cure you from that feeling of sadness.

But if you begin combining many small actions, you go out with your friends for a drink, create that breakup/feel better playlist, take that class you love, draw yourself a bubble bath, call your therapist, get out of the house for a walk instead of consuming a tub of ice cream then slowly, one day at a time, you will begin re-writing your jar of feelings.

The jar will begin to change in color and that feeling of happiness, of being loved, of serenity will magically reappear more stable than ever.

You know what my friends, maybe the F You moment in real life isn’t about the other person at all. Maybe the real F You moment is just you finding yourself once again and realizing that in fact you are absofuckinglutely enough.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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