How to get over a breakup with Ovid

Part XXXI of the Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers series

[Based on How to Get Over a Breakup: An Ancient Guide to Moving On, by Ovid, translated by Michael Fontaine. Full book series here.]

What do you think are the most stressful things you may experience in your life? Psychologists measure the stress induced by different kinds of events on something called the Holmes and Rahe scale. The scale is based on the rankings of 43 potential sources of stress, the kind that may cause illness. As usual in psychology, there is debate about the actual usefulness of the method, but it is interesting that the most stressful event, right at the top of the scale, is the death of one’s spouse. At number two and three, respectively, are divorce and marital separation. (Fourth and fifth are imprisonment and the death of a close family member.) In other words, a negative turn in the relationship with our significant other is the most impactful thing we can experience.

That’s why we have psychotherapy. In modern fashion, psychotherapy emerged in the late 19th century with Sigmund Freud’s development of psychoanalysis, which emphasized unconscious processes and childhood experiences, and which today is largely considered a pseudoscience. The 1950s saw the onset of the humanistic approach, with Carl Rogers’s…