To Be a Good Ex

You have to move. You can’t exist in the same town anymore, it’s not helpful and the chance of running into you is too high when you still live within reach. Get fat. And not from the extra hot weight you carry around because you’ve successfully started hanging out with someone new and all you do is go out to eat and order takeout together. The twenty pounds that immediately makes you look unhealthy and like you don’t care about yourself anymore. A good ex never cares about themselves anymore because the relationship ending ruined their self esteem for life. However, if you can lose so much weight from sadness you can fit into jeans you wore in high school, do this. Your well earned weak body will deter any new suitors. Continue to wear clothes that fit way too big on your body which will further exacerbate how skinny and unhealthy you are now. Your cheeks and eyes will start to sink into your face which helps as well.

Do not pursue any activities that will give you a higher sense of self and do not make any new friends, romantic or otherwise.

You also have to age worse than you would if you were still in the relationship with your ex. This is a must. You can’t work on yourself mentally again and you can’t develop any new skills. Well, you can, but they have to be very stupid and time consuming. Download Pokémon Go and become good at that. Don’t discover new music or art and don’t become knowledgeable in anything exciting or fun.

Don’t even think of becoming richer or getting a better job. It can’t be done if your goal is to be a great ex. Don’t learn a new language or how to become a scrum master or anything that would make you more marketable on a resume. Stagnate in your career.

On a similar note, do not become more educated. Don’t apply for your Masters and don’t practice an instrument. Don’t listen to classical music or read another book. Don’t even hang around people smarter than you so their intelligence rubs off on you by osmosis. In fact, actively become dumber by forgetting everything you learned through school and experience thus far. Never invest in stocks, robot or otherwise. Spend all your money on makeup at Sephora and never wear any of it. This way you will be more broke and not any hotter.

Never move on. Don’t go on dating apps. Don’t see any of your other exes you still harbour secret feelings for. Don’t even hang out with friends or family who want the best for you and who encourage you to move on. Gross.

Develop new addictions. Not exercising or veganism but harmful to your health things. Expensive skincare. Smoking. Binge drinking alcohol and coffee. Try new drugs. You have to act like your body is worthless now so anything that hurts it will contribute to becoming the best ex you can be. Don’t look after the environment and don’t recycle. This will make you more desirable to your exes which isn’t an option if you want to be remembered as a good one.

Go cold on social media. This means no pictures of you at the beach on your vacation and absolutely no pictures of you at parties having fun. No life updates. You are, however, welcome to send cryptically vague messages through captions on Insta or subtweet people on Twitter to confuse and delight every person who has dated you. Could this be directed towards them? They don’t care.

Listen to a lot of Billie Eilish and Lorde. If a seventeen-year-old girl makes music, listen to it. Identify with it. Your problems are as real and as serious. Learn from it and develop but not so much that you become more emotionally sound or stable. Try to ask your doctor for a prescription of Xanax.

Listen to Elton John. Listen to Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, then Someone Saved My Life Tonight and finally listen to Daniel. If you play these three songs on repeat, in this order, you will unlock all your best ex qualities and develop a new appreciation for Elton John (who might have been a good ex). Become gay or straight if you’re feeling that. It can’t hurt your best ex status to develop an entirely new sexuality to further become a distant memory of the past to your exes. However, and this is crucial, do not post about your new sexuality or partners on social media. You are an enigma now and any updates to the internet will undo all the hard work you’ve done in becoming the greatest ex. Ideally, they should only hear about you in passing at a party from a mutual friend you no longer keep up with.