You’ve seen those marionette puppets, of course. The ones with twenty strings connected to their arms, head and feet so a puppeteer can make them tap dance across the floor to great applause? Well, I hate to be this blunt, but if you’re mentally stuck at all on a guy or girl who isn’t dying to be in a relationship with you, you’re as good as those puppets getting dragged across the floor doing goofy things.

And you don’t have to be watching I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant to know that the metaphor also holds for babies stuck to their umbilical cords. (But, may I just say it’s one of the best shows ever on TLC, so you really should be watching it! And that link is hilariously the schedule for this week’s airings.) But let’s just stick with strings…

Someone needed the strings cut (Image: ABC.com/Karen Neal)

I was watching Cougar Town last night when Courteney Cox’s character Jules realized she needed to cut the strings for the young guy she’s been dating—Josh—so he wouldn’t remain caught up on her. (Such a better problem to have, right?) This is how she said it:

“The last thing you wanna do is keep that door open. If you give a guy any strings to hold onto, you just know he’ll cling to them forever.”

Ah yes, the clinging. I have been there. Sure, you may say you’re over someone and really believe it. You may text them less, check their Facebook updates less, even think about them a few times less a day. But if you still have any romantic feelings for a person who isn’t returning them—if you’re putting any eggs in that basket at all—then you are no better than a puppet stuck to a master. Even if you cut nineteen of those twenty marionette strings, you still can’t get far enough away to get off their stage.

So if you feel like you might actually be strung up a bit, do yourself a favor: Cut the final strings! Stop calling the puppeteer. Stop texting. Stop emailing. Stop going to parties where you think he or she will be. Stop making the puppeteer an option in your life and open yourself up to the rest of the world—because that’s where you’re going to find someone who does love and care for you as much as you love and care for them! You don’t deserve to be strung to someone who doesn’t want to be with you. You deserve to be free and happy and living your full, awesome life! You deserve to be dancing without strings toward the partner who is right for you. Free yourself so you can be.

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Big love and happy dancing,