No man can lose what he never had.

A great deal of disappointment is spent on things that were never yours to begin with: the job you were not offered, the person who was never going to stay, the version of your life you had drawn but not built. Naming that honestly does not make the ache vanish, but it moves it from loss to something lighter. You are mourning a picture, and pictures can be redrawn.

Take the thing you feel you have lost and ask what you actually held. If the answer is a hope rather than a possession, let the hope be examined rather than guarded, and see whether you still want the thing itself.