About this quote

Strong feelings can arrive suddenly and vanish just as fast, while the memory of them can take a long time to fade. That lag makes endings feel like unfinished business. Notice what keeps pulling you back: a song, a photo, a routine. Do one concrete thing this week to limit those triggers—box up keepsakes or set a time to think about the past—and measure whether the hold loosens.

When to use it

• After you clear your ex's desk at work, you tell your coworker, 'Love is so short, forgetting is so long.'
• At your parent's funeral, while folding their sweater, you say to your sister, 'I keep thinking how quick the happy parts felt and how slow I'm to forget.'
• On campus before finals you bump into someone from a summer romance and tell your roommate, 'That summer flashed by—love is so short, forgetting is so long.'
• Sitting in the care home reading an old letter aloud, you tell your partner, 'Even now I feel it: love can be brief, and forgetting drags on.'