First Comes the Breakup, Then Comes the ‘Thrive Post’
Living well is the best revenge, they say. But in the age of social media, an even better revenge is publicizing how well we’re living.
If the thrive post has a patron saint, it is Nicole Kidman. Specifically, Kidman the day she finalized her divorce from Tom Cruise, when she was photographed by paparazzi leaving her attorney’s office with her arms blissfully extended, her mouth a wide, Whitmanian yawp. She is undeniably free. The image has since become a meme—and inspiration for people leaving relationships. If you catch a friend posting this photo, assume that they’re recently single.
What I call “thrive posts” are the things people share on social media in the aftermath of a breakup to signal that they’ve moved on and are thriving. (I’m a thrive-poster myself—I once Photoshopped my novel into the Kidman meme hours after being dumped.) This is a modern manifestation of a long-standing impulse. “Living well is the best revenge,” the 17th-century poet George Herbert wrote. But, in the age of social media, living well feels like it isn’t enough; an even better revenge is publicizing how well we’re living. That publicity may take the form of thirst-trap photos, cryptically optimistic status updates, or photos documenting nights out with friends. Though research shows that social-media usage tends to increase after a breakup, thrive-posting is different from simply tweeting more often. Thrive posts tend to say nothing about the breakup or comment elliptically on the subject of personal growth. They’re as opaque as they are obvious, reliant on plausible deniability (I’m simply posting about my life), while sending a pointed implicit message (and my life is incredible without my ex in it). These public displays of self-worth can be great for a dopamine hit, but ironically, thrive-posting may hold people back from truly moving on.
Kristin Mickelson, a psychology professor at Arizona State University, compares thrive-posting to the “resurrection process,” a concept from Steven Duck and Stephanie Rollie’s model for the dissolution of relationships. According to this model, breakups are not a discrete event but a series of stages. In the resurrection process, people prepare for the future by telling a new story about their life. The thrive post may be how people choose to share this new story.
It can be innocuous. A flattering selfie from a solo camping trip, for instance, is a subtler, perhaps more dignified, way to signal a change in relationship status than a “conscious uncoupling”–style post. The thrive post, done sparingly, can be a reasonable answer to the question of whether and how to share news of a breakup on social media.
But excessively posting photos with the intention of showing followers that you’re doing great risks backfiring. Creating a coherent narrative in the aftermath of a disruption is a common impulse, Jamieson Webster, a psychoanalyst and an assistant professor at the New School, told me. She sees the thrive post as “an attempt to tell a story that somehow includes the breakup without including it entirely for everybody else.” But it is usually pretty transparent to followers, especially those who find out about the breakup offline.
I’ve experienced ghosting and divorce and everything in between, and, in every breakup, I’ve benefited from creating a story after it’s over. Telling the story of a breakup can be healing, like the catharsis of calling a friend after you’ve been dumped. What distinguishes the thrive post from telling a friend is the scale. Online, you’re performing for a bigger audience, and some of them might not interpret your story how you would like. Will followers see your posts as proof that you’re thriving or a sign that you’re in denial? I always feel a little transparent and emotionally exposed when I share thirst traps after a breakup. Worse, I feel impatient. Sitting with heartbreak is painful. Healing takes entirely too long. Perhaps what the thrive post offers is the illusion of skipping a few stages of grief.
Maintaining healthy social-media habits after a breakup can be especially difficult for people who frequently posted about their relationship, Ebony Butler, a psychologist and the creator of My Therapy Cards, told me. Social media is a common tool for external validation. When a relationship is going well, social media is great for showing it off; when a relationship ends, though, people might turn to the validation of social media to mitigate shame or to avoid confronting the pain of the breakup. Butler stressed patience for anyone in this position. She advised not to post anything because you feel obligated to make a statement, and to avoid sharing photos hoping to get a reaction out of your ex. Often, she’s found that her clients share these posts out of impulse or to self-regulate, but doing so can result in even more shame or regret after the fact. And in response to that feeling, they may take the posts down, she said, but she didn’t have to tell me. I have a history of deleting thrive posts when they don’t perform as well as I’d like—I guess when they don’t magically make me feel better.
“Closure comes from your own peace of mind and understanding,” Butler said. “Nobody can give it to us.” Butler and other experts I spoke with advised slowing down, reconnecting with friends, and, if possible, taking a social-media break after a relationship ends. Posting in retaliation or to elicit a reaction will probably derail the grieving process.
Although I understand that it may not be the healthiest behavior, I still have a soft spot for thrive-posting. I don’t expect the posts to genuinely protect my heart. I don’t expect a provocative selfie to win me the fire emoji I so desperately crave from an ex. But I love deducing from night-club Instagram stories that a colleague finally left her toxic fiancé. I love playing photographer for a friend at a party because they want their ex to maybe, just maybe, see them looking amazing. The sometimes-cringe—predominantly petty—flawed humanity on display in thrive posts is a welcome antidote to the sterile brand management happening on so much of social media.
Should you thrive post? Probably not. But if you’re going to, I recommend following these two simple rules. First: Be prepared for disappointment, because you might not receive the reconciliation text you so deeply desire. Second: Make sure you look as hot as you possibly can.