But the narrator isn't bitter. She’s sad. She admits that even though the relationship was broken, she still misses him. She hopes he finds someone else. And she admits the hardest truth of all:

Notice she doesn't wish he would come back. She wishes he was different . That is the tragedy of leaving someone who isn't "bad"—just not ready. You are left grieving the potential of what could have been, rather than the reality of what was.

There is a specific kind of heartbreak that doesn’t come from being dumped. It comes from making the impossible decision to walk away from someone you still love.

We love to tell people leaving a toxic (or merely mediocre) situation, "Just be happy you're free!" But freedom isn't always warm. Sometimes it's cold and lonely.

Compatibility is not the same as affection. You can adore a person’s soul and still realize that their behavior is destroying yours. 2. The "what if" is the heaviest burden. The bridge of the song is devastating: "I just miss you, and I just wish you were a better man."

We don’t usually sing songs about that kind of pain. We sing about revenge, about anger, or about desperate longing to get someone back. But country-pop anthem “Better Man” —penned by Taylor Swift and performed by Little Big Town—takes a scalpel to a different wound entirely:

And that is the saddest, bravest thing in the world. What song helps you heal after a tough decision? Drop the title in the comments below.