Dear Wes & Jenny: I need good dating tips. I’m going through a tough breakup, and I need to know if I’d be moving too fast if I decide to start dating again. Is it right to force yourself to move on to new people even if you’re still in love with someone else? I’m afraid, I guess, of getting hurt again when I haven’t quite healed.

• Teenage girl

Jenny: I would love to tell you that everything will be OK and that you won’t feel this hurt again, but I can’t. Relax and take a couple of days or weeks to enjoy what you used to do before you had a boyfriend. Doing things that you enjoyed in the past and just hanging out with friends can help with the healing process. This is just another step in dating – one I hate, even though it means more girls’ nights with pizza and chick flicks. It isn’t wrong for you to get back into the game, but just make sure you’re ready. The worst thing for you to do is have a rebound relationship and get yourself or someone else hurt. That is why the coping process is so important.

When you think about your ex-boyfriend, recall all the happy times you had together. I have noticed that many girls want to focus on how much they have been hurt and all the bad times they’ve been through. But that will only lead to hate. Think about it this way: You had a time where you two were in love, and you learned and grew. Now is the time to learn something else that will help you in your next relationship. He helped you and you helped him, so don’t resent him for leaving.

Don’t be afraid of getting hurt. If that is why you are holding back, then ease your way back in. Go on a couple of dates. You don’t have to jump into a serious relationship again. Kick back and take pleasure in being a teenager. Just don’t use this breakup as a reason to prevent you from dating other people. Now is a time for you to find out what you can handle and can’t handle in a relationship – to grow as a person both in a relationship and out of one. It’s OK to feel upset and still love your ex-boyfriend. Only you can determine when you’re ready to get back into the dating scene.

Wes: First let me congratulate you on actually dating someone that you could break up with. Fewer kids today are taking the time to figure out their relationships or learn how to love someone. A classic example is the 17-year-old girl I saw the other day who said she thought she was kind of dating a guy but wasn’t exactly sure. So it’s always refreshing to see teens in relationships that mean something. Unfortunately, with meaning comes hurt and that is where you stand today, asking the same question that everyone asks after a breakup: When should I move on, and how should I feel when I do?

As Jenny notes, you can make two mistakes at this point: holding on too long to the ill-fated relationship or jumping too quickly into the first rebound that you find. After some appropriate grieving, you have to get up and move on. In fact, psychologists find that emotions tend to follow behavior. Rather than sit around and wait until the time “feels right” to get on with your life, you eventually have to step up and give love another chance. Sometime down the road that will begin to feel like the right thing to do as you come to see your new love as being just as important as the one you’ve lost.

Jenny’s right on the rebound situation. A core problem teenage girls have today is loneliness – regardless of how many friends or dates they may have. This can become so severe that it causes them to reach out carelessly to people who really aren’t looking out for their best interests. Never is that so true as right after a break up, when all those good times are gone and you’re sad and depressed.

So watch out. You are especially vulnerable.

As for the possibility of getting hurt again, let me save you the suspense: You will. This is because all the loves of your life will one day come to an end – except one. This one you will consider your soul mate, and if you work really hard, you will keep him for a long time. Maybe forever.

For now, you have simply passed another milepost on that journey, and it is a sad one. Some think teen love is not real. I think quite the opposite. It is the love upon which your future relationships will be based. Cherish the sadness as well as the happiness of these experiences while you are young. You will not always feel things so deeply, and someday you will miss that a great deal.

Bottom line: You need to move forward deliberately and carefully, not stay stuck or fall helplessly into a relationship that will disappoint you even more.