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Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from how Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff,

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Speaker 1: Lauren Vogel bomb here. If a relationship is like a

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Speaker 1: shark that must constantly move forward or die, then what

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Speaker 1: the Museum of Broken Relationships has on its hands is

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Speaker 1: a lot of dead sharks and are shards because romantic

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Speaker 1: or not, when any cherished relationship hits the skids, it

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Speaker 1: can blow your heart to Smithereens with heart shards in

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Speaker 1: mind and an eye toward healing and purposeful change, the

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Speaker 1: Museum of Broken Relationships is an innovative resource for helping

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Speaker 1: people seek solace, let go, and move on. Curated from

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Speaker 1: once valued possessions that X is of every ilk can't

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Speaker 1: stand to keep around anymore, yet can't bear to throw away,

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Speaker 1: the museum provides a space to showcase the flotsam of

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Speaker 1: flouted vows and forsaken promises and the sad souvenirs of subterfuge.

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Speaker 1: Anonymous and sometimes gut wrenching personal stories presented alongside their

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Speaker 1: related objects, provide context i viewing these ordinary items, like

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Speaker 1: say a pair of converse sneakers, a latch key, or

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Speaker 1: a wisp of hair, with universal meaning. Raw and unedited

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Speaker 1: personal artifacts selected from hundreds of warehoused and ever incoming

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Speaker 1: donations from love lorn people around the world. Comprised the

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Speaker 1: installations at the award winning Avant Garde Museum located in Zagreb, Croatia,

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Speaker 1: plus in an international traveling exhibition, and at the museum

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Speaker 1: in Los Angeles, California, which, while they scout a new

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Speaker 1: brick and mortar location, is alive and well online. A

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Speaker 1: poignant smattering of samples includes a jar of spicy Amish

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Speaker 1: pickles purchased by a young woman for her first love.

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Speaker 1: He stopped returning her texts within the span of their

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Speaker 1: two months together, and she never had a chance to

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Speaker 1: give him the pickles. Peter Pan plush toy bought by

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Speaker 1: a twenty five year old man to remind himself to

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Speaker 1: keep the boy inside alive. Now fifty, His placard caption reads,

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Speaker 1: the boy is lost to me. An ex wife's non

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Speaker 1: traditional whispy silk wedding dress crammed into no kidding, a

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Speaker 1: pickle jar after her husband got the seven year itch

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Speaker 1: and split. A magnifying glass left by a woman as

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Speaker 1: a reminder to a self absorbed lover that she had

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Speaker 1: always felt small, and a small bottle filled with tears,

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Speaker 1: be they ordinary, extraordinary, or even downright bizarre, the objects

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Speaker 1: alone are just bloodless chatch keys without the stories that

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Speaker 1: bring them to life. The museum f a Q section

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Speaker 1: invites contributors to write their personal confessions to be frank, withdrawn, furious, imaginative, witty,

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Speaker 1: or sad. Your story creates the museum display. They say,

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Speaker 1: your story is your stage. Anyone with strong feelings about

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Speaker 1: t m I etiquette may find the museum's theme to

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Speaker 1: be more pure exhibitionism than art. Conversely, reality show loving

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Speaker 1: boyers may see it as another delicious way to access

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Speaker 1: misery on demand. For as long as humans have had

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Speaker 1: sad hearts, there has been love lost and unrequited, And

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Speaker 1: for as long as there has been love, there's been

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Speaker 1: heartbreak and pain. But perhaps the real takeaway from seeing

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Speaker 1: brokenness on display is to note that it's in the

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Speaker 1: liminal space between love and loss that we find our

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Speaker 1: shared humanity and discover our capacity for empathy. Today's episode

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Speaker 1: was written by Carrie Tato and produced by Tyler Clang.

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Speaker 1: For more on this and lots of other poignant topics,

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Speaker 1: visit our home planet, how Stuff Works dot com