As if it’s not enough for famous people to have better skin, better bodies and better houses than the rest of us, it seems these days they are also liable to demonstrate how much better they are at getting in and out of relationships. “Conscious uncoupling” is a celebrity-endorsed attitude towards separation, made famous by Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin. The aim is to be as generous and reasonable as possible about the end of the affair, in both public and private.

The current queen of gracious divorcees is Anna Faris, who poured out her happiness about ex-husband Chris Pratt’s engagement to Katherine Schwarzenegger on Instagram this week, saying, “I’m so happy for you both!!” before offering to perform the wedding ceremony herself (ostensibly a genuine proposition, given that she is an ordained minister).

This perhaps takes things one step beyond even the hypercivilised efforts of Paltrow and Martin, who recently revealed that things had gone so well post-breakup that he had accompanied Paltrow on her honeymoon with new love, Brad Falchuck. Are there no heights of internal and external perfection that people in the public eye won’t aim to scale?

“Conscious uncoupling”, and its counterpart “conscious coupling”, are phrases that suggest the possibility of a certain level of control over the emotionally volatile matters of love, sex and attachment. At its worst, the implication is that, if you are a clever, decent person, you should be able to manage your relationships in such a way as neither to cause, nor suffer, extremes of pain, and to preserve the dignity of both parties at every point in the romantic or sexual encounter.

A brief flick through literary history might suggest that this is a tall order, but Shakespeare, Stendhal and the Brontës didn’t know what it was like to contend with the constant, baleful gaze of social media. In the old days people could have tantrums, wreak revenge and die of heartbreak when their love stories didn’t go according to plan. Now it is de rigueur to retain a consistent appearance of sentimental hygiene given that everything you do or say needs to be fed into the like-machine. It’s become a competitive sport. What would people think of you if they knew you felt hurt, rejected, brimming with envy or rage? Perhaps it would seem at odds with your job as guarantor of the possibility of the charmed life.

Still, is conscious uncoupling simply another unrealistic, persecutory ideal? (If Paltrow can do it, why can’t I?) Or might there be things you can do on the journey in and out of love that can truly make life easier for everyone? The term itself was coined by the American writer and psychotherapist Katherine Woodward Thomas, and the process she describes is one of radical generosity coupled with fearless introspection. In practice, this means refraining from doing most of the things people are liable to do in the aftermath of a serious emotional letdown.

For instance, don’t blame the other person and badmouth them around town. Even if they really did do something terrible to you, don’t be deflected from thinking about your own role in the situation. The point isn’t to “win”, but to learn. Allow yourself truly to mourn and recover. Don’t pay heed to that hideous old adage, “happiness is the best revenge”; if you want to feel better in real life, the best way is to be honest with yourself about what you’ve lost, and to be frank about any hopes you have for the future. In short, Woodward Thomas is describing an authentic grieving process, some of which is liable to be very painful, and might not look nice from the outside.

The problem, it would seem, isn’t in the phrase itself, but in the cheesy public enactment of “good” behaviour. Of course it may be the case that Anna Faris is truly and unreservedly delighted at her ex-husband’s good fortune – although, to a cynic, the offer to get among the actual moment of knot-tying smacks a little of hyperbole – but one can’t help wondering about the unspoken sadomasochistic pacts between celebrities and audiences.

We hold them to impossible standards, which they then attempt to demonstrate for us at goodness knows what cost to themselves, and we punish them when they let us down. We, in turn, risk finding ourselves feeling terrible when we are unable to adhere to the ideals of perfect social grace we see constantly enacted in front of us. In this alienating hall of mirrors, one must attempt to look good at all times.

Losing love, and being replaced, can be terrible narcissistic blows. What better way to cover your tracks than to make it look like you’re delighted?

• Anouchka Grose is a psychoanalyst and the author of No More Silly Love Songs, a realist’s guide to romance