My first girlfriend, her Jewish parents really wanted her to break things off with me and that was one of their plays.
"Stay away from him for a while and if it's meant to be then you'll get back together"
She bought into it fully, having watched lots of romance movies. Having some distance just made it easier for her to stay broken-up with me, since every time she saw me she'd end up wanting to get back together because I made her laugh, cheered her up, was doting, and so on. So her parents got her to "put some space" on the relationship to "see if it's meant to be"
All I can say is... "lol"
We both just sort of moved on before long because nothing was happening, and my attempts to get together were met with "but we gotta have distance to see if it's meant to beeeeee" until I went "alright fuck this then" and told her off. Which I'm guessing was the exact desired result for her dad.
TLDR: "Figuring out if you love someone" by separating is a bunch of bullshit and used by manipulative people to force an actual real separation.