A Relationship Breakup: A Chance to Ready Yourself For Life's Next Chapter

Aug. 2, 2010 - PRLog -- MALIBU, CALIF.-- Despite the advice from family, well-meaning friends and therapists, you couldn't save your relationship. Instead of believing the relationship failed, however, view it as being complete--a relationship that has simply run its course, says Dr. Noelle Nelson, relationship expert and author of Your Man is Wonderful (Free Press, 2009).

   "As painful as it may be to acknowledge, some people are not in our lives forever, yet the experience of being with them has great validity," says Nelson. "When you can use the experience as a springboard to greater happiness, you can radically transform what appeared to be a definitive disaster into something positive."

   First, look at what the experience taught you about yourself, suggests Nelson. "Maybe you fell in love with love, and didn’t really look at who this person was you were inviting into your life," she says. "Perhaps you learned that you need to use your head as much as your heart when you embark on your next romance."

   Second, what did the experience teach you about what you need in a mate? Make a list. "This is a list you probably couldn't have written before the relationship," says Nelson, "but knowing what you do now, the items on the list become much more real."

   Third, take a cold, hard look, at how you behaved in the relationship. “You have no control on how your partner behaved but you can learn how to do things differently in the future," says Nelson. "This is where counseling can be immensely valuable. You receive the benefit of a neutral eye (unlike our mother, siblings or friends) to determine what were the good choices you made and which were less so."

   Sometimes, no matter how hard we try, relationships don't work. "The experience may have brought much joy, many lessons, but often a greater knowledge with which to move forward into a happier future," says Nelson.

   For more relationship tips, go to Nelson's blog, http://anotefromdrnoelle.blogspot.com  or follow her on Twitter, http://twitter.com/drnoellenelson.

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Dr. Noelle Nelson, relationship expert and author of Your Man is Wonderful (Free Press, 2009). For more relationship tips, go to Dr. Nelson's blog, http://anotefromdrnoelle.blogspot.com, on Twitter or www.noellenelson.com.