Break Up Advice

People generally pay little attention to their emotions until they encounter a situation where an emotional reaction affects their lives in some dramatic way. In essence emotional episodes usually last for a very short period and are quickly followed by a return to the underlying mood. For example if you get a fright or see something funny the extreme of the emotional reaction only lasts for a few moments followed by a slow return to your normal state. In this type of situation your emotional systems are in balance and the purpose of the emotion is the motivate you to take action. When you are frightened you tend to move away from the situation and were you are amused you tend to move toward the source by continuing to watch or listen.

In a similar way the emotions experienced during a relationship break up are intended to make you take action. The action will be to either resolve the differences with in your relationship or to move away from it. The one major difference you will experience in this situation is that the emotions do not easily return to you normal state. In fact the negative and painful emotions can continue for months and even years into the future.

So what has gone wrong? Well put simply, in a break up we tend to not follow the message our emotions are giving us and as a result instead of moving away from the source of pain we cling onto it. Making the decision to let go of the relationship is very difficult especially since it means moving away from what we were comfortable with toward the unknown. People do not like the unknown; it frightens them into indecision which keeps them in the negative emotional cycle.

People who make the tough decision to move on find that they very quickly start to feel better and experience fewer emotional episodes.

Nothing in life is written in stone and deciding to walk away from your relationship does not mean you cannot pick up the pieces at some later stage. What you need right now is time and space to rest and recover from the emotional battle you have been involved in. Once you are feeling in control of your emotions you can make a choice about finding a new romance or re kindling your old one.

Fortune favours the brave; walk away from your painful relationship, for now at least

The secret to coping with a painful relationship break up is to acquire a better understand emotions and how they can be controlled and balanced. While people with a high degree of emotional control still experience the distressing effects of negative emotions they have a distinct advantage when it comes to the duration, intensity and frequency of the pain. Unfortunately few of us ever know how prepared we are for emotional trauma until we experience it and look back at how well we coped.

Fortunately for anyone currently suffering from the effects of love loss there is some good news. Firstly, it has been psychologically proven that people with a greater degree of understanding and habitual emotional control fare much better with emotional turmoil. Secondly, understanding emotions is quite straight forward and therefore does not require any special talent other than the ability to read and listen.

Anyone who has been through a break up will tell you that it is futile to continually torture yourself with unanswered questions about why you ex/partner did what they did. The answer to your emotional pain and future happiness lies not with your ex/partner but rather in obtaining a greater understanding of your own emotions.

The happiest people in the world are not necessarily the richest or the most intelligent but rather the people who habitually trigger positive emotions; either by design or nurture they have learned to balance their emotions.

You can continue to listen to agony aunts or you can help yourself by finding out why you feel how you do and what you can do about it.

The greatest difficulty with breaking up is coping with emotional turmoil. It’s like riding on a roller coaster, one minute you have it together the next you are a mess. Clearly getting control of your emotions is essential if you are going to cope with the situation. What causes them and can you do anything about them?

Your emotions have three major functions:-

1. Warning you of danger
2. Motivating you to take action
3. Letting you know if the action you took was effective.

If you put your hand on something hot a sharp pain will warn you of the danger, you will be motivated to take action (pull your hand back) and if the pain subsides you know you’ve done enough to avert the danger. If the pain stays you need to take further action because you are burnt, run you hand under cold water and seek medical advice.

When you feel emotional pain the process is exactly the same; you need to remove yourself from the source of the pain; if the pain continues you need to further action until the pain abates. The pain will continue until you stop putting you hand in the fire.

If you continue to feel emotional pain you need to think about what you are doing and what you are thinking about. Much of the pain felt during a break up is caused by obsessive thoughts about your relationship and what went wrong. People seem to think that if they can make sense of the situation they will stop feeling so bad. They can also fool themselves by believing that if they can understand what they did wrong they can resolve their relationship problems.

The mere act of asking questions which have no logical answer sends your brain into overload and it reacts by getting stressed. Your recovery from heartache will not begin until you stop looking for logical explanations for your ex partners emotional and illogical actions. There are no logical answers and the more you seek them the more you will suffer. When you get to the point where trying to save a relationship is damaging your health then it is time to walk away.

The pain of walking away will be much shorter lived that the ongoing battle with your ex/partner.

Your emotions carry a message which requires you to take action; ignoring your emotions will result in more pain.

If you are feeling heart broken this is a time for you to be self indulgent; even if it’s against your nature you need to become selfish for a while and focus on your own needs. Regardless of the circumstances of your break up you must cut your emotional ties with your Ex and go into recovery mode. Even if you have children your emotional needs must come first for now. Naturally it’s a balancing act but you must come out first some of the time. So make time for you to recover and regain your energy.

Your thoughts need to be primarily focused on your own recovery and that includes spending time and money on things which help make you feel better. Connect with friends, even if you haven’t seen them for some time they will be glad to see you and to help take your mind of your break up.

While being selfish may include sharing your wows with friends be aware that there is only so much they will want to here. Besides it is very therapeutic to get your mind off your troubles for a few hours at least.

Have a night out, go to the movies, go dancing, watch a play but get out and enjoy yourself. While drinking alcohol may seem like a good way to unwind you should be very wary of over indulgence.  Remember alcohol is a depressant and once the initial euphoria has subsided you may feel worse about your break up and do something silly; like sobbing, calling your ex, hunting down your ex in various pubs and clubs, going round to your ex house etc. My advice is to take it easy on the alcohol and if possible leave it out all together until you are feeling much stronger.

Other more positive activities include walking, running, going to the gym and numerous other forms of physical activity. Exercise produces chemicals called endorphins which are the bodies natural opiates; endorphins make you feel good so product as many as possible.

People often use the metaphor of a bank account to explain the ebbs and flows of a relationship; they call it an emotional bank account. You unwittingly open an emotional account with everyone you meet and just like a real bank account you can make deposits and withdrawals. Unlike a real bank account there is very little logic to these deposits and withdrawals. This is because the value we put on some thing we do for someone is often very different to the value they put on it. Also when someone does some thing negative the value we put on that can vary greatly from person to person depending on their perspective.

For example if a man buys a single red rose for his partner he may not value it as much as paying for her car repair but she may think the rose means much more. Even though the car repair cost many times more the rose had a higher value for the lady because it was a symbol of his love for her. This whole system revolves around personal values and therefore finding out what people value is essential for a relationship to grow or be sustained.

Using this emotional bank account can be a very good way of assessing whether your relationship is worth fighting for. You have a general idea of how much the relationship is over drawn, how much pain and damage has brought you to where you are now. By thinking about what your partner does for you and what value you attach to it you can determine how much needs to be done to rescue the situation. If your partner is unwilling or unable to see the deficit they are very unlikely to go the extra mile to repair the damage. You may also feel that your relationship is so much in the red that your partner does not have the capacity to make up the difference.

If you go through this exercise and come to the conclusion that your relationship is too damaged for it to be rescued then you are probably better to write it off.

Breaking up is very painful but can be less so if you can convince yourself that to rescue it would be futile. Decide whether your relationship is bankrupt; if it is save yourself a lot of pain and move on as quickly as possible. This exercise can also be useful for someone who had no say in the end of their relationship; if you come to the conclusion that you could not have rescued the situation then it is easier to accept what has happened.