Marriages are breaking up at an alarming rate even in good old Australia.
So, what’s new?
Gossip mags are filled with celebrity breakups week after week and as tends to follow, we - the general public -  more and more accept 2nd, 3rd and sometimes even more marriages as being ‘the norm’. But at what cost? What is the real cost of separation? I don’t mean the financial cost, although that can be absolutely debilitating. What I am talking about is the mental and emotional cost - the stress and distress that accompanies separation and divorce.

After separation or divorce at least one of you will be wading through the splinters of your shattered dreams. Where children are involved, they too are left to pick up the pieces - pieces that are far too heavy for little people. Often working with couples who go through this process all I can say is that the cost is enormous.

So, what can you do? How can you make sure that your relationship is one of those that's going to last?

You need to build it. Yes, you need to put into this process just as much time, effort, planning, goal setting and plain old elbow grease as you would if you were going to build a house. A love relationship, just like a house, needs strong and solid foundations. My understanding - although I’m not a builder - is that a house needs a concrete slab before it can be successfully built. So, imagine your house going up on a slab of dirt, gravel or sand. How long would it take before it would come crumbling down? Would it be able to withstand gusts of rain, wind storms or the heat of summer? I doubt it!!!

We need to recognize that the same is true for a love relationship. Unless it is built on a solid foundation, it won’t take much to shake it, crack it and, eventually, break it. The building blocks that ensure that your relationship house is built on a strong and sturdy foundation are:

TRUST

RESPECT

COMMITMENT

COMMUNICATION

TOGETHERNESS

SEPARATENESS

TOLERANCE

FORGIVENESS

Please join me as over the next couple of months we'll take an in-depth look at these individual building blocks.

Love begins when the needs of someone else become more important than your own.
(Lao Wei, Strawberry Wisdom)