I had a couple of dogs when I was a young boy. Like all kid’s dogs, they were with me for many years. I shared a lot of my life with them. Many days they were my only companion as I was deep in the woods fishing, or wandering looking for who knows what. Eventually my dog’s in their turn grew old, and eventually died. They lived good lives, and I missed them terribly. I would cry over them, but one day I realized I was crying about how I felt, not about them being gone.

Now farther down the road, I know it is the same with relationships. If you go to any blog web listing, say wordpress.com for instance, there is a number of recent blog posts written every few minutes about a relationship that has ended. What confuses me however is I don’t read about how grief stricken some of the hapless bloggers are. I read some of the posts a second or third time and I do not see where they are overwhelmed by the situation.

What I do read is they are stricken over the effect someone leaving is having on them. They are overwhelmed that someone could not be in love with them. They are grief stricken that the relationship is over. They can not fathom the idea that someone could possibly want to be somewhere else than with them.

I could be wrong in my thinking here, but by the time they get to this point in their lives it should be clear that the world does not revolve around them. It should be apparent that the other person had a life before them, and they will are going out to find their life again with someone who thinks about life the same way they do. I have met a few people that are really heartbroken, and have been for years that someone they loved with all their being left them, but that is not what I read in most blogs.

They are not crying about the relationship, or what happened in it. They are generally sad for themselves, and how this effects them. For those of you who have solid relationships you understand what I am getting at. A good relationship is not all about you, a good relationship is all about direction.

If someone enters a relationship for themselves, they better find someone with no self worth who thinks they only exist to make someone else happy. For any relationship to work, there must be a few things going in the same direction.

First you have to forget about looks. They are a relationship built on sand. Looks only last a short time, and then most people start to forget that they were first drawn in over looks, and start looking for something more in the relationship. If you are the jealous type, you better look for a homely person…

Secondly, it is important to share the same thoughts on the most important things in your life. If you can not find agreement on those things most important to you, you are heading for a breakup. Write down the four or five most important things in your life and find out if they feel the same way before you get serious.

Find out how you both feel about time away from each other and what you expect from each other as boundaries. For example if you are the quiet type, and they like to be with many people, one of you is going to be hurt. Remember too, what you see is what you get, people do not change because you want them too.

I am by no means an expert, but these things will help. If you enter any shallow based relationship , do not expect it to last. When it does end, do not be surprised, and remember, it is not all about you. They invested part of their life too. If you feel like crying over the relationship, think about what you are crying over. Usually you will find it is all about how you feel. When that happens be happy, you are one of the lucky ones in it is over quickly.