I compare the energy released when a marriage breaks up to the energy released when an atom is split. It takes an amazing amount of power to join to people into one and if the union then formed is broken again that energy has to be released. We spend our childhood and youth forming a personality as an individual and it takes enormous hormonal power to push us into the arms of another and to then accept them as a part of our lives so we are no longer an isolated unit we must allow great psychological transitions to happen. One part of that process is to identify the other with our primal dream image of an ideal mate. As that image is not clear to our conscious mind it is very possible to pick ‘the wrong one’. Life is complex and difficult so it is not only possible but quite likely that a relationship which made us feel complete at one point in our life journey will no longer be ‘the right one’ later in our life. Then comes the problem of splitting it up. The huge investment of two selves into each other is difficult to untangle and to abandon the dream is terrifying. Even if both fully understand the reasons enormous quantities of emotion are released if the relationship is to end. We all know people who hate each other just as powerfully as they formerly loved each other. Nuclear family fission is awesome in its power.