Why Relationships Fail
by
William Cottringer

Mary and John argue all the time. They can't seem to communicate as well as they used to and they are going in opposite directions with their interests and friends. Both are feeling they are doing all the giving and are wondering if they are even with the right person. Job commutes and money matters are creating extra stresses, which they haven't even begun to deal with.

The couple spends all their time complaining about each other's annoying habits and has forgotten what the initial attraction was. Other pastures are starting to look greener and resistance to temptation is weakening. The relationship is on a downhill slide. Unfortunately, this scenario is a common one. What goes wrong in many relationships such as this on?

Having an intimate, long-term relationship with another human being is both the challenge and the opportunity of a lifetime. Successful relationships offer the most important things in life and even some things you can't get anywhere else.

The rewards range from the peace and contentment of unconditional love and acceptance to the exhilaration and joy of growth, happiness and success. Of course unsuccessful relationships can result in the punishment of unhappiness, heartache, loneliness, anger and poor self-confidence, which in turn, can all interfere with future relationships.

Healthy relationships also offer the fantastic opportunity for both people to "have their cheese and eat it too." Mary and John can experience both the freedom of independence and the security of dependence and both the complete acceptance for who they are, along with the welcome encouragement to become better. They can have romantic love, lusty love, platonic love, utilitarian love, best friend love, and higher love all together. On the other hand, a failed relationship can leave Mary and John wondering if they can ever get any of these things either alone or with someone else.

Why do so many relationships fail? The reasons are discussed below.

Selfishness

Healthy relationships require a natural balance between giving and taking. The more this balance is disturbed in either direction, the greater the uncomfortable feeling that something isn't right. Lopsided selfishness is a core problem that shows up as many different symptoms in unhappy relationships.

The trick is to realize there is only one way to achieve the needed balance and that is to put your stubborn ego aside and take the first step in doing the giving. The simple rule of Karma is when you give you get and when you take you have to give. When John waits for Mary to become more sexually responsive before he is willing to give her want she wants- to be supported emotionally and acknowledged for her other assets- he will be waiting in vain. And naturally, green pastures start looking even greener.

Keeping a balance sheet is another waste of time, because that approach also keeps you from doing what you need to do now, to get back in balance. Of course, if John is doing all the giving he is probably either with the wrong person or hasn't expressed his needs clearly, assertively or frequently enough. Maybe he just complains passively, which gets him nowhere. Or since he is not getting what he wants, he withholds what he thinks Mary wants.

Inequality

We are all really equal and any treatment to the contrary is disrespectful and offends our souls deeply. It also kills any kind of good feelings we might have been trying to give the other person. John's unequal treatment of Mary may show up in the way of a subtle sexist attitude that works its way through the foundation of their relationship like termites. The end result for both people is to imagine more inequality and then look toward greener pastures, which usually doesn't have a happy ending for anyone. Mary starts looking for emotional intimacy and John starts looking for physical affection.

Oddly, inequality is a red flag that should be seen in the beginning of a relationship before there is too much investment. Why didn't Mary see this inequity when first dating John? Did she sense it and just ignore her own intuition? Was she foolishly thinking she could change that aspect of John? Or was she being overly "realistic" and making an unnecessary sacrifice, thinking she couldn't get everything she wanted?

Inequality is not something you are likely to have much success at changing and it is not something you can or should overlook. This just reinforces the importance of making a good selection to begin with, which may be an underlying problem with all these other reasons for failed relationships. Or is it just simply our tendency to be impatient?

Intolerance

We all have many differences and when we focus too much on them, we can easily become irritated. It is important to keep the right perspective. It is the differences between people that make things interesting and challenging. Trying to change all the ways another person is different from you is futile and frustrating. Never the less many people still try to do it.

When Mary complains about John leaving lights on, loading up the hamper with three changes of clothes per day and playing the TV late at night, he just fires back about her credit card spending, coffee cups in the sink and overflowing trash cans. Where does that get either Mary or John? Nowhere, of course.

Healthy relationships require partners to focus on each other's strengths, not minor weaknesses. Unfortunately, time has a way of shifting our focus on the wrong things. Mary has an excellent job, keeps herself appealing, has many interests and is active in community affairs, whereas John makes good money, is a good conversationalist, keeps physically fit and has an overflowing positive attitude about everything. These are the things they should be focusing on, not the minor foibles everyone has.

The bottom line is that we all have bad habits, odd characteristics and other shortcomings that can easily get under another person's skin, and the less we complain about these things in our partner, the less he or she will complain about us. Unfortunately the opposite is usually what happens and once it starts it is difficult to stop. Little, insignificant ant hills have a way of becoming threatening volcanoes.

Incompatibility

Too many couples start out a relationship being so far out of alignment with their characteristics, interests, values and needs, that it doesn't take very long to dissolve whatever the initial attraction was. This is basically a problem in mate selection (impatience) and not something that is worth tolerating. Another problem is when two people allow themselves to grow apart from one another. This situation results in the same consequences- irreconcilable incompatibilities.

Incompatibilities are not likely to disappear and are real sources of unnecessary conflict and unhappiness. For example, If John smoked, was an eternal pessimist, had low energy, tended to be devious, wasn't very smart or educated and was physically unappealing, while on the other hand, Mary was bright, energetic, a non-smoker, attractive, trustworthy, an incurable optimist and highly educated, would they really have a fighting chance?

You might ask why would such an incompatible couple get together in the first place? But the fact is that this is not such an uncommon scenario as you may think or even want to acknowledge for yourself. The myth that opposites attract can be devastating.

Compatibility of moral values, sex drives, recreational interests, intellectual abilities, spiritual development and other basic needs is what makes a relationship enjoyable and comfortable. Unless two people are exceptionally fluid and changeable, what doesn't start out right will end wrong. At the least, the relationship will be uncomfortable and unsatisfying. This is a warning to be more patient in waiting for the right person and to take your time in evaluating the beginning of the relationship with both your head and heart to get what you want and need

Immorality

Healthy relationships are founded on honesty. Without honesty there is no trust and without trust there is no commitment. Without commitment the relationship is merely an "experiment" doomed to fail. Immorality is one of those non-negotiable items in life that many of us struggle ferociously to deny, but sooner or later reality wins out.

Immorality is doing anything intentionally that hurts another person, words included. When Mary catches John lying about finances or where he has been and he lies about those lies, he is implying she is either stupid or not worthy of being told the truth. Either way it is going to hurt and even make her angry. These feelings won't disappear.

Once trust is eroded through lies, infidelity and other forms or immorality, it isn't likely to come back. Immorality is probably the most flagrant violation of the most important rule of human relations: The Golden Rule. What could be a simpler guide than for John and Mary to treat each other the way they both want to be treated themselves? It is so obvious but so widely disregarded. But it can't be disregarded forever.

The mistake is in seeing immorality as a symptom of other more deep-seated problems. It is not a symptom; it is a core cause of relationship failures.

Poor communication

It is almost ironic that it is good communication that usually starts a good relationship, while it is poor communication that most always ends relationships. Mary and John started out talking through the night and now all they do is yell, accuse, complain, deny, rationalize, plot or withdraw. All that they need to talk about festers and boils inside.

Good communication requires intentional listening to respect and understand the other person better, open expression, thinking about what you are saying and why you are trying to say it, and appropriate reactions. It also involves little kindnesses, not always having to be right, the courage to confront potential conflicts and consistent assertiveness.

John needs to start listening to Mary with both ears, take the lead by paying attention to her emotional needs, ask if there is anything more he can do and then learn how to ask for the physical affection he wants in a tender, sincere way. Mary needs to ask for emotional support and acknowledgment of her other assets assertively, without appearing to be complaining and without withholding something as basic as physical affection.

Too often, in the beginning of a relationship something important does not occur. This is the open communication of expectations. It is the assertive communication of basic expectations such as recreational preferences, money management practices, and sex needs, which sets up clear, visible and fair boundaries. It is the unspoken expectations and unclear, unfair, invisible boundaries that, when crossed, start the deterioration of the relationship. Then John and Mary's communication typically escalates into loud, abusive arguing or dwindles into silence and it is just a matter of time before the relationship is over.

The quitting habit

Quitting anything has become so easy these days that it is a difficult habit to stop. With the technology and speed of today, we have learned to want everything now if not sooner. If we don't get what we want immediately, we give up and move onto something else. Taking the time and effort to deal with any little obstacle in our way is viewed as a waste. We even avoid potentially difficult things when we anticipate that we won't get what we want right away.

Relationships can't be easy all the time. They are designed to put is in a safe arena where we can grow as human beings. This can be an uncomfortable, time-consuming process. Part of the design is conflict, which blocks us from getting what we want right away and takes time and effort to resolve. Too many people like John and Mary walk away when the going gets tough. There is nothing to be learned in doing that though.

Mary and John started out on the right foot, but they both allowed their relationship to go South by making many common mistakes. They can't quit yet though, because they really haven't tried. They won't cure the relationship overnight, but by working together on one problem at a time, they will be headed back in the right direction and get immediate satisfaction for their efforts. Without making an effort to resolve their conflicts, they will just be postponing this inevitable requirement and it will confront them again until they eventually get it right.

The chance of a relationship surviving is obviously related to the degree of these other "failures." This is especially true in regards to whether or not the relationship has already gone past the point of no return. But there is an X-factor and this is the willingness of two people to stick it out during the toughest of times and work through the difficult conflicts to get to the other side. With the right desire, even "the point of no return" is merely a temporary perception.

For Mary and John to rebuild their relationship they have to find out how to change their little failures into successes, one by one. Their best starting point is to communicate about their miscommunication and how they both allowed that to occur. And, it is often the little, seemingly insignificant things that have wrecked the most havoc on their relationship, such as Mary insinuating in a heated argument that John was the most negative person she ever met.

There can be no greater accomplishment or reward than turning an uncomfortable, mediocre relationship into a satisfying, flourishing one. Actually, the opportunity will keep coming back until you get it right, so what are you waiting for?


William S. Cottringer is a business and fitness consultant, psychology instructor and writer from St. Louis, MO. He is the author of Passwords to The Prosperity Zone, 101 Ways To Get It, and You Can have Your Cheese & Eat It Too. He can be reached at ckurtdoc.charter.net or (314) 531-2000.