These days, anyone starting a relationship should be aware that it probably won’t last very long. High divorce rates speak for themselves, and everything suggests the figures will get worse in the future, since the trend is clearly upward. But there is one thing we probably can’t escape: the pain of watching a relationship we began with such excitement come to an end.
Why this happens matters little. In the end, all we can do is focus on some very common mistakes we tend to make in relationships, from the point of view of psychology and neuroscience, drawing on the research of three psychologists and authors who specialise in relationships.
(See: 5 rituals to reverse depression and raise your happiness levels, according to neuroscience)
1. The magic doesn’t wear off. Often, we just discover the trick
When we meet someone, our brain experiences a whole flood of endorphins and dopamine at astonishing levels. That means that at that moment we don’t see the person as they are, but as we want to believe they are.
That is why some of the things we used to love about that person end up driving us up the wall. What we once called their special quirks, we now call manias and flaws. We think the person has changed, but the only thing that has changed is our perception of a behaviour we once adored.
Of course, it is also true that some people are masters of deception when it comes to hiding major flaws in order to win the other person over. But people are constantly telling us who they are, if we pay attention. You have to learn to read people, and sometimes the best reading of a person comes not from interpreting what they are telling you, but from listening to everything they are not telling you.
2. Your partner doesn’t choose you. Ultimately, you choose your partner
If we asked a young woman what kind of man she is looking for, I imagine she would say something like: “someone romantic and fun, who makes me laugh, who loves me very much, who makes thoughtful gestures and who is faithful.”
Many women would agree that it is very hard to find a man like that. Curiously, though, that is what most men are like. The thing is, people don’t always look for what they say they are looking for. And sometimes they don’t even know it themselves.
A woman may find herself attracted to a jealous man, and may even be attracted by the fact that he gets into a fistfight with another man for looking at his partner.
Violence against women by their partners often has a common factor: it is committed by a violent man. So if you are attracted to a violent person, it is probably only a matter of time before that violence is turned on you.
Remember that, as a rule, you find exactly the person you were looking for.
In other words, if you like men with a fake red nose who work in a circus, you shouldn’t be surprised if you end up with a clown.
3. Bad choices
Often the relationship is broken from the start because the choice was wrong from the beginning. A ship that set sail in bad shape cannot reach a safe harbour.
The psychologist Walter Riso, author of Manual para no morir de amor: Diez principios de supervivencia afectiva (roughly, “A manual for not dying of love: ten principles of emotional survival”), explains the three basic pillars of a relationship. If a relationship lacks any one of them, it is doomed to fail, and we are doomed to suffer.
For Riso, every relationship needs eros, philia and agape:
- Eros is sexuality, and sex within the couple is a basic pillar.
- Philia is friendship: if a couple are not friends, the relationship is incomplete.
- Agape is concern for one another and the desire to make the other person feel good; in other words, focusing on the other person’s happiness beyond our own.
Put another way, your partner should be your lover, your beloved and your friend. A fruitful long-term relationship is unthinkable if one of these supports is missing.
4. Opposites attract, but only for a good time
People often say that opposites attract, but in that case only eros (sexuality) is talking. To sleep with someone, all you need is to be attracted to them.
The psychologist John Gottman, author of What Makes Love Last?, is clear on this point: couples who are very similar to each other last longer than those who share few similarities. But Gottman is referring to similarities in fundamental values and in the kind of beliefs each person holds.
A thief married to a policewoman is a happy couple that only works in Hollywood films. On the other hand, extreme differences in culture, religious beliefs and even political leanings can cause major conflict in a couple.
So opposites may get on very well in bed, but they rarely end up well as a couple because, depending on the differences we are talking about, that attraction could be as dangerous as a train crash.
(See: How to get over a heartbreak in 72 hours)
5. Love doesn’t conquer all, and it doesn’t move mountains
Often the mountain ends up crushing you. Sometimes both people are in a very complicated situation, and some decide to believe that love will overcome it, but in a high percentage of cases they will discover that love can’t overcome everything.
Aaron T. Beck discusses this in Love Is Never Enough. Indeed, love is not enough when the circumstances are not right or when there is a huge difference in culture and beliefs.
The romantic story of Romeo and Juliet was not really written to show how beautiful love is, but to show the stupid things two people can do when they fall in love with the right person in the wrong circumstances. As the joke goes, “a three-day romance that ends with both leads committing suicide together isn’t exactly what you’d call romantic.”
6. The drunk syndrome in couples
Often, as time goes by, one partner may start focusing only on the negative side of situations or of the other’s actions.
In Love Is Never Enough, Aaron T. Beck explains how partners interpret certain behaviours of their spouse negatively, giving rise to a destructive cycle.
There could be millions of reasons why a person does what they do, and no, we don’t know the answer. But we think we do, and it is almost never a positive interpretation of a behaviour we didn’t like.
This is called the drunk syndrome, because a study found that drunk people tend to get into more fights, since alcohol strengthens the belief that others have done something with the intention of screwing you over.
In other words, a drunk sees two people laughing on the other side of the bar and thinks they are laughing at him; and if someone bumps into him, he may think it wasn’t an accident but something deliberate and disrespectful.
This syndrome shows up in many relationships, where we behave like those drunks, assuming that some harmless mistakes or slip-ups by our partner are signs that they act that way because they don’t love us.
When people think negatively and always assume the worst, they can fall into something similar to clinical depression, but as a couple. That is, the relationship can enter a kind of depression in which we look at anything our spouse does from a state similar to a psychological disorder.
According to Gottman, a relationship will last as long as it takes the couple to go from focusing on the positive to focusing on everything negative in the relationship. That doesn’t mean the relationship ends there, because there is what he calls a zombie couple: a dead romance between two people who still put up with each other, or who, partly because of philia, don’t dare take the step of leaving.
7. Sometimes things only mean what they mean
In couples, we often tend to interpret certain facts that need no interpretation. For example, the fact that your partner is late, as a rule, only means that they are late, and not that “they’re late because they don’t love me and couldn’t care less about what I want.”
All the more so if punctuality has never been one of their virtues, which you should know by now.
Sometimes it isn’t the person’s behaviour that changes, but their situation, which forces the behaviour to change: a new job with longer hours, more accumulated mental fatigue, or hundreds of other factors. At other times they may simply be exhausted, and that doesn’t mean they no longer feel the same way about you.
8. Communication
Last but not least, lack of communication may be the biggest relationship killer there is. By the same token, early and fearless communication could stop two people from starting a relationship they should never have begun.
Listening and listening to the other person… listening to their concerns and needs isn’t only useful in sales. It is essential in a relationship, because sometimes a person may have expectations that we will rarely be able to meet.
For example, imagine your partner wants to have five children (and it’s not negotiable) and you don’t like children (you would be willing to have one). Just as important, you need to have certain conversations about that person’s priorities. (See: 5 money conversations you should have with your partner before getting married)
Above all, though, it’s about communicating to understand your partner’s needs and to help them understand yours. Only then can we know whether they will meet our expectations, and whether we will meet theirs.
And remember: people don’t change. One of the most serious mistakes a couple can make is to think that someone who hasn’t changed certain annoying habits in five years together will change once they get married. Especially when it comes to values.
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Featured image: Unknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
