We don't enter into a relationship with the notion that this is short term, not usually anyway. Typically we hope for long term commitment and the first year is usually pretty great, they honeymoon phase if you will. Then you settle in and each of you are now comfortable revealing you true colours to each other. Sometimes your colours compliment each other sometimes they clash.
When we are in a new relationship we are unsure of our status with the other person, we try really hard to impress and are willing to compromise on issues that normally we wouldn't in an effort to ensure the other persons happiness. Why does that have to change? When does it change? What do we do to facilitate that change?
Relationships fall into three categories. First the honeymoon phase, as mentioned above. Second the fashion assassin phase and Third the colour blind phase.
Honeymoon Phase: This can last up to three years depending on the compatibility of the couple.
You know that period when you are first discovering each other, learning what pleases and what doesn't actually making an effort to ensure your new found loves happiness. Doing those little things to please them and being very appreciative of their efforts. It's a lot of figgin work and after a while we have to wean ourselves off the constant niceties. The trick here is to not go cold turkey but to maintain a level that will sustain you into the Fashion Assassin Phase.
Fashion Assassin Phase: This is where your true colours either clash or compliment and the duration is dependant on how you "look" together.
This can be long and happy if you compliment each other, and not in the verbal sense, however that helps. Are you the Yin to his Yang? Are you balanced as a couple and as individuals, do you embrace each others differences and compliment each other on what a great team you make. Congratulations you will likely move onto the colour blind phase with little conflict.
However if your colours clash you will know it and fast. Once the honeymoon phase passes and that knight in shining armour turns into an idiot in tin foil what do you do? Continue in the relationship hoping and praying that maybe he's just on vacation and will return to sweep you off your feet? Good luck with that. People are incapable of changing their true colours, their nature is what it is. No matter how hard you try or how much effort you put in, if the other person is a lazy procrastinator or controlling and manipulative you will not change that.
Keep in mind however that what you see is reflected back on you. You see them as lazy they may see you as a controlling nag. Be careful of what you accuse them of because they will have also formed an opinion of you bases on what they see. This is a recipe for disaster, this is why couples run into problems. It's not necessarily outside influences, however that can play a part. It's simply because their colours clash.
One thing I have observed in my relationships is that opposites while initially attract they are and always will be opposite or opposing. My ex is an extrovert I'm an introvert it was exhausting listening to him prattle on about how great he is and for him my lack of expression was read as a lack of interest, not true at first but eventually I did lose interest. My current partner is an introvert maybe even more so than me and it has lead to a lack of communication. It's all about balance, extremes of either personality will set the relationship out of balance. Too much of a good thing is not a good thing.
There are couples out there who compliment each other perfectly, this doesn't mean their relationship is perfect but they have the balance necessary to facilitate harmony in the relationship. They are not fashion assassins but well co-ordinated with all the right accessories and matching shoes. You know those couples, the ones most of the rest of us envy they have it all together right? Not necessarily trust me there is no such thing as the perfect couple, they just know how to continue complimenting each other in the face of adversity because they have balance.
Colour Blind Phase: This is reserved for couples who have made it through child rearing years and are so accustom to each others colours they have become colour blind to them. My parents for example.
My parents have been married for almost 44 years and they are the epitome of colour blind. They exist together because that's what they have always done. There colours have melded together creating an entirely new colour that is undetectable to the naked eye they are uni-coloured. This doesn't mean they have no individual personality, my parents are very different from each other it's just that over the past 44 years they have adapted to each others colours blending them and creating balance where there may not have been.
I remember growing up, my mom was the disciplinarian, with two daughters it's really no wonder, yet we were terrified or our dad. Not in a way that we though he would hurt us, more so in that we didn't want to see what would happen if we did piss him off. My dad's a big man with a big voice and you didn't need a cell phone to be called home for dinner you just needed my dad standing in the front door hollering for us, and you came running as soon as you heard the first bellow.
What do you do if there is no hope of balance or compliment? Do you continue to force that square peg into the round hole or do you give up and find a round peg? It depends on you conviction and commitment to the relationship as well as the other persons conviction and commitment. BUT you need to talk about it. You can't sit and stew about how your partner seems to ignore you until they want something from you, usually sex. This builds resentment. Day to day life events cause us to act or react and depending on the situation sometimes you need your partner to help you. If they are unavailable (even if in the room) you will grow to resent their in-action or lack of reaction.
How do you get back to the honeymoon phase to salvage your relationship? You don't that has passed and it's too late. That doesn't mean you give up it just means you have to be practical in you approach to repairing your bad relationship. You move forward, agree to disagree and try to find balance. If both parties are willing to do the work the relationship may survive. If only one is willing then you may as well stop wasting valuable resources on someone who just doesn't give a damn about you.
There is no invisible force field holding you to someone who really doesn't love or respect you, children growing up in such an environment learn that it's ok not to love your wife or husband because that's what they have grown up with, it's normal in their eyes and will lead to failed relationship after failed relationship.
So now I ask myself, why, if my parents have such a great marriage have I failed at more than my fare share? Because I honestly believed during the honeymoon phase that their attentiveness, commitment and care would last the rest of our lives. Once that phase passed and their true colours emerged (mine included) we clashed big time, there was no balance and no compliment. No matter how I tried I couldn't change them and I was wrong to think I could. You are not responsible for changing someone else only they can change themselves and trust me, they don't think there is anything that needs changing about them any more than you think you need to change.
Be true to yourself, take care of you and put behind you any notion that you are unworthy of finding your Yin. They are out there it's knowing how to recognise them. And that's a whole other story...
Tammy.
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