Mar 30
I Vow to Love You…Until I Don’t
“I, ___, take you, ___, to be my husband/wife. I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health. I will love and honor you all the days of my life.”
These or similar words, pledging one’s life to another, are said during most wedding ceremonies and yet for 41%* of divorced Americans apparently the vow to love our partner only lasts until “I don’t anymore.” With wedding season quickly approaching. it’s the perfect time to explore the behavior of LOVE.
No one goes into marriage thinking “I know this isn’t going to work but let’s do it anyway” so how do so many married people end up with the wrong partner?
Love Undefined – We have a general idea of the love we want but we don’t define it in detail. Without our own filter for love it’s easy to unconsciously accept someone else’s definition (especially for people orientated individuals). In new relationships we also tend to consciously adapt to our partner under the guise of compromise. Since love was never clearly defined, the partner has no idea of the compromise and we are left feeling resentful, unfulfilled and unloved over time.
Use my Ideal Mate Worksheet to help define the love you want – this works equally well for single people as married couples.
Unmet expectations – We each go into a relationship with an expectation of what our relationship will be. The problem is we don’t often voice our expectations and then we’re disappointed when they go unmet. The beginning of a relationship is the most important time to be honest with ourselves and our new partner. However, we tend to hold back our own wants and desires at the start of a relationship for fear of losing it. It’s important to remember, a relationship based on unmet expectations is doomed to fail over the long-term.
Use my Expectations Inventory to discover where you may have unmet expectations in your life.
Behavioral misunderstanding – We are often attracted to behavioral characteristics in others we lack. In the beginning of the relationship these traits appear admirable, endearing and even cute. Overtime these same qualities drive us crazy. The key to understanding others, is knowing ourselves first so we can better predict behaviors in our partner we can live with for the long haul.
To better understand your behavior take my quick DISC assessment. Then schedule time to talk with me about your results and what they mean.
When saying “I do”, it’s important to know the average person is emotionally available 50% of the time, which means 2 people being emotionally available simultaneously happens approximately 25% of the time (if we are lucky). These statistics (Gottman Institute) leave relationships ripe for misunderstanding more often than we like to admit. How we deal with those misunderstandings is the key to saying, “I vow to love you…forever.”
Laura Treonze, serves as Chief Life Strategist with LMT Consulting, which helps executives and teams create massive success through self-awareness. Her life-changing approach has transformed individuals and families and has redefined the way non-profits and corporations “do” business.
