Passion is the feeling of exhilaration in the face of mystery. It arises from the heat generated by the intermingling of two people pursuing their own individual passions. So if partners sacrifice their own personal passions, interests, and friends for the sake of their relationship, that relationship will probably lose its passion.
Jealousy
A jealous partner may have experienced abandonment in his or her life and be easily triggered. Getting angry won’t help the situation. Be considerate and reassuring, but don’t start constricting your life to pander to the jealous partner’s fears, if they are unreasonable. Tell the jealous person that the suspicions are hurtful and are causing you to feel defensive and suggest focusing on his or her positive desires instead.
Feeling controlled
Those who are susceptible to being controlled need to stop fearing the other person’s reactions. That doesn’t mean becoming confrontational. You simply cannot let the fear of another person’s anger dictate your willingness to stand up for your values and needs. Calm, candid, honest communication is best to avoid developing a relationship based on fear and resentment.
Perfectionism
There is no reason you can’t have both the desire to excel and the ability to accept and enjoy the moment, which may be less than perfect. Laughter is much better for your health and your relationships than the anxiety of having to control for the perfect outcome. You rarely hear about the perfect dinner party, but an over-spiced, smoke-filled, ridiculously-problematic dinner tale gets a lot of mileage in laughter-filled stories long after the smoke clears.
Stress
Focus primarily on difficulties you can do something about. Taking control requires taking positive steps to deal with challenges, not ignoring the problems, suppressing the stress, or allowing yourself to be consumed by stress.
Taking control includes prioritizing situations in your life, changing your situation, and changing your perspective, and, just as important, relieving the mounting tension in healthy ways such as exercising, slowly exhaling, relaxing with friends or family, and developing a sense of humor. In cases where you cannot take physical action, you can take action by consciously changing your attitude and the way you think about the situation.
Difficult times
Feelings of fear and worry are important signals meant to get our attention in times of danger. Once we are alerted to difficulties, however, we need to harness fear and worry in favor of our personal power. The most useful powers in times of difficulty include courage, love, and clear thinking.
Experiencing vulnerability, including fear and sadness, is a crucial part of being able to feel empathy and love. However, we should not allow feelings and vulnerability to take over and engulf us in panic. Worry and anxiety are contagious and paralyzing. It is the power of our capabilities, our thinking, our courage, and our optimism that can best handle the inevitable difficulties of life.
Romantic relationships with intimate partners (significant others) are comprised of three components:
I. Mate Selection (Choice)
II. Relationship Model or Hypothesis
III. Termination Triggers
Mate selection is critical, of course, but even more important is to ensure compatibility between the mate selected and the model of relationship one has in mind. There are as many types of relationships as there are couples and one would do well to define precisely how one would like to live her life with her spouse. An open marriage calls for one kind of partner and a traditional one calls for another. Mismatches between the personality, character, and temperament of the members of the couple and the relationship model they have adopted are often the main fount of trouble, gnawing at the foundations and leading to the disintegration of the pair.
Yet, even when one’s mate, partner, or spouse has been selected with care to perfectly fit the relationship one has in mind – some relationships crumble. This is because the members of the couple have disparate “termination triggers” and abandonment anxiety thresholds. Insecurities, fears, and codependence often rise to the surface and lead to self-defeating behaviours, such as preemptive abandonment; (“I will walk away before he does.”)
Romantic, intimate relationships are comprised of various dimensions, functions, and axes. Deconstruct your past relationships in order to avoid mistakes in future ones.
Ask yourself:
How do you perceive the role of your relationships in fostering your personal growth and in attaining your life’s goals? This is known as your Personal Narrative.
Which of these internal and external functions matter to you most in your romantic relationships (use your answers construct a prioritized list)?
— Experiencing Love: romantic, “mature” (as distinct from mere and fleeting infatuation)
— Being desired, chosen, focus of attention/adulation
— Being exclusive/monogamous
— Excitement, thrill — to counter boredom
— Stability, safety, predictability, reliability — to counter anxiety
— Mirroring (emphasizing and sharing similarities)
— Personal growth enhancement
— Giving/Receiving
— Conformity (enhancing your social acceptability)
— Conferring social status
— Sexual Availability
— Non-sexual intimacy
— Procreation (having children)
— Companionship (unrestricted and immediate physical and mental availability of another person with whom one shares the same range of opinions, interests, and pursuits.)
— Friendship (deep, all-pervasive bonding to another person, involving full, unmitigated trust, a great measure of non-sexual or also sexual intimacy and the pursuit of the mutual well-being and happiness of both parties.)
Then proceed to identify your Commitment Triggers:
What is it that determines whether a prospective partner would end up being a one-night stand or your life-long spouse?
What are your Relationship Predictors?
Commit to paper (or screen) everything that your inner voice tells you when it says: “this maybe the one” and when it guesstimates how long the relationship is likely to last.
List your expectations of yourself and of your partner and generate a coherent Expectations (“what to look for”) Profile.
Determine how you test for reciprocity. Is it a quid pro quo type of ledger or accounting approach? Is it more diffuse, synoptic test?
How do you build trust in the context of your relationships? Do you share information with your partner? Are you more into “information discovery” (not to put too fine a point on it: spying)? Do you constantly gauge and test his reliability and responsibility? To what extent are you self-aware of your own good and bad qualities, fortes and limitations or shortcomings?
Sexual Trajectory:
What is the frequency of sex throughout the life of your typical past relationship? Are you sexually creative, imaginative, and inventive? Do you initiate or merely respond to advances and cues? Do you frequently end up finding yourself in sexless relationships? Are you mostly sexually available – or withdrawn? To what extent do gender roles express themselves in your sex life with your intimate partner? What about social, religious, and cultural strictures and biases?
Relationship Horizon
The partners’ expectations regarding the longevity of the relationship determines the relationship style. Do you expect your relationships to last, or are you doubtful, pessimistic, cynical, and fatalistic from the get-go?
Proximity – Spatial
Are you into cohabitation or otherwise sharing the same premises or area? Or, would you rather live in separate apartments and schedule your encounters? What role does territoriality play in the thriving and survival of your relationships?
Proximity – Temporal
Do you need to do everything together with your partner (clinging) or can you give him/her space? (Synchronous interactivity or time-delayed interaction)
Do you immediately progress from casual acquaintance to full-fledged commitment – or do you give it time and proceed incrementally, carefully, and gradually? Role Allocation
Who decides on the allocation of roles in the couple and how are they allocated? Do you typically talk over your roles (functions and responsibilities) and reach an agreement (explicit role allocation) or do you leave it to “life” and play it by ear (role allocation by emergence)?
Role Specificity
Once the roles in your relationships are defined are they “cast in stone” (rigid) – or subject to change as circumstances change and both of you grow and develop?
