Here’s the thing. A relationship is what psychologist David Schnarch, in his book Passionate Marriage, calls a ‘people-growing process’. It invites us to flourish by learning to overcome not just the problems of everyday life, but the specific problems that our partner and our partnership present. It invites us to step up to the challenge of becoming more tolerant, more patient, more loving than we were before, in order to cope with the one we love. (If this seems unfair, be reassured. It cuts both ways; a partner has to step up in order to cope with us.)
This challenge of people-growing is never going to be a constantly happy one. It can’t be. Poet David Whyte, in his work The Three Marriages, offers the metaphor of buying two houses in order to join them together – but instead of being able to simply knock down the walls, we have to demolish both houses completely so we can rebuild, and ‘from the razed foundations of our former individual [selves] make a new home’. Schnarch picks up on this metaphor but with an extra emotional challenge: that in order to do this we must become more loving not only to our partner, but to ourselves as well. We must be strong, self-contained, ‘secure’, comfortable in our own skin – for we need to feel ‘at home’ in ourselves in order to have ‘a good place to invite a spouse to visit’.
Standing in love
Both Whyte and Schnarch say the same – that this process is universal, that it is a good thing, that we need to welcome it as a way of maturing and developing, that long-term it will lead to happiness because it will help us thrive. Similarly, Erich Fromm, whom we met earlier in this book, says that falling in love is inevitably followed by a period of needing to ‘stand’ in love, if our relationship is to survive. Happiness will not necessarily be what marks progress; sometimes there will be pain.
A common response to all this is to swallow hard as one tries to come to terms with the shock revelation that even the most successful ‘love, sweet love’ doesn’t always feel so sweet. But there often follows a sigh of relief that relationship problems don’t imply that the partners are wrong for each other or that they necessarily need to separate. For even if we make the most perfect partner-pick in the world, we will at some point meet challenges. We will always be required to master the essential human balancing act of trying to answer our own needs while meeting those of our beloved, of loving ourselves while loving another, and of growing through that process.
So the key aim in finding the right partner should not be to try to avoid that balancing act – it’s inevitable – but to find someone for whose sake we’ll attempt the act because we love them so much, someone who loves us so much that they’ll make the attempt for our sake. The question for both sides becomes how to choose a partner who is so compelling that we’re willing to demolish our own house in order to rebuild a more beautiful mutual home.
Diamond-polishing
The good news is that we likely know how to choose correctly even when we’re not doing so deliberately. For humans are drawn towards those who help them grow; the message from Whyte, Schnarch and Fromm is that partner choice is the way we actively, though often unconsciously, choose to mature. Schnarch even likens it to the meeting of two flawless but rough diamonds that rub away every part of themselves that doesn’t fit in order to stay joined together. The end result is not only a loving relationship, but two sparkling jewels.
So, for example, we may be drawn to someone who needs something from us that we find it hugely difficult to deliver: attention even when they are angry, energy even when we are drained, emotional control in the face of difficult circumstances. Over time, because we care, we learn to step up and meet these challenges – and in this way develop a part of ourselves we would otherwise never have developed.
Or, we may pair with someone who – once the rose-coloured glasses are off – manifests some vulnerability or fault that we dislike, or even deny, in ourselves. Because love means we are motivated to understand and accept that partner, we learn to accept and understand our own vulnerabilities – and so we thrive.
More unexpectedly, perhaps – for more explanation of this, reread Chapter 3 – we may find someone whose personality reflects that of someone from our early past with whom we’ve had a complicated relationship. That reflection may make our current relationship complicated – but given that we are now older and more mature, we may learn to relate to our partner in a way we never could to the original. We may grow up sufficiently to create a happy ending this time round.
Take some time to think back to past relationships with partners (or friends, or family) where things were challenging but left you changed for the better, even in small ways. You’ve almost certainly, in those relationships, chosen to be with people who helped you with the diamond-polishing. So what did those relationships give you? What benefits have you gained? And what can you learn that will help you begin – and maintain – your future partnership?
The right order
How can we tell whether a partner will help us mature in these ways and whether we can help them in return? There’s no formula, no guaranteed way of discovering if someone constitutes our growth opportunity – and as with attachment tendencies, real evidence may only be possible when the relationship’s well beyond the point of first choosing.
But in the earlier going, certain signs are encouraging: feeling ourselves becoming more emotionally truthful, and seeing our partner becoming equally more authentic; feeling encouraged by them to reach our potential, and being able to encourage them to do the same; finding ourselves both learning and teaching, like Elizabeth Bennet; or finding ourselves emotionally healing and professionally achieving, like Elizabeth Barrett. In her novel Beloved, the author Toni Morrison describes this kind of personal development as if the person in question were a jumble of jigsaw pieces, taken up by a partner, rearranged and returned ‘in all the right order’. If we have chosen well, both partners may find their ‘pieces’ falling into place.
The sparkle
The lesson of this chapter is not that we should choose a partner with whom things are tough from the very beginning – if that’s what’s going on, it’s not the right relationship. The lesson is that the best love is a three-part process, with the initial delights driving us on to ride out the medium-term challenges for the sake of long-term rewards. To complete the stories with which we began this chapter, David and Victoria Beckham are near to celebrating two decades together, while David Copperfield learned to accept his wife’s failings and so allowed his marriage to gain stability, even if it was cut short by Dora’s death.
Enough, then, of any alarm bells. My original statement of belief in love still stands, and more. Because, firstly, whether or not a relationship lasts, being love-struck may be worth it just for the experience. And, secondly, if the relationship does last, love-struck is a wonderful place to start. The very fact we are so drawn to someone else – the lure of the obsession – is a huge motivator to stay loyal if things become challenging. The fact that we want so much from a partner means we’re driven to deliver in return. The fact that ‘falling in love’ means we bond, connect, open up, reveal and respond to each other emotionally creates the foundation for ‘standing in love’ further down the line. If what’s left after the earthquake subsides is a solid core of commitment, then we have the best of both worlds.