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I have been looking critically at relationships in the last couple of months as a means of finding the failure points as a result of my two failed marriages as well as multiple challenging relationships I manage.
I guess I have reached the stage in my life where I am tired of all the BS!
I am tired of the song and dance around relationships and I am questioning what the value in relationships actually are? Cynical view right?
Well, I have come to see that the main problem with relationships is that everyone wants honesty, but not total honesty!
The general view is that certain things are on the table for honest conversation or discussion and then there are a host of things which are not.
My personal experience has shown me that conversations around family, finances, kids(blended families) and religious convictions are the types of conversations that are off the table. The very thought of raising any of these things causes friction and even animosity in a relationship.
I have had to ask myself why people choose to be together if such matters are not to be dealt with in the confines of a committed relationship?
Have we become so feeble-minded and weak, that we choose to live in an imaginary utopia where we steer clear of challenging conversations and things that we choose to ignore because it challenges our very understanding of what it is we are trying to avoid?
Do we think that fostering relationships absolves us somehow from dealing with matters that make said relationships challenging and almost impossible to navigate?
We are fooling ourselves into thinking this is normal or in any way healthy. I would venture to say that this is why many people are afflicted by mental illnesses these days.
The argument around relationships from previous generations lasting as long as they did, being a result of the couple's conviction to work things out is generically thrown out as the argument for why other generations are so bad at staying together and finding ways to make things work, as well as laying the platform for the criticism that the other generations are weak and immature and that is why those generations are such a mess is thus perpetuated.
I can call on various arguments for why relationships are more challenging now, and how the current setup is not conducive to long and lasting relationships, but that would be an argument for another day.
The core affliction by my calculation is communication! Communication automatically stirs up a bunch of stereotypical sayings and colloquialisms we have by and large come to accept and buy into, such as:
Communication is a two way street.
Everything rises and falls on communication.
Communication is key.
I could bat on about the different clichés around communication, but I am pretty sure we all could add to the list with all the clichés on communication that we have come to know and learn of in our lifetime.
The crux of the matter is simply that couples cannot and do not engage fully in all-encompassing honest conversations. We withhold, water-down, and ignore full and honest communication under the guise of sparing the other's feelings or rationalizing that the other party isn't interested and doesn't need to know, until such time as the conversation in question becomes a problem in the relationship.
I know that many would at this point argue that this isn't the case, or that I have totally gone off the deep end with this, until something happens in the relationship that brutally highlights the point. I have experienced a great many such instances based on personal experience, and I postulate the following items:
rearing and disciplining of children
financial decisions around helping family
financial goals and allocations in the relationship
dealing with family members meddling
religious affiliation and its effect on children(blended or homogenous families)
personal goals
critical decisions relating to children's health and well-being
I have never been able to have an honest conversation about these to list but a few items. I have been told at times that my honesty is too brutal, my views are one-sided, that I have some context missing or my personal favorite, I just don't want to talk about that. So the question then becomes?
Why would you go into a relationship knowing that open communication and honesty was not on the table? So relationships work on the premise that you see yourself being with another person as a means of building something together? Did I miss something? Am I fielding a misguided view? Why go into a relationship then, if off the bat our intent is to be dismissive, coy, avoidant or disingenuous? Spare each other the frustration, pain and discontent if that is the intent.
Honesty too brutal, then one has to ask the question why is my view of such a nature that I see honesty being too brutal?
One-sided viewpoint points to the need to then share viewpoints in order to broaden the perspective, or maybe the party claiming the other person's viewpoint is one-sided is the one who chooses to see only their viewpoint?
Missing context points to the fact that the other person hasn't been given all the facts, signaling yet again that a critical conversation was not had.
Not wanting to talk about something indicates a discomfort with the subject matter for one or the other reason, indicating that once again, a critical conversation has been missed.
The initiation of an intimate relationship signals our need to share our lives with another person, and yet we subconsciously sabotage it with the narratives we have running in our heads around the level of honesty we are prepared to have with the person we bring into our lives.
I ask the question again, why do we then choose to go into relationships when our intent is not to be open and honest?
My kids have formed really strong views on relationships based on what they have seen in my failed marriages and relationships, many of those things were never really mentioned until we had a conversation on relationships, and I was then shown how they view relationships from friends, family all the way to marriage. The main thing they had come to realize was that people don't say what they mean, but more especially that people don't mean what they say. I feel terrible for giving my kids this view on relationships, but I would rather have them walk into situations with their eyes wide open, than to experience any of the things I have had to experience.
#blaauwchronicles#donttalkaboutitbeaboutit#arkanelifestyle #reflection #introspection #relationships #honesty#dolcevita#itsalllove#loveyours#legacy#authenticity#perspectives#communication
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