We all know that the most powerful force in our lives is love. In addition to providing us with soul-warming companionship, the emotion of love is truly inspiring. It's the great motivator, making life feel effortless. It's one of the many reasons most of us wish to live in its embrace.
Of course, the facts of our lives tell a sadder story. We have a very hard time making love last. The divorce rate in the U.S. still hovers around 50 percent. That figure doesn't even grapple with the many couples who live together without marriage and whose unions are even more apt to dissolve, bringing their own share of pain.
"Everyone wants their relationship to work," says Diane Sollee, M.S.W. "It's a goal that every single person has. And when relationships split apart, it's not through lack of trying."
Sollee is founder and director of Smartmarriages, an organization dedicated to making love last. "Why are couples stuck in the swamp?" she asks rhetorically. It's because they don't have the right information about marriages and lack understanding of how marriages work, she says.
"There's lots of research," she insists. "Relationships fail because people are operating on bad information about what to expect in marriage." What Sollee's organization does is specialize in disseminating good information to people about how to make relationships work.
First and foremost, Sollee says, people need to realize what marriage is and what it isn't. "People have crazy notions. They think marriage makes you happy. Marriage makes you married. It makes you a player in society in a different way."
Myth number two is the fantasy that everything will be wonderful as long as you find the perfect person, your missing half, with whom you merge. Wrong, says Sollee. Marriage is a team sport. It's one team with two people, two people with two different minds. The beauty of it is, it's two brains committed to going the distance together.
The difficulty is, it's two people. The misperception is that if you find the right person, you won't disagree. But in a real marriage two people disagree all the time, so they need to know nondestructive ways of expressing differences, and the inevitable disappointments that come from living with another person.
Researchers have mapped the way. At the very least, there are ways to state disagreement. You don't lead with criticism. You don't hurl contempt. You start with a statement of something you admire. Then you state your request for change.
No matter how well you search for the perfect person, life always throws some surprises. The messy fact is, people grow and change. Of course, this is a blessing, not a curse. But it is one more piece of proof that successful marriage hinges not on the perfect partner but on possessing skills for, among other things, negotiating differences, surviving change and staying in touch with each other through it all.
That means you and your partner need discussion skills and ways to stay updated on each other's wishes, hopes and dreams. In addition, you both need ways to exchange new information and ideas that are impacting your thinking as you go about life in the wider world.
Just as important is having a true roadmap of marriage, that is, knowing at the outset that there are specific bumps on the highway and when to expect them. For example, says Sollee, "the first two years a couple is essentially creating a new civilization. That's when the divorce rate is highest."
The next big bump comes with the birth of the first baby. There are new disagreements that arise with parenting. Surprisingly, the entry of the first child into school is the next big marriage hurdle. When report cards are issued and brought home, it's really the relationship that's getting evaluated: Can Johnny make friends? Can Sarah read?
It will probably come as no surprise that having an adolescent around is the next big bump in the road. The intensity of parenting issues goes up. So does the intensity of disagreement.
At each of these junctures you have to hunker down and shift gears. "Marriage is not about luck," says Sollee. "It's about mastery."
And when you know you have the tools to make love last, you wind up with energy. You gain a sense of possibility in life.
