Men, and women, who won’t commit
by Mira and Charles on June 9th, 2009I recently did an interview about men and women who have trouble committing. The way these things work, only a few sentences of the interview will make it into print. So for you, here’s the whole thing:
1. What are some of the reasons people are unable to commit to relationships, even if they want to?
MK: There are lots of reasons people are unable to commit to a relationship. Here are the top five. There’s the Fatal Flaw: everything is great but there’s this one thing about the other person – a big belly, an embarrassing job, a slant toward stinginess – that feels like a hurdle that can’t be overcome.
There’s the Barely Passing Problem: the other person is okay, but just okay. There’s nothing wrong, but the good stuff is only so-so.
There’s the Haunted-by-the-Past Problem: Problems from a past relationship are so fear producing that even a wonderful new person can’t bring you past those fears.
There’s the Old Flame That’s Still Burning Problem. The old relationship may be over but the feelings, and the hopes, are not dead.
There’s the Still-Looking Problem: the current relationship might be just fine, but you can’t shake the feeling that you could do better, that you deserve better.
2. What are some of the ways you can tell whether someone isn’t right for you or whether you’re repeating a pattern of non-commitment?
MK: Well, to tell if someone is not right for you…read my book Is He Mr. Right? It’s the classic book on the subject. As for whether you’re repeating a pattern of non-commitment: if you’ve had a pattern, then you’re probably repeating it.
3. If you’re stuck in a pattern of ending relationships as soon as you find fault with the person you’re with, are there ways to retrain your thinking?
MK: The key to ending the pattern of always bailing out is to understand the difference between settling and good enough. Settling is when you go along with a relationship that doesn’t meet your most important needs but you stay in it because you think that something is better than nothing. Good enough is very different. Good enough means you’ve found a relationship that gets the job done, meets all your important needs, gives every promise of making you happy. Perfect? Who know? The best possible? Who cares? With Good Enough you’ve entered the territory where search costs are going to chew up all hope of gain. If you understand this, you can commit if the relationship is right for you.
4. To what extent does our environment - information overload, shortened attention spans, addiction to novelty - affect our relationship duration and quality? Or are there other factors that encourage us to place less value on sustained relationships?
MK: Quite literally everything in the media makes it hard to commit to someone who’s right for you. All we see are unrealistically happy couples, perfect people, images of the thrill of the hunt. We never see images of people finding a flawed but perfectly terrific person and then doing the basic work you always have to do to keep a relationship working well.
Well, there you have it. I’d LOVE to hear your comments. And if you are looking for the definitive book that will tell you if someone’s right for you, you gotta get a hold of Is He Mr. Right? And if you’re already in a committed relationship, there’s the classic Too Good to Leave, Too Bad to Stay, which some people say is the best relationship book ever, period. Everything you need to know is in there.
Love, Mira
