Relationships and Choice

Let me begn by stating what seems to be universally accepted: relationships are hard. In this case, my use of the word "relationship" speaks to those of the romantic variety in which two people join together because they are mutually attracted and want to maintain an exclusive commitment toward each other. Often times the end result of this is marriage or, at least, going steady, being pinned or living together. Interestingly, other relationships we have do not seem to be so challenging. For instance, I get along just fine with the person who takes my dry cleaning, co-workers, students with whom I interact, and even people at the gym I frequent.

All of us are involved in multiple relationships. My guess is the great majority of those relationships or connections are positive and cordial. Even in the professional world of public relations, so many interactions are positive even if we do not always generate as much publicity as we want, hit the target we are shooting for, or attract as many clients as we wish. Thus, if one were to make a list of all the relationships in their life, my hypothesis is very few would be placed in the negative column. As social beings, we need relationships inthe broad sense and, for the most part, seem to be pretty good at establishing and maintaining them.

Assuming this is true, I go back to the initial statement about relationships of the heart being hard. Are they really? If so, is the reason for this because we do not know what to do to make them successful or because we decide we no longer want to do what is needed to keep them viable and strong? My sense is when those special relationships take a negative turn or fail it is not because of any mysterious or mystical reason. We have and knowledge-base to keep those ties bound tightly. They fail or end out of choice rather than something beyond our level of comprehension. It is a choice-thing.