Tuesday, February 08, 2011

1st entry - Fragile Relationships

For some people, its not easy to find someone to fall in love with, especially if you hope that person also feels the same way about you - kind of. Like procurement, first you need to decide what you want (coming up with the basic "specifications") and ascertain your own readiness for commitment, then you need to find someone who more or less matches your requirements. Once you have zeroed in on your target (or targets), you can start your courtship - a mutual fact-finding process that is usually an enjoyable experience for most people - in fact this is the fun part. Ultimately, your objective is to know whether the person your had identified is "relationship material" i.e. someone you want to be committed towards.

The more fortunate ones (like me) eventually succeed in finding someone to love and are more or less certain that their feelings towards their beloved are genuinely reciprocated (or at least believes that the significant other also has similar honorable intentions). Begin "Phase 2" i.e. developing a relationship. If Phase 1 was difficult, the next Phase will be even more challenging.

When you are madly in love, you think that nothing else matters. Suddenly you are filled with irrational optimism that everything will work out, including the impossible. "Love conquers all". But as the dust settles and reality kicks in, you will quickly realise that you need more than love to build a sustainable relationship and maintain it. Any cause for mistrust or any unresolved dispute will undermine the fragile foundations that your relationship was established on. Differences, even the most minute, will become more painfully obvious and pronounced, whereas previously all you could see were similarities. Adjustments in your life that you once considered to be minor sacrifices may seem to be onerous and demanding. You may even begin to doubt yourself and your partner, and the word "regret" surfaces repeatedly in your mind. If you entertain even the slighest notion of giving up on the relationship, you will start on the slippery slope that will end inevitably with a breakup. Sounds familiar?

A relationship that is so difficult to grow and so valuable needs to be nurtured and guarded constantly. We need to stay vigilant of all threats, which can be both internal and external. External threats may emanate from well-intended advice from your loved ones. Internal threats may stem from insidious fleeting thoughts that you brush aside repeatedly instead of addressing them rationally. One must be discerning of what one hears from others (and not just who said it or how it is said), and be mindful not only of what is spoken to one's partner, but also what is not.

What do the tensions in Egypt and the Middle East, MM Lee's recent message about integrating Muslims with the rest of society in Singapore, and the British PM's critique against the policy of multiculturalism in the UK, have in common with romance and relationships? I think these suggest that a lack of trust, coupled with unresolved differences, can destroy a society the way they destroy relationships. People often forget how difficult it was to build relationships and fail to realise how easy it is to tear them apart. What takes years of hard work to establish can be washed away in a single disaster.

I think my new year resolution should be not to take my relationship for granted.

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