I love reading the relationship sections over at the Huffington Post. I can’t help it. Most of the articles there are what I like to call relationship self-help pieces. I love them for their amusement value but I also read them on the off-chance that something interesting or insightful will be hidden in them. Mostly they are just amusing and the advice they purport to give self-evident (and as such they are bound to hit on some truths). One of the things I read again and again in these is the value of communication. Communication is important, they declare, without being specific about what is meant by communication. Is it really important to talk about everything under the sun especially when you are not sure why you need to talk about everything? If you just say everything in your head, you are not really doing anything but saying what’s in your head. Yes, communication is important, but knowing why it’s important and what kind of communication needs to happen is the more significant point.
I would argue that most people assume that views or ideas they see as essential to them are shared by their partners without actually knowing if that is the case. We assume we share the same ideas because they are so essential to who we are that it is easy to mistakenly think they are essential for everyone or that at the very least they are important to the person we are with. We liken these ideas to breathing. Everyone needs to breathe, right? We don’t need to talk about it. No one ever says to their partner, “Hey, so you know that breathing thing, you do that too, right?”
Because we make these types of assumptions we often neglect to have discussions about very important things. Sure, we don’t need to talk about breathing, but most things having to do with relationships are not so self-evident that it is safe to assume we are all of the same mind about it.
For example, I’ve read a number of times that talking about monogamy is important and not something a lot of couples do until it’s too late. That rings as very true to me. Some people might be tempted to counter that and say, “We have!” and that’s great if you have, but what did that conversation entail? Was it more than a minute long? Years ago I too would have said that I’d had that conversation in all my past relationships, but thinking back on it honestly, I hadn’t. Usually talk of monogamy goes something like this:
“I’m into the monogamy thing, so you know, I don’t think we should be dating other people or anything.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“Alright then, we’re good.”
Is this enough? I don’t think so. This type of communication really doesn’t say anything about what we mean by monogamy. Instead, both people are assuming that the other person means what they mean. For some people, monogamy is assumed and not a conversation they even feel the need to have. I don’t think that assuming your partner will be monogamous is a bad assumption to make when you are in a committed relationship, but we need more than assumptions. When we say we are monogamous, what do we usually mean? Well, on the surface, we mean faithfulness in our partners. Great, we are all agreed, right? Well, yes, but are we sure we are all on the same page as to what we mean when we say faithfulness in our partners? To those of you who have had the conversation, did you have a conversation similar to the one above in which you simply confirmed to each other that you would be monogamous or did you actually talk about what it means to you?
In order to determine what we mean by monogamy (and therefore what we are tacitly agreeing to), we need to get into the nitty-gritty details and that is the type of communication that is important in relationships. We need to have discussions about specifics. Is flirting okay? Does kissing count? How about emotional connections with other people? You may be surprised by how differently your partner perceives these things. It is important to lay things out and say, here’s what I think it means to be in a monogamous relationship. Having those conversations is infinitely more helpful than just assuming or declaring that you are both monogamous and can go a long way toward eliminating confusion or misunderstandings later.
In addition, it’s important to have conversations about signficant issues (such as monogamy) not just once, but to revisit those talks every few years since we are constantly evolving creatures. Bottom line, this type of communication is important. Communication is not about communicating every thought that goes into your head or simply stating agreement about terms that contain underlying assumptions. It’s about those underlying assumptions. That’s where the real communication needs to happen.
The list of topics that some couples assume they have agreement on are too numerous to list but they include things such as money, children, and even family obligations. Don’t assume that because both of you are in agreement about saving money that you mean the same thing by that. Communication about other, less practical things is also crucial. Again, it’s not just talking about everything under the sun, but discussing those things that are important to us. Talking about how we process our past feelings and events or how we see the future is beneficial for couples. Likewise conversations about worries, fears, insecurities or any potential pitfalls we see are also very useful for confronting those specific fears and insecurities as well as avoiding the pitfalls.
I think there is another benefit to having these types of conversations that is not often discussed in the articles and that is the potential of bringing couples closer. (It's not just about avoiding conflicts later.) What we are essentially doing when we talk abou these things is opening ourselves up to our partner. By sharing our insecurities, fears, and vulnerabilities we are exposing a little more of ourselves to the other person and that process can make us feel closer, more intimate. The act itself allows for the random threads that make up who we are to get tangled with the other person’s, thereby weaving us together more tightly.
I am not talking about the largely vacuous idea that couples should come together and become one unit. That idea, in addition to being unhealthy and weird, makes me want to throw up in its sappiness. It is not that both partners’ fears become intertwined and meld into one, but rather that both people become aware of each other’s fears much in the same way that they are aware of their own and by that process they become more a part of each other without losing their individuality.
This sounds great, even if a little touchy feeling, but it also raises another potential problem. How do we avoid losing ourselves in the process? Opening up your insides and letting someone in cannot be one-sided. It’s not just one person absorbing another’s fears, but both people laying out their inner angst, if you will, and sharing in the burden. I contend that when the process is equal, when it is both parties opening themselves up to each other, they walk away fuller, more rounded, never losing sight of who they are as individuals, but having a deeper understanding of this thing they are creating together. The individuals are making their collective worlds more full. They are not making it smaller by merging into one amorphous person, but rather expanding it with more of themselves.
