Creating Relationships

You don’t develop courage by being happy in your relationships every day. You develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging adversity.
~ Barbara De Angelis

One evening, after I had given an inspiring talk, several women crowded around to ask me questions. Those who could not get close enough to me turned toward my wife and one asked, “What’s it like to be married to a man like that?” She answered, loud enough for everyone to hear, “A long, hard struggle.” The women looked at me in surprise only to find I was nodding my head in agreement.

My wife and Joseph Campbell agree. He wrote that marriage was an ordeal. What are the two of them trying to tell us? They are reminding us that relationships are not about individual desires and satisfactions but about creating and sharing a third entity, the relationship. Building a relationship takes work. It is an ordeal and a struggle because two people are giving birth to this new entity, and labor pains hurt.

We would see far fewer divorces if the couples involved focused on creating a marriage rather than just getting their needs met. I do not mean that one shouldn’t speak up and express feelings, or that one should become a doormat. I bellow regularly, but I also say I am sorry when I know I have acted in a way that hurts my loved ones. Even our children have learned to say, “Dad, you’re not in the operating room now.”

I am talking about becoming a unique part of a loving relationship, a part of a team that works together to create harmony.

Build your relationships out of love and hold them together with a sense of humor.