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Can A Relationship Last? If so, how?
YES!

Live Love Laugh does not profess to have all the answers. If you find some ideas of value, we feel some satisfaction in sharing with you.

One of the considerations about creating a new relationship is whether or not it will last. Perhaps you've already experienced one or more relationships in which you thought nothing could separate the two of you. Perhaps you've been a little disillusioned about the possibility of it lasting.

Actually the word disillusioned is rather interesting since in its most basic form, dis-illusion, implies that an illusion is being removed. Could it be that the vision of your previous relationships lasting forever was an illusion?

Is it possible for you to be in a happy, supportive, fulfilling relationship lasting even through retirement? We all know of specific cases where marriages have lasted 40 or 50 years, but were they happy? Perhaps some were, but does that mean you could find such a match? Or, are you destined to be with someone two, five or even ten years and then be back in the single life again?

Not to be discouraging, but there are even those people who have taken many workshops, read many books, practice various supportive principles, and even have wonderful children, yet still their marriages end in divorce.

Perhaps you've even seen couples split apart that went through a year or more of counseling. Why does it happen, especially the couples are so very optimistic in the beginning?

If you listen in on the thoughts radiating from almost all newlyweds you might hear, "Love will keep us together". Unfortunately, the truth about them might be closer to, "Love has brought us together, I haven't the foggiest idea as to what it takes to keep us together".

Do you know what it will take to keep the relationship alive, vital, loving, sharing, caring, supportive, growing, changing, exciting, responsive, and lasting? How much would it be worth to know this before you even meet your mate? Would this information help you in making the choice of who to date and who to avoid?

The material here has the goal of not only helping you get clear on who you are, where you're going and who you want to be going there with, but it is also designed to help you make it last. To do so, the following analogy is very important to understand because it quite similar to relationships. It provides a visual model that you can draw on.

Imagine that you seriously wanted to buy a house that you would want to live in the rest of your life. Maybe the laws changed and you only get to buy once. How would this affect your choice of the geographic location, the number of bedrooms, construction materials, the size of the lot, the floor plan? How much importance would you place on paint color or how well the lawn is kept up?

After buying the house, how would you care for it? Would you repaint when necessary, repair windows, fix the roof? In short, would you be more careful about preventative maintenance? After all, that is your house for life.

And, after living there for years and your needs change, wouldn't you devote time to changing things around to suit you better. Perhaps removing a wall to increase the size of the living room, or adding on a sun deck.

Can you see that it is conceivable that you could be happy in one home the rest of your life if it was properly selected, maintained and remodeled when needed?

It is also true of a relationship if it truly is your intention. Perhaps you don't fully believe it, so let's take a moment to explore current everyday relationships.

Boy and girl meets, they're attracted in various ways, they go together, decide to take a chance and move in together or even get married. While together they do little or no "preventative maintenance" on their relationship, dwell on past memories of how good it used to be and eventually let enough resentment and hurt build up that they both say "I don't need this anymore, life's too short to be unhappy" and separate. Then boy and girl meets, .... and so on. Except the next time they carry with them the hurts, unsolved problems and fears based on the previous relationship.

Ask any relatively smart home owner, they know the following statement is true. "If you don't pay for your repairs when needed, you'll pay double, triple or more later on".

People buy and maintain houses with more consideration and good old elbow grease than they devote to something much more important--their primary relationship. This is partly due to having no concept of what preventative maintenance in a relationship looks like. Everybody knows what repairing a roof looks like, but when passion is falling with your mate do you know what will bring it back? Do you merely say, "Well we've been married five years now, you can't expect it to continue." If you used the same philosophy with your house, you'd catch yourself saying, "Well, the roof is about five years old, guess we'll just place more pots around under the leaks".

The only reason that it is a mystery why so many relationships fail is that we continue to keep it a mystery. Lack of desire and belief keeps us locked in old behavior patterns that don't fully explore the knowledge and techniques that have been developed over the last 20 years.

There are wonderful books, seminars, workshops and counselors that can show you how to select a mate, keep the passion alive, let go of resentment, ask for what you want, and renew your experience of love. Most couples wait until it's almost too late before they attend a workshop on improving their relationship. What about doing that while it is still alive and vibrant? It is vital to find out how to keep it that way before it's lost. Prevent the problems before they have a chance to dampen the flame of love like a leaky roof would do to an open flame.

Having the intention of a lasting relationship, select a mate that is willing to work with you on continually enhancing the relationship through deep communication, reading books, taking workshops and even taking counseling when desirable. If the other person is not willing to do the work, it might be best to take a walk.

Once in a relationship, don't expect that it will maintain itself based on the initial flame of love. Both of you will be changing, growing and creating new and different needs and desires. Working together with a desire to please and make the love grow is critical, yet it requires more than being willing, it requires conscious action. It's easy to fall asleep on the job, so you might want to mark on the calendar certain times to "wake up".

What about those people we mentioned that seemed from outside appearances to be using "preventative maintenance" in their relationship, or were seeing a counselor? The truth is there are just too many variables to say anything conclusive even if you think you know each person in the couple very well. However, taking it back to the house analogy, what if a couple let a leaky roof continue over the years and it eventually created wood rot in key supporting beams, and perhaps the walls were ruined and the hardwood floors destroyed. It may be that the effort to repair the dream house almost requires taking it apart and starting over, except now you still have to live in the house at the same time. Anyone who has remodeled knows what a challenge that can be.

So, if the preventative maintenance has not been complete, or has been deficient over a period of time, it is possible that you no longer have sufficient desire to do the necessary repairs. Some find a new house and move instead. Of course, there is a good chance they will repeat the same errors in the next house as well.

People do that in relationships all the time. The cycle is: meet, fall in love, think love will keep them together, fail to do "preventative maintenance", experience damage and built up resentment and finally separation.

There is another way. It seems longer and more involved, but it can break the costly cycle and lead to lasting happiness with your mate.

1) STOP and learn about yourself, relationships, what you want and need, who you really are, where you are going and what's your passion, what preventative maintenance tools are available and develop some skills especially in the area of constructive communication.

2) Move yourself into a position, if not there already, where you are living your passion and dream.

3) Create a profile of what you want in a relationship and what the person is like that you are seeking. Remember, a person who is not willing to use the preventative maintenance tools with you may place you back in the "single" cycle again. This selection criteria may be far more important than what most people put at the top of their lists.

4) Place yourself in environments in which you increase the likelihood of meeting such a person.

5) Meet the person

6) Before being swept away, see if this person matches your profile and has good potential for creating all that you want in a relationship. If so and you feel the attraction and spark, allow yourself a greater freedom for romance.

7) Fall in love

8) Both parties commit to always doing your preventative maintenance on your relationship. Schedule at least once a month "wake up" meetings in which you consciously see if anything is slipping into disrepair.

9) Keep the love, excitement, the dreams, the joy alive and thank yourself for doing what it takes to have what you really want.

10) When you've had enough time and experience to build mutual trust and confidence in each other, the relationship and your love for each other, discover the true meaning of commitment and make it with each other. There is much power in the traditional marriage vows that state "for better or for worse . . ." If you knew you only got one mate for life, and took the commitment seriously, you would each have far more incentive in keeping communication clear, doing preventative maintenance on your relationship, and spending the time necessary to grow together instead of apart.

This may sound like a lot of work and perhaps a bit overwhelming. The choice is to take the high risk traditional methods and continue to return to the single world periodically--which can become more than overwhelming as you probably already know.

The truth is that the work is more like play and it can be quite exciting to discover parts of yourself you didn't know were there. The bonus of finding and living your passion in life can almost be reward enough, but to find a mate in which you can share a happy, loving, joyful and lasting relationship as well, can make it well worth the time, money and attention you invest.

This material does not contain all the tools you will need. It contains some very important tools and will act as a guide to help you find what you need. Some tools may not even exist yet, some may be very specialized and rare. The main question is if you are now ready to do whatever it takes, whether that involves using unfamiliar techniques, finding new tools, or even inventing tools if it is necessary, to achieve your vision of a relationship?

Remember, if "love" was all that was necessary to "keep it together", the divorce rate wouldn't be nearly as high. Also, love is necessary, but is not all that is needed for a lasting relationship.

So, can you create a relationship that will last? YES!