Each of us have a pretty good idea about what we would like in a partner; a checklist of qualitites that will make the ideal relationships. I remember when I was single. I thought I would meet my ideal girl in a bookstore (wipe that smile off your face!), beautiful, intelligent, independent, a great conversationalist, graceful body language, quick to smile, passionate in defending her beliefs.

The moment I met anyone who came close to my checklist, my heart would start pumping like crazy and my head would spin, and my eyes would glaze over, impossibly lost in the possibilities of having my dream life with this girl. I say to myself, “she is perfect!”. And that was the beginning of the end.

Successful relationships are about pedestal management. Each relationship from beginning to end can be viewed with this idea.

Stage 1 – Pedestals are in the air
Most of us begin relationships with a fair amount of certainty that the person we are choosing will make us happy. After all they match most of the criteria we assume will lead to a perfect partnership. In the heady, dream-like state of first few weeks or months of a relationship, we spend most of our time building a fantasy of our partner’s qualities and behaviours. There are very few irritations, if any. And most flaws will be dismissed as ‘cute’ or ‘adorable’ =) Relationships start because we build pedestals, put our partners up high on them, and begin an affair with who we fantasize them to be.

Stage 2 – “I thought I knew you” or Pedestal breakdown
Most relationships begin to disintegrate slowly but surely from this point on. It’s only a matter of time that our partner behaves in a way that completely misfits the image that we’ve built up to that point. And the pedestal we’ve built up crumbles. More sentences like these begin to enter conversations – “I never knew you had this in you”, “How could you do this to me”, “You think you know a person”. And before we know it our world is upside down, we cannot trust our partner to be who they were at the start of the relationship. We silently question whether people can be trusted, and if we’ve made a mistake in choosing a partner.

Stage 3 – The inverted pedestal
Before relationships fail, there must be sufficient evidence that our partner is absolutely unfit for being happy with. So begins the stage of digging a hole in the ground, flinging the mud at each other, and building an inverted pedestal, putting our partner on it, and burying the relationship six feet under.

How many relationships like that have you had? I can count 3 such heartbreaking episodes as I look back. I wish I knew then what I know now. Nothing like a few years of courtship and marriage to gain some perspective =)

So why do relationship fail? Because we build pedestals with the bricks of illusion, the mortar of fantasy and the finish the marvelous structure with three coats of wishful thinking. They are destined to collapse.

And how can they be successful? By being aware of this tendency we have to build pedestals.
Here are some ideas I have about navigating our way in relationships.

Enjoy stage 1. Build your partner up to be the heroic soul that has come to bring you happiness =) It’s hard to beat the chemical thrill of infatuation! At the same time, know that stage 2 will come. There will be a point in every relationship when our partners cease to fit the pedestal that we’ve made for them. This is the make or break point.

You have two options as the painful process of pedestal breakdown begins.

Option 1: At your own risk – Approach this stage with disappointment, irritation and anger, and you’ll start building the inverted pedestal. If you’re seeing your partner as a complete villain, the total opposite of who he/she was when you started your relationship, know that you’ve successfully built the inverted pedestal. And this pedestal is also as far from the truth as the first one. The relationship is bound to break. The sad thing about this is that you’ve never truly loved or been loved in this kind of a relationship. You’ve just fallen in and out of infatuation with a fantasy.

Option 2: Recommended! – Approach this stage with curiosity and you’ll begin to see your partner in a more down-to-earth, realistic way. The real people in the relationship emerge only once the fantasy begins to dissolve. I deeply believe there can be no love without embracing reality. The reality is that you have both virtues and vices, good and bad, perfection and imperfection. And so does your partner.

Love is about accepting the person as they really are. It is about creating space for you and your partner to revel in the perfection of imperfections. This is the foundation and the journey of successful couples. On this journey know that there will be fights and disappointments and unhappiness.

Welcome each fight and they will help you break unreasonable expectations and bring you to reality.

Embrace your disappointment and it will become the doorway to receiving satisfaction.

Be friends with your unhappiness and it will be your compass to true love.

Use your relationship and the challenges you face with your partner as a pathway to higher self awareness and happiness.

You can read more related topics in the Lighter Relationships series.

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Wishing you Lightness