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50 first dates and the nice-to-nasty ratio
Spoiling your life after marriage, why?
Date: 2/17/2009 12:15:43 PM ( 15 y ) ... viewed 1512 times 50 First Dates and the Nice-To-Nasty Ratio
By John R. Buri, Ph.D. on February 17, 2009 in Love Bytes
Why is it that so many people marry for love and then don't?
Within months of walking down the aisle and exchanging vows of sweet love, many (if not most) couples in the United States begin to lose their sense of civility with the one they love. Why would we treat a mere acquaintance (or a complete stranger) with greater pleasantness than we treat our partner?
A while back I was refinancing our home, and the man with whom I met to arrange the details of our refinancing was pleasant, amiable, and engaging. At the start of our meeting, he had told me that he might receive a call from his wife and that if he did, he would have to take it. Sure enough, his cell phone rang about 20 minutes into our meeting, and he turned around in his chair to talk with his wife. Let me tell you --- the conversation was nothing short of nasty. (Fortunately, it did not last very long.) As he finished the conversation with his wife, I wondered which person I would see --- the pleasant person I had been talking with earlier or the one that I had just witnessed ripping into his wife. As he turned in his chair, it was as if he had flipped a switch and there in front of me once again was that amiable and engaging individual.
Over the years I have worked with a lot of men, and on many occasions I have found myself encouraging a man to be more pleasant, engaging, and loving at home with his wife. And on more than one occasion, I have received a response along these lines: "All day long I have to be courteous and amiable with people I handly know at work, and now you're telling me that I have to do this at home as well! When do I get to be myself?" My reponse is usually something like this: "If you are a jerk, then you never get to be yourself. You need to change." (Let me quickly add that it is also possible to be a jerkette, and if you have inclinations in that direction, then change can do wonders for your love life.)
John Gottman is arguably the foremost love expert in the world, and he has reported that couples who have a 5:1 ratio of positive to negative exchanges have a happy relationship --- no small thing in today's potpourri of love. In other words, if for every negative exchange with our partner, we have at least 5 positive exchanges, then we will maintain the love, joy, and happiness that we had on the wedding day (or on the first day we fell in love). This is what most of us want, and just think, all we have to do is to be more nice than nasty with the person we love.
50 First Dates is one of those cheesy, slightly over-the-top chick flicks that I probably shouldn't have enjoyed, but did. For those who haven't seen it: Adam Sandler plays a man who has fallen in love with a young woman (Drew Barrymore) who has been in a car accident. As a result of this accident, the young woman can't remember anything from the previous day --- in other words, every day her life begins anew. As a result, she can't remember Adam Sandler, much less the fact that they had been in a kind, affectionate, and loving relationship the day before. The solution: every day, Adam Sandler once again proves to her how much he loves her. Every day when she wakes up, he once again is warm, kind and affectionate. Every day he makes his love clear as he essentially says: "You can trust me with your love because I will not take it for granted. I won't abuse it. I will not leave you with more scar tissue on the heart."
Can you imagine how our marriages (and our love relationships) would be thriving if each day we were intent upon elevating our nice-to-nasty ratio? If, ever day, we were determined once again to show our partner just how much we love them and just how much we value them in our lives?
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