What Does Society Call a Successful Relationship?
Hint: One of you must die while still in it
Somewhere between deaths and moving, break-ups are one of the hardest givens of life. I’m sure this is especially true when divorce and kids are involved.
However…
Is staying together always a sign of success?
As human beings, we love to pigeonhole things.
This is round. This is square.
The data shows that …
I get it, and I am not excluded. Our brains learn and store information in schema. I like to think of our brains as filing cabinets filled with giant green binders each containing dividers. When new information comes in, we automatically try to decide where it should be filed so we can attach it to our previous knowledge.
It seems to me that we have categorized all relationships that end with death as successful and all that end with separation as unsuccessful. It makes sense on the surface since divorces are so painful, difficult, and life-altering. Yet, people still get them. All the time.
Of those that stay together, we often presume it’s because they’re happy. This is optimistic of us. There are many reasons people stay in relationships and many ways to measure one’s success.
