| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 9:27:24 AM | You've Got to Know When to Hold em,
Know When to Fold em,
Know when to walk away....
and know when to RUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 10:03:21 AM | | It's time to go when you realize that the love you thought you had was not of the unconditional type. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 10:07:59 AM | What's staying power got to do with it??
Being in a relationship out of obligation and not desire, is not a relationship worth being in. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 10:27:05 AM | Everything is relative. Let's say you never settled for anything less than awesome. You meet that person. Does that person has issues? I am yet to know a person in this planet that unless was a useless beggar did not have issues. Do that person has red flags? We all do. So that person that was first awesome, absolutely good looking, a great entertainer, fantastic in bed, turns out to have issues like everyone else? Maybe it's insecurities, maybe is whatever, but at one point you have to address each and everyone of those issues and define if they are deal breakers or not. Sometimes you compromise, sometimes you do not.
An example is that I have a very head strong gf. She got laid off 6 months ago, then couldn't find work. Had to cancel a particular physical and mammogram, now it turns out that she has Breast Cancer. This is some serious stuff where I've have had to learn to humble myself to this reality and be there for her during the pain, the throwing up, the bad temper, the losing of hair, the days with anemia, lack of desire and even the days when she absolutely hates me.
Staying power? All I know is that you deal with it one day at the time. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 10:27:07 AM | | First of all, we need to be clear and realize that there is a difference being staying in a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship and staying in a marriage. A marriage is a commitment while a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship is just something outta your mouth and you can leave whenever you feel like it. If you're not going to settle then the relationship stage is the best time not to do so, if a guy is iresponsible, abusive, lazy, and dishonest or if a girl is inconsiderate, dishonest, shady, lazy, and triffling, then I'd advise anybody to walk away before you get stuck. But once you get married, then you should have a pretty good idea what you got so you've got to stick it out and work out any differences you may have. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 10:54:06 AM | [First of all, we need to be clear and realize that there is a difference being staying in a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship and staying in a marriage. A marriage is a commitment while a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship is just something outta your mouth and you can leave whenever you feel like it. If you're not going to settle then the relationship stage is the best time not to do so, if a guy is iresponsible, abusive, lazy, and dishonest or if a girl is inconsiderate, dishonest, shady, lazy, and triffling, then I'd advise anybody to walk away before you get stuck. But once you get married, then you should have a pretty good idea what you got so you've got to stick it out and work out any differences you may have.]
^^^^ You have it exactly right Prime Material. The gf/bf stage is the time to decide what you can deal with and what you can't. A marriage should be the real commitment, and is an indication that you are in it for the long haul. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 11:20:28 AM | OP -- For the most and best part, I do have staying power. However, I may end up tripping over my own two feet with the best of intentions ahead of me...or may miss obvious signs that collapse is imminent. It happens.
When I feel committed to someone, I will do my best to compromise as much as I possibly can without compromising myself or my own goals or integrity...just to make the relationship work. Still, sometimes Fate is outta your hands and no matter what you do or say, it's no longer "enough".
Being one who won't settle just to say I'm with someone, the time to leave is when things start becoming very one sided. If there's no feeling or sense of mutual exchange happening, and you feel that it's all becoming very one sided, that's usually my cue to leave.
JMO. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 12:42:06 PM |
When do you know it's time to go?
When one of you shows the other contempt.
If you are compatible, most problems or issues can be worked out. But when one slides into disgust for the other, it's over.
Daniel Goleman has done extensive and useful work examining relationships. His studies (which tracked couples over time) have something like 90% accuracy in their predictions of whether a relationship will be a success or not.
What do they look for?
Contempt... revealed in words, small gestures and facial expressions indicates, unaltered, the relationship won't make it over time. | |
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Dagaz!
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Joined: 5/11/2009
Msg: 30 | |
| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 2:36:05 PM | robertslovequest, I just had to say that I am sorry for the loss of your wife and son. I'd say that counts as a lot for staying power. Good luck on your quest! | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 5:36:23 PM | Thank you for your responses everyone. I see that some of you have stood by someone in times of despair and anguish and hopefully, especially for Robert's sake, acceptance. I hear what people have to say about it, including distinguishing between relationships and marriage. Where I live the distinction is not cut and dry since once a couple lives together for one year, they are considered common-law married.
I realize that I was truly wondering why some people get reprimanded for staying in a relationship though things ended up going sour; while others get it for not having any staying power. I feel that it's a delicate balance and that sometimes that line we draw in the sand gets moved day by day.
I read Daniel Goleman's EI and respect him for the work that he has done on Emotional Intelligence. As a matter of fact I used that book to come up with a program to teach young adolescents how to develop EI by facial expression recognition and generating responses to them. It is wonderful to have him come into my question like this in such a serendipitous manner.
I have staying power. My greatest quality in a relationship can also be my greatest downfall: loyalty. That being said I did manage to pick up and leave a destructive marriage and by doing so I saved the friendship between myself and my ex, the father of our two children.
We are complex beings because, well I'll speak for myself, I find myself saying one thing and doing another which is sometimes the exact opposite of what I had intended to do in the first place.
I knew it was time to go when I had a dream that woke me up in the middle of the night and brought me to a scene in the adjoining house that allowed me to make the decision that I was too chicken to make in the first place when those first red flags waved at me. Eventually the flags stop waving as we cross the finish line. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 6:08:34 PM |
Do you have staying power?
Unfortunately, I do. In relationships past, I was much like a bulldog with a runner where trying to make sure we'd tried every conceivable way to work our way through whatever obstacles were presenting themselves. Looking back with the benefit of hindsight, I now agree with my ex-husband who, in a convo post divorce, advised me that in his view, I had "cared too much". It seems that I didn't know how to withdraw enough to let him (or force him) to have to come forward... I still think there should be "instructions" with these do-it-yourself kits... 
Which begs the inevitable question: When do you know it's time to go?
I know that it's time to go when I am paddling like mad, look back and see that I am the only one rowing the damn canoe. I have to admit that I have a lot more expectations of someone in terms of them having the self-knowledge and ability to see the importance of our relationship as being a third and very important entity between us than I once did.
It's all about "balance"... (says the pendulum that has rarely rested in the middle but is trying ever so hard to be better at this relationship stuff now... )
That's all I know...  | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/1/2009 7:34:39 PM | When you care about something or someone, you put in the work needed to make things right. Then when you have exhausted all resources or avenues, then it is time to move on (or out if you prefer).
Cowards and people who do not care run at the first signs of trouble, Other form of cowards and Masochists stay in even when all hopes are gone.
So I say: work it first and attend the funerals if nothings works after (on both ends)
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/2/2009 5:32:52 AM |
Is the problem with some people, some of the time, not one of staying power, but one of making premature and uninformed commitments?
As usual Margo boils it down fairly well and then expounds on that with her post on contempt.
The difference between me now and when I met my ex I think is the fact that when I see certain types of problems I realize that they are not circumstantial, but the type that aren't going away, i.e. when problem A is solved, problem B rears its head because of the way the person is and his approach to life. I am not willing to hang around because I have made a "commitment" to that person whereas when I was younger, I saw something noble about staying there, whether there was really a good reason to stay or not.
I confused my overall attitude of not being a quitter with the whole concept of not being able to control or influence overly much whether the other party dealt with his b.s. People that have the attitude that life happens to them, um where are my running shoes, because they will not hold themselves accountable and will slip easily into contempt because it is easier to be hateful to people they purportedly care for than to behave differently. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/2/2009 7:18:06 AM | .
I can understand this analogy, but not the conclusion therein.
I think you can use the sinking ship analogy. It is admirable to stay with the ship but at some point, if you don't let go, you're gonna drown.
On the other hand, and I think a more realistic action at least in my case, is to suck it up...and learn to swim. Whatever it takes, especially in a marriage as long as mine; 25 years, drowning or saving just oneself is not an option I would consider.
One makes one bed, so to speak, and at least in my generation, you make the best of it and soldier on.
JMHO
 
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/2/2009 7:32:47 AM | On the other hand, and I think a more realistic action at least in my case, is to suck it up...and learn to swim
I agree with this analogy and I have used it to describe the difference between a victim of circumstances or "survivor" and a person who takes matters into their own hands.
I believe that attitude is everything. Relationships teach us about ourselves and how we act as a result of them is the determiner as to whether we carry baggage or garner tools. I like to think that I garner tools. I realize that I have a wee bit o baggage left (just carry on) that I am dealing with, one step at a time.  | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/2/2009 7:46:04 AM | | with true love there is no such thing as staying power it just is .. take a look into the eyes of a picture of the now departed Christopher Reeve and his partner and you will see staying power in action.. real love from real people being real with each other is never ever going to go away .. it just is. The best relationship you should have is with yourself and when that is clear .,.. everything else is just .. awesome... | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/2/2009 12:25:15 PM |
On the other hand, and I think a more realistic action at least in my case, is to suck it up...and learn to swim. Whatever it takes, especially in a marriage as long as mine; 25 years, drowning or saving just oneself is not an option I would consider.
One makes one bed, so to speak, and at least in my generation, you make the best of it and soldier on.
Hope in your generation that selfless behavior did not include forcing your children to continue to be subjected to a verbally and emotionally abusive parent. Sometimes you are saving more than yourself.
Sometimes it is easy to pontificate but you cannot be married by yourself, I would think there are numerous caveats to your stance. The cheating spouse that could threaten your health. The gambler who leaves you and your children homeless. A molesting parent. A violently mentally ill person. Is your statement truly that black and white? I don't think it should be. | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/2/2009 3:10:11 PM | You are certainly right in a case where children are involved. None of the other examples apply to me either. It's only affecting me, and I'll manage. I always do.
Nor am I advocating, or even suggesting we got it right; simply saying it was what it was.
I never would presume to speak for you; I don't know you or your situation. I'm not attacking any stance you stated; I'm afraid I haven't gone through this entire thread. I'll have to go back and read your posts.
Namaste
Ginny
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/2/2009 5:07:48 PM | Hmm, let me see... Well, for one thing, "Other relationship has a connotation of something slightly abberant. Most women shy away from that. It's often the perview of people seeking three or more-somes, NSA or FWB hook-ups.
In other words, you have to get hold of them before you have to worry about longevity. ROTFLMAO | |
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| Do you have staying power?
Posted: 7/2/2009 7:39:44 PM |
I stood by my wife as she fought cancer.
I stood by my son after his mother died.
I stood by my dogs and cats when my son died.
I stand by myself, even when all stand against me.
Does that qualify?
Wow........
That has got to be in the top 3 saddest things I have ever read. | |
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Exactly! s.n.marin Exactly! 
