What are the components of a successful relationship? What do couples who have been married for over 50 years have to say about what kept them close? The simplicity of their answers may surprise you. They compromised, were able to put their needs aside, admitted mistakes, accepted their partner’s more challenging sides, and communicated vulnerably.

Being able to put your own needs aside for your partner does not imply that you are codependent. It means that you are flexible. When you know how to take care of yourself, then you can distinguish what a healthy dose of giving is for you. That is often an intuitive call. You simultaneously feel taken-care-of and you are able to bend - be flexible to the needs of your partner. Even when - especially when it requires you compromise or give up on something you want. That doesn’t mean you do it all the time or martyr yourself to someone else. It simply means being willing to adjust to your partner. Being resilient and flexible as well as clear about your own needs.

Being humble means being wiling to admit mistakes. It means pushing past your drive to defend yourself. It means recognizing when you’re angry because really you feel ashamed after you’ve screwed up or hurt your partner (even when it wasn’t intentional). It means taking a couple of deep breaths, taking the time to really consider what upset your partner, what actions you took and why that hurt. Being willing to come back, admit your mistake, and apologize with sincerity are all key to repair. There are often small ways we hurt one-another, or even bigger ones. Nobody is perfect and no relationship goes without injuries. But to be able to repair them is critical. Repair allows for reconnection and enables you and your partner to process hurts that might have driven you apart or led to unnecessary resentment.

Lastly Acceptance and vulnerability. Accept your partner the way they are. They are not a project to be changed or worked-on. We all evolve over time and hopefully, with self-reflection, into more compassionate, mature people. But we should never expect our partner to change their basic personality or temperament. You can of course ask your partner to change behaviors that are hurtful to you or disconnecting to the relationship.

If you do ask for a behavior change, it’s most effective to say it from a place of vulnerability, not blame or finger-pointing. Let your partner know what hurt and why, and give your partner’s motives the benefit of the doubt (this can be hard to do but very helpful). They may not have intended to hurt you or behave the way it seemed to you. Simply express your hurt and sadness in an open way, and your partner will more likely be drawn to you and want to be close to you. Your vulnerability creates compassion and natural empathy in your partner. We are drawn to each-other’s openness and sharing when we don’t blame. True vulnerability creates bonding, closeness, and safety.

Sure, there are many more components to lasting love, but these are the most basic, the ones highlighted by long-term partners. They are also qualities that can be developed. I see them in couples that I work with - and oftentimes it took a lot of hard work to get there. But it’s worth it because increased connection is like a magical elixir that increases contentment and joy not only in our relationship but in our everyday lives.

Do you ever feel like you're living with a stranger rather than the person you married?  Or like you are fighting an endless battle over nothing in particular with increasing disconnection?

I promise that you are not alone - those feelings come up for many people in long-term relationships and marriage.  We try to talk about the stuff in life that needs to be ironed out - content like finances, kids, or extended family, but we get derailed not because of the subject matter, but because of the feelings that come up underneath.  

It's normal to go through phases of feeling like you can't connect - where everything feels like an effort.

The truth is, most of us can get into 'negative cycles' in our relationships that are exacerbated during stressful times.  By negative I mean that we begin to misread each other, make assumptions based on the body language or tone of the other, and end up feeling unsafe and shut down as a result.  

We sometimes create just what we don't want, increasing disconnection.  This is because we can begin to experience our partner as a scary tiger based on what we see on the surface.  Ironically, we are often surprised to find out what is happening for our partner underneath: their unspoken fears, hurts, and misunderstandings.  So we react - based on what we initially see as a growling tiger, without seeing the scared bunny rabbit underneath.  

The goal is to learn to talk with each other from the bunny place, the place that is soft and vulnerable.  The catch is that you need to feel safe enough to dare to do that.  Ironically, the closer you feel with your partner, even though it can feel scary, the safer you actually are.  

We tend to create disconnection and hardened defenses (anger and withdrawal) in order to feel safe, but it actually makes us feel more alone and less resilient.  It also feeds the 'negative cycle'. 

Coming to know that cycle like a team investigating a phenomena, working together to understand and defeat it, is a bonding experience in itself.  The immediate result is that we tend to feel more bonded and supported, with a common goal.  The more transparent and safe we feel, the less assumptions we tend to make about the other.  Starting to see the world through our partner's eyes and thereby daring to give them the benefit of the doubt.  

From there the results are plentiful: we can find our way back to one-another more easily and swiftly.  This closeness and safety inevitably brings with it less effort in communicating, and most importantly, a secure and lasting connection.  

The Blame-Avoid Cycle is an offshoot of the distanced-pursuer dynamic that is common in partnerships.  The pursuer tends to blame while the avoider evades being blamed by withdrawing.  

Without being checked, these cycles can snowball and rigidify, each person setting off the other while strengthening their respective positions.  Say Brian has a habit of blaming and criticizing Susan, she will feel hurt and angry from his constant attacks.  Susan will probably go into her shell, avoiding him in order to get away from the blame.  But Brian participates in the blame cycle because he covers up his more vulnerable feelings by criticizing her.  Underneath the blame, he has likely been feeling neglected by Susan for some time now.  He probably feels alone, frustrated, and rejected by her withdrawal.

So which comes first, the chicken or the egg?  Neither - each partner's participation in the dynamic feeds off the other, creating a balanced, but steady intensification of the cycle.  

There are plenty of assumptions at play here.  Brian believes that Susan's withdrawal is rejection; he may wonder if she loves or finds him attractive anymore.  Susan, on the other hand, feels bewildered, confused, and helpless because it seems that whatever she does is not enough.  In her mind, she gets criticized and attacked no matter what.  She avoids Brian further because she doesn't know how to make him happy.

Gaining understanding of the feelings beneath each partner's reactions can soften respective positions.  This creates more empathy, less reactivity, and ultimately a turn-around of the negative cycle.  Once the cycle softens, there is room for awareness and self-responsibility.  For example, by listening to his/her partner's feelings, the blamer begins to realize that the avoider actually just feels helpless and afraid - attack is actually part of what is driving him or her away.  The avoider understands that the blamer is actually just craving contact and validation, that he or she longs for connection but is expressing it poorly.  This begins to shift the position of the avoider, who can begin to take risks by being more open and assertive.  This is an obvious but initially scary way of making clear contact with the pursuer.  

From this, trust has a chance to build - the pursuer blames less because there is more contact from the avoider who is now speaking up more.  Positive cycles begin to form and the relationship regenerates trust and connection once again.

Insight meditation - the type that has it's roots in Buddhism - has recently become well-known in the Western mainstream.  It is recognized mainly as an empirically backed stress-reduction technique, but it is so much more than that.  Not only is relaxation and less stress a side effect of mediating, but it can help to slow down repetitive thoughts enough to understand and gain some necessary distance from them.  The basic message of insight meditation is: 'allow whatever arises, don't push it away or try to hold onto it, simply nod to it like you would to someone you are used to passing on the street.' 

The reality is that we are accustomed to have many thoughts that are repetitive, some can be debilitating and negative.  The ability to slow down those thoughts and question their validity is a basic tenet of both insight meditation as well as aspects of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy.   

The practice of insight meditation is to allow whatever experience is there to pass through your awareness, or even hang out for a bit if it wants to.  Simply noticing these thoughts and feelings leads you to begin to understand yourself a whole lot better.  It helps to develop the capacity to gain some objectivity by witnessing the thoughts and thereby choosing which you would like to cultivate and believe, and which you would rather set aside. 

To understand your thoughts for what they are means that you begin to know them - often swirling judgements, plans, memories, fears, etc, going around and around.  When we are "identified" with those thoughts, whatever they are, we naturally believe them.  So if you have a recurring judgement about yourself or a chronic expectation of yourself in relationship to others, then you naturally believe it without even noticing that the thought occurred.  You end up feeling sad or scared, without understanding that the feeling most likely came from a negative, judgmental, or worrisome thought.  

When you start to slow down the process of thought and become more of an objective observer of it, then you can begin to see that your thoughts don't define you.  They are often not even based on reality, but are just subtle messages that you may have picked up from relatives, teachers, friends, etc.  When you begin to separate from the thoughts and gain some objectivity, you realize that the resulting feelings also change.  In other words, why be sad, fearful, or depressed when you are not believing negative thoughts about yourself?  Insight meditation can help you to become your own therapist by learning to gain more awareness and thereby control over your mind.  What a relief! 

For more on Insight meditation, here's a great user friendly book I highly recommend by Jon Kabat-Zinn:  Review - Wherever You Go There You Are