John Lennon and Paul McCartney married their talents in a 1965 hit “We Can Work It Out.”
Try to see it my way,
Do I have to keep on talking till I can't go on?
While you see it your way,
Run the risk of knowing that our love may soon be gone.
We can work it out,
We can work it out.
Think of what you're saying.
You can get it wrong and still you think that it's alright.
Think of what I'm saying,
We can work it out and get it straight, or say good night.
Marriage takes work. Waiting to get older and road-testing a variety of relationships may not be the best route to end up in a long marriage: working things out may be the secret sauce. Start young, commit fully, and communicate deeply with someone you love. A 2015 Cornell University study of 400 Americans 65 or older who had been in a relationship 30 years or longer found five common traits: communication, commitment, kindness, acceptance, and love. Practice at love doesn’t necessarily make perfect: sometimes it just muddies the waters.
“I’m finding that is true, in my own practice,” says Dr. Viviana Coles, president and lead therapist at Houston Relationship Therapy, author of The 4 Intimacy Styles, and featured therapist in seasons 9-14 of the hit TV show “Married at First Sight.”
“I’ve noticed that when you give people choices or comparisons, they get overwhelmed and don’t make the best decisions,” Dr. Coles tells KTRH News. When you communicate in a marriage, “you give the option to be able to move together or grow apart and move back together and grow apart, and hopefully with those gaps not being anything too far or creating too much of a distance you can’t come back from.”
The benefit of a first marriage is you don’t know any better. “People, as they become older or move to their second or third marriage, become a little less malleable, a little less adaptive, to other people and the way they are,” Dr. Coles advises. “Whether it’s your first love or your sixth, it’s important to remember that what you have in front of you, and the information you have already gleaned from this partnership, is something that is so valuable you don’t want to push it aside for something new. There’s always going to be something to work on; it’s nice to know the devil you’re working with.”
There is an adage: “better the devil you know than the devil you don’t,” suggesting option two could turn out to be a whole lot worse than the devil you fled. The saying comes from a Latin proverb from 1539, “nota res mala opima,” roughly translated to “an evil thing is known best.” A 30-year anniversary is represented by a pearl, a 40-year by a ruby, a 50-year anniversary gold. The average marriage in America doesn’t get to a gemstone: the average is eight years, 40-50% of marriages ending in divorce.
A poem by William Edward Hickson, published in 1928, when applied to marriage, doesn’t suggest jumping from relationship to relationship, but submits that a lifelong commitment is going to take work and effort from both parties. Dr. Coles says open communication will be at heart of a golden anniversary.
It's a lesson you should heed,
Try, try again.
If at first you don't succeed,
Try, try again.
Then your courage should appear,
For if you will persevere,
You will conquer, never fear,
Try, try again.
Once or twice, though you should fail,
Try, try again.
If you would at last prevail,
Try, try again.
If we strive, 'tis no disgrace,
Though we do not win the race;
What should you do in that case?
Try, try again.
If you find your task is hard,
Try, try again.
Time will bring you your reward,
Try, try again.
All that other folk can do,
Why, with patience, should not you?
Only keep this rule in view,
Try, try again.
photo: Getty Images