Intimacy Training - Commit Deeper Or Quit

Commitment

In our practice lately we've been seeing a number of couples who are at what we call a "commit deeper or quit" point in their relationship.

It's a stage that comes up now and again in all growing relationships.

The cue that something important needs attending to might manifest as confusing amounts of anger, wearying levels of power struggle, or perhaps just too much numbness.

At least one partner won't commit to a deeper level of relationship -perhaps using the present levels of discomfort in the relationship as an internal justification. And yet, neither will quit for fear of loosing a partner who means a lot. Strangely, these couples are often not aware (or not willing to admit) that lack of commitment is a major source of the difficulties they are having.

If there is pain (and obviously joy too but that's a different discussion) in commitment, what we learn after some life experience is that it is also painful not to commit. And in intimate relationships, the most pain of all can come from a "halfway" commitment that has run on too long.

In a halfway commitment (and we have seen couples who have been together 30 years in a half way commitment) at least one of the partners wants the advantages of relationship but is not willing to pay the price it takes to sustain a successful intimate relationship. Half-committing partners expect full availability from the other but hold back from being fully available (and vulnerable) themselves. By keeping a foot (or even a toe) out, non-committing partners keep themselves "safe" and protected (and thus defended) in some way.

From what we have seen over the years halfway committed relationships might work well enough in the early stages (how else to get to know each other well enough to make a conscious commitment?) but they reach a point where they almost always go downhill and become stagnant as time goes along. Why would this be so?

The commitment dilemma is fraught with fascinating and diabolical complications but boil it all down and underneath a refusal to commit, is an implicit pronouncement that the partner is not good enough to commit to. Partners who are holding back from making a commitment will want to put more flowery words around it, but after a couple of years of being together this is the truth -certainly the truth felt deep down by the one who is not being committed to.

Let's stand back and objectively look at two individuals in a half committed relationship. One (probably both, but usually one more obviously) is holding back from commitment which essentially means that person is emitting the energy that the other isn't good enough to commit to. At the hidden levels it is clear non-committing partners are still on the look out for someone better (or at the very least aspiring for an impossible life where they always get more than they are willing to give). When it comes to this territory, the non-committing partner, day in and day out, secretly holds a more desirable or "better-than" position while the other (when it comes to this territory) holds down a "less-than" position. Partners who are occupying the "better-than" position are understandably comfortable with the arrangement -they get to feel powerful. It's a safe position and up to a point they generally get their own needs met. For the "less-than" partners, (even though they may deny the feelings for years) it feels like crumbs and the hunger for more slowly builds. Clearly it is not terrifically expanding to be held in the position of "not good enough" for months or perhaps years on end.

This couple carries on day to day -and their type of relationship might be functional in quite a few other ways -but it will always reach the stage where "less than" partners begin to feel their anger. Ultimately they will begin withhold from the partner who refuses to commit -or punish them in some other way. This begins a cycle that is inevitably responded to in turn -withholding begets defense begets walls begets withholding. Anger spills out, often in ways that are not even fully understandable to either party. Habits of relating get formed -bad habits that get difficult to turn around if this process goes on too long. As partners refuse to either jump fully in or jump fully out, a lot of life passes both of them by and tension arises from that part of it too. Saddest of all, if the fundamental issue is not addressed, all this malaise only increases over time.

We strongly suggest that if partners are sensing the arrival of this point in their own relationship, they put some effort into very honestly defining their commitment to each other. Marriage is the point where partners have to back up words with action but the most important thing initially is to bring everything out into the open and find an agreement that works for both. If they truly are unable (or unwilling) to work on this challenging task, each time it comes up, then better to muster up the strength to call it quits -before too many deadened years go by in a "half-committed" situation.

By Doug Moseley