BLOG 241: Shattered

"The hard truth is... not only CAN she live without you... She'd rather"  

Greg Behrendt co-author "It's called a break up because it's broken" 

It's shocking really.  

Here I am being paid to build relationships... and be it personal or be it work... I just can't do battle to save what is broken myself.  I walk away from every situation where relationships are fractured or broken.... Am I a case of  those who can't teach? 

I have spent most of my working life being paid to advise on how to build relationships. It’s a weird thing to do for a living but that’s the skill I have that corporations seem to be happy to part with (in some cases) significant piles of moollah to get right. Business functions on the premise that a company should find out what people want and deliver it for profit. 

For many companies the challenge never seems to lie in the delivery, systems are in place to get what ever service or product they make into the grasping paws of those in need, those in want or those prepared to get into debt to satisfy desire, For most companies it's the staying abreast of what people want that is the gauntlet that they find hard to pick up with any degree of confidence. 

Over the years the skill I have for reading this correctly has morphed into human relationships, and as you know I write blogs and advice columns for internet dating sites these days. My top ten lists have been pinged about cyberspace and hopefully clueless lovers are little more prepared in the art of not making their partners feel like they are a trivial consideration. 

For as I write in almost every article - it is never the big stuff that causes relationship breakdowns... it's the small stuff. It's the not checking each others plans, it’s the not knowing each others expectations, it’s the not treating the other person as home base from which all else radials. That will end the deepest connection and be ultimately less forgivable than coming home and finding the Dagenham Girl Pipers dancing at the foot of the matrimonial bed.  (NOT a analogy before you ask!... I went out with an Essex Boy … and funny enough that was MUCH more forgivable than when he booked a football trip that clashed with our annual vacation.) 

So here I am this morning, putting finishing touches on a piece for a HR magazine about building great staff relationships, and checking the edit on my 10 ways to have a successful romantic relationship article for a website. And it dawned on me... what the HELL do I really know about any of this???! 

One would think that given that my jolly nice lifestyle is funded by spouting wisdom on relationships, that I must be exempt from hurtling into all the pitfalls those not gifted with the insight I possess do. My relationships should be like perfect vases not some glued together vessells leaking water. And given my propensity for fleeing at the first sign of a hairline crack.... maybe it does appear that way. 

Which is why sometimes when I get paid for spouting wisdom I feel like such a fraud. Yes, if you follow the steps I write about, you'll have better, healthier relationships with great communication.   But to date I've never figured out if fighting to make something work is a process worth going through. I've never really bothered myself. 

I think one of the worst things about being super-emotionally-aware is that you know what every thing means before the other person has even processed it. It means that I know where things are heading before anyone else, which means that my one great skill... is leaving. 

I walk before the person even explains to me where they were at in their head. The only steps I take seem to be in the opposite direction. 

Maybe it comes too easily to me to see that not knowing the date of your annual vacation with your spouse means the event just wasn't important enough to you in the first place. Which means that down time with your spouse isn't something you treasure. Which means that of course you'd act like a single man and get tickets for the Nu Camp. Which meant it was time to go. 

Maybe it comes too easily to me to see that not giving someone the work appraisal appropriate to their service  means that their contributions to date just were not important enough to you in the first place. Which means that what ever they have done so far isn't something of value. Which means of course you would down grade an established member of staff to level of a newbie just learning the job. Which meant it was time to go. 

I write about how to have healthy successful relationships be they corporate or personal. 

Walking away from relationships that are damaged in anyway does seem to be in conflict with that to some people.That giving advise on healthy successful corporate or personal relationships must involve advice on repair.

Actually in my defense, to date I have never yet given any advise on fixing anything. I strongly believe that the fractures are a disconnect. They lead eventually to a shattering of the relationship... maybe not today, maybe even not tomorrow. But broken, even when repaired can never be whole... and will always have less value. The trick... the thing I get paid to give advise on is NOT to damage the relationship in the first place. 

And THAT is advice worth every darn penny people pay me to deliver it. 

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