Relationships - I : The Inevitable Expectations

You can find many young people in relationships may be in love or friendship around every corner of your life; almost equal in number are those who broke out of it. An individual enters into a relationship to do way with his/her loneliness, for emotional or moral support or for carnal desires etc. There would be equal number of reasons for breaking-up which vary for each and every relationship. All these human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsion, habit, reason, passion and desire. Here I want to mention some of the intricate details of the relationships.

The most important facet of any relationship is “Expectation.” One simply can’t deny that it’s the nature of every ordinary human being to expect something in return for a favour one does. Everyone enters into a relationship expecting some or the other things like trust, faithfulness, love, romance etc. This may not look obvious on the surface but if we analyze properly, we can surely find out our expectations.

You introspect yourself thoroughly to find out your expectations. Each and every individual expects something or the other that vary according to the situations. It would be better if everybody knows their expectations from the relationship (partner) and proceed further only if they are absolutely sure that their expectations are going to be met. The one who actually knows just what one wants in life has already gone a long way towards attaining it. Don’t look for a partner with out faults, for you would find none in this crooked and contaminated world.

Many of you don’t agree that most of the relationships are selfish. We enter into relationships just for mutual benefits and not for charity. I agree that there are very few relationships in which a person does not expect anything from the other, but let’s be human and accept that we are not completely altruistic. You trust your partner or friend and help him/her with complex situations or needs and expect something in return like sympathy or love etc as and when we need it. We take it for granted that the partner would give in those kinds of situations, which doesn’t happen in most of the relationships. So, what if your partner turns his/her back at you? It is at this moment the relationship trembles, which might eventually, leads to a break-up.

Some prolong the relationship with the intention of utilizing the partner as and when needed and stay quite the rest of the time. Even they negotiate and make a compromise to nourish the relationship. I call it “Use and Keep,” it’s different from the much renowned phrase use and throw. This has become a very common phenomenon in many of the present day relationships. No position is life is secure and no relationship is permanent unless built on truth, justice and sincerity. It is also important to note that every person changes with time, in fact some change every moment, which may change one’s expectations, behaviour etc. These changes look tiny but they may turn out to be magnanimous for a relationship to sustain, in a way that these make the partner unable to meet your expectations, ultimately leading to a break-up.

These kinds of break-ups make one think about the need of doing things for others or helping others and the necessity of an eternal relationship. Just a couple more of these kinds of humiliations will make one self-centered, malevolent, greedy and selfish. He/she just gives up the idea of a relationship. Remember that the moment you stop helping others, you die as a Human and loose your status as a citizen of the society.

So, what is the ideal way to make oneself comfortable in any relationship?
“Minimise your Expectations.”
That’s the only best thing as a human; we can do to build a strong relationship and make ourselves comfortable. Even if we make sincere efforts in establishing a relationship, it may fail due to the partner. It leads to distress, agony and also at times to a reduced sense of “me.” Dealing with emotional distress post break-up can be tough. When a relationship ends it brings with it not just the agony of the partition but sometimes may also shatter a person’s self-concept that would be dealt in detail in the next post.

With valuable inputs from Diwakar...