Why did he do it?
Why did he walk away from everything you had together?
It makes no sense. Sure, you had your problems, but all relationships do. You have work at it. You have to try to fix things.
Instead of trying, he just walked away.
Why???
Deep down, you worry that you already know the answer.
It was because of you, wasn’t it?
A Rigged Game
There’s a popular saying in self-help circles:
The only common denominator in all your relationships is you.”
This saying implies that you’re the reason all your relationships have ended.
You’re making it happen somehow.
If you want love that lasts, you have to figure out what you’re doing wrong and fix it.
Blame yourself—that will help you do better next time!
Seriously?!
From my decades of relationship research, I can definitively tell you this:
You are NOT the reason every single relationship you’ve had ended the way it did.
It turns out there’s another common denominator in all your relationships.
Want to hazard a guess?
Here’s a clue:
It’s a 3-letter word starting with M.
Men’s Expectations
We love men.
Their strength, their humor, their tenderness, their quirks.
But men bring a different set of expectations to relationships than women.
They’ve been raised by a different code. They have a complicated relationship with feelings. Being manly is at odds with being a woman’s best friend.
Men bring this cultural baggage to their relationships, where it competes with their natural desire—a desire all humans share—for love, intimacy, and belonging.
As a result, too many men are set up to fail in relationships…
Because there’s a conflict between what they’ve been taught to want and expect…
And what relationships actually require of them.
The Relationship Contract
Do you know what your guy wanted from you?
Do you know what he expected from you?
Chances are, when you got into this relationship, you didn’t find out what exactly you were agreeing to.
You just assumed that a relationship meant the same thing to him as it did to you.
That’s where you went wrong.
He may have thought that you were agreeing to make his life happy, satisfy him in bed, and never bother him with demands or difficult conversations.
You may have thought that he was agreeing to co-creating an incredible relationship with you, one where you expressed your love and supported each other at every turn.
He didn’t get what he expected.
Neither did you.
But you kept communicating. Relationships take work, right? Even if it was hard right now, you believed in a future where things could be perfect.
He thought things would be perfect now. He did everything that was required of him. He asked you to be his. What more was he supposed to do?
Clearly the relationship isn’t working, so he knows only one thing to do:
End it.
What Can You Do?
There is no way you can give a man a perfect relationship.
Even if you keep yourself fit and attractive for him, even if you look at him with stars in your eyes, even if you look after him like a gourmet chef/housekeeper/personal assistant rolled into one…
You will have conflict.
You’ll disagree.
You’ll irritate one another.
If you want proof, just look at the marriages of Hollywood stars. Some of the most beautiful, accomplished, sexy women in the world have terrible love lives.
So don’t blame yourself for everything you aren’t.
It wouldn’t help, even if you could be the ideal woman.
What would have helped is getting on the same page.
Negotiate A New Relationship Contract
Before you get into another relationship, talk about your expectations.
Talk about what being in a relationship asks of you.
Discuss what a woman’s role in a relationship is. Discuss what a man’s role is.
Make sure you sign the same contract!
And that contract has to be reasonable.
If his vision of the ideal relationship involves a woman who’s fun, easy, takes care of him, and never asks much of him, then you’re doomed.
So why do men end relationships? We now know the answer.
Men end relationships when their expectations have been violated.
It doesn’t matter if those expectations were unreasonable.
It doesn’t matter if you never knew what those expectations were.
That’s not fair.
If you haven’t talked about expectations before agreeing to a relationship, you’re playing a rigged game.
Don’t sign up to a relationship you can’t win. Talk about it.
Let us know what you think!