100% – 100% Responsibility

Many couples early in their relationship set up a model of responsibility that could be called 50% – 50%. If each person in the partnership does their 50%, then all 100% of what needs to be done gets accomplished and presumably both partners will be happy and satisfied. The 50% – 50% model is an additive model. While this model appears to have its merits, it is insufficient to creating a true partnership. As soon as one partner does not do “their” 50% in the relationship, the other partner may experience a sense of being taken advantage of. It is a model that is based on what each person is doing in a relationship, rather than based on who each person is being for the relationship.

A committed relationship requires a model of 100% – 100% responsibility. Responsibility in this framework is the act of owning one’s own happiness and creating one’s responsibility for it by saying: “I am completely responsible for my happiness. In addition, while I am not responsible for my partner’s happiness, I am committed to it.” The corollary to this is also very powerful: Each person is responsible for his or her unhappiness and not responsible for their partner’s unhappiness. This clear understanding of responsibility, together with a commitment to each other’s happiness is an important aspect of workability in a partnership.

If both partners are responsible for their own happiness and committed to the happiness of each other, who then is ultimately responsible for the workability of the relationship as a whole? Both partners are. Both partners naturally commit themselves to being 100% responsible for the workability in their committed relationship. Each person views himself or herself as being the relationship.

In giving advice on marriage, Kahlil Gibran in The Prophet writes, “And stand together, yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, and the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.” Like two strong pillars, partners are compassionately committed not only to the well being, success and fulfillment of each other but also to that of their relationship.

Reference

Gibran, K. (1923) The Prophet. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Publishers.

Posted in Partnership Marriage