Time and again I have had a distraught husband or wife tell me that they no longer communicate with their partners. What they mean is that they no longer take the time to share their hopes and fears, their joys and their frustrations. Two days ago Beverley sat in my study and cried, because after 9 years of marriage she could no longer get through to her husband. Every time she pleaded with him to “talk things over” he would promise her that he would do so, “but not right now”. Yet this same couple used to share so much together in the early years of their marriage. Now they only communicate frustration, resentment and blame. Their experience is fairly typical of a great number of marriages. Somehow the high level of communication that characterises the courtship begins to decline — for some more rapidly than for others.
Courtship is usually characterised by a high level of communication. If this were not true, the relationship could not even begin to develop. Courtship is a time of excitement and wonder as two individuals begin to discover each other. We all grow up isolated in the sense that we keep our deepest emotions to ourselves. However, when we find someone to whom we can reveal our inner spirit, with whom we can share our deepest emotions, whom we can trust with our very hearts, it becomes one of the most exhilarating and thrilling experiences of our entire lives. This is the romance that poets eulogise, authors fantasise and singers croon about. This is the essence of an intimate relationship.
Why the decline?
I want to stress that there will always be a natural decline in the level of communication unless a couple take active steps to maintain their communication at a high level.
If this kind of communication is so meaningful, so uplifting, so stimulating, why is there an eventual decline?
Familiarity
One of the major reasons for this decline is the problem of familiarity. We assume that we know our partners — that there is nothing left to discover. So we no longer make any effort to explore further. Yet this is a complete fallacy. We will never know all that there is to know about our partners. Every individual has emotional depths that are fathomless — and changing constantly. I am not the person I was a year ago. I have become more mature. I have gained new insights. I have experienced spiritual growth. I have developed new perspectives. What’s more, I have a great need to share these changes with someone else — for only then will they really become part of me. Similarly my wife is not the person she was a year ago. She has learned new truths, her reactions have changed, she looks at situations differently, she has gained greater skills and she has developed more self- confidence. She needs to share all this with me in order to discover herself. She cannot know who she is until she can tell someone who she is.
In the early years of our marriage I thought I really understood my wife, but today, after almost 13 years of being together, I realize that I’m just beginning to touch the surface. It has become an exciting adventure for both of us to rediscover one another.
The thief of time
Another reason for the decline in communication is the lack of time. During courtship most people have considerably fewer responsibilities. Consequently fewer demands are made on their time. In those days a couple could afford to “waste” an evening simply talking to each other. It seems however, that as we become older our lives become just one mad rush. The arrival of children, the demands of a growing career, involvement in extra-mural activities etc. are all given priority. Even our vacations are so filled with activities that we just don’t have time to really talk to each other. And unfortunately intimate sharing requires lots of time — it simply cannot be scheduled into a busy programme. “Let’s sit down and share — I’ve got 23 minutes available,” will seldom lead to meaningful communication.
Whenever I have to travel some 60 km to Johannesburg, perhaps to speak at a meeting, I take Joy with me if I can — just for the pleasure of being able to talk without any interruptions. When we are alone in the car there are no children demanding our attention, no ‘phones ringing, no household chores that need attending to.
It never ceases to amaze me that we always seem to have more time to communicate with our colleagues or our neighbours than we have to talk to our partners. This suggests that we could arrange for time if we really wanted to..
Conflict is another culprit
The third reason for the decline in communication is the way conflict is handled. In the previous section we saw how styles of handling conflict like avoiding, yielding and the win/lose approach, all inhibit communication. Those who avoid conflict neither express themselves nor really listen. The yielding approach also implies that we do not express our own opinions and desires while the strong competitive element created by the win/lose approach would preclude any intimate sharing. Even the bargaining style tends to inhibit people not to expose themselves too much, since this may weaken their negotiating power. Only the win/win approach encourages a high level of communication.
