The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com, and at Amazon.com

Come back here. We're not finished.

You don't care anymore. Is that it? It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what I feel. Then tell me you don't love me. Say it. Let out that what you need to hear. I don't. I don't. Let me go. No, a person doesn't just wake up one day and stop loving somebody.

In this segment, I'll be talking about what it takes to create a genuine romantic partnership. And it's my pleasure to introduce my guest, Dr. Ed Locke. Dr. Locke is an internationally known business scholar, and he's written several books. Prime Movers is one of them. Study Methods and Motivations is a fabulous book. It helped me through graduate school. And he's co-authored books on goal setting and leadership. He's a senior writer for The Ayn Rand Institute, and he's been a therapist for 15 years.

Welcome, Dr. Locke.

Thank you for having me. Glad to be here.

Tell me, we're talking about romantic partnerships, not just marriage, because sometimes marriages go bad, and many times marriages go bad. What does it take to make a romantic partnership? And what does the word partnership add?

I think what it means is you're really in this together, as you know, two equals, growing in the same direction, but together and passionately loving one another.

As opposed to a boss and an employee, right? Inferior and superior or held together by duty. And I think, certainly, one of the things that's critical, I think, is generosity and sharing. I think it's very unromantic for a spouse to be a cheapskate. And I don't mean that if you're poor, you should go out and spend money you don't have, but being a cheapskate is very unromantic. It says, I don't want to get in the thing that you value if it costs more than 50 cents, and it's not very nice.

So what would be an example of this? If I'm going out with my partner, and he looks at me and says, "Oh, you can order anything on the menu that's under $5?"

Right? He's saying, and assuming you're not poor and have agreed to this, that since we're both very poor, let's be careful. But you're just playing a cheapskate. You're saying, I don't value you very much.

So why did you buy that dress that was $15?

And then you get in a big fight over it. So obviously, you may need a budget and you may need to be careful, but cheapskate means that you're being cheap when you don't have to be. One aspect of generosity would be, you know, buying little presents for the person, because you see something in the store and say, "Geez, they would love that. I’m going to just get that for them as a special kind of present," or doing special little things like maybe a special meal, or writing a poem, or a surprise card, or flowers.

Now you're saying that many people will do this to win a person, but the minute they settle, well, then this goes by the wayside.

Yeah, that's no good. If you want to sustain it, you keep doing it forever. Here's an example from Ann Landers: "My neighbor's husband could not be bothered to look for a suitable birthday gift, so he handed her a bathroom rug and said, 'Happy Birthday, honey.'" That stinginess is anti-romantic.

So I once had a boss give me a pipe cleaner because he smoked pipes and it must have been left over in his closet. Now that wasn’t a romantic relationship, but it’s that type of an idea. "I care about you so much that I went into my closet and pulled out some old thing to give you."

I think another thing of a partnership is good manners toward one another. For instance, you see stories where "we have guests, and he always interrupts me every time I start to speak." Well, that’s very rude and very anti-romantic. By having no manners you should have, not just manners for guests, but manners with your own spouse. Wiping your mouth and saying please and thank you, holding the door, not swearing if they are against it, good manners should be, especially with your spouse, taking joy in their achievements. And a very, very important issue—the best marriages involve...

Hey, I got to interrupt this because we’ve got to pay some bills. 30 seconds, that’s it. A very quick ad, and then Alan will be back.

Romance. Oh, I wish guys knew more about what we want from a relationship. Boy, I wish I knew more about what I want. Where’s that ad I saw? Here it is: The Selfish Path to Romance, a serious romance guidebook. Download chapter one for free at SelfishRomance.com and buy it at Amazon.com. The Selfish Path to Romance, that is interesting.

And a very, very important issue—the best marriages involve joint decision making by equals. And if the man says, "I earn the money, so I’m going to tell you everything to do, and don’t question me," that’s not a marriage. That’s a boss-subordinate relationship. So you really need to make decisions jointly, and one person shouldn’t go off and make big decisions about furniture, housing, jobs, cars, without doing it together. And an aspect of this very important today is both spouses should fully understand the finances. It shouldn’t just be, as the old-fashioned way, the man’s job, and "keep it from the little woman." It should be done jointly. And both parties should fully understand what the assets are, how the money is being spent. Otherwise, you can get in terrible problems.

Such as?

Such as in divorce, the woman doesn’t know what’s happening, has no concept of what their debts or their assets are, where the money is, what to do with it—which happens all the time.

So when you talk about a division of labor in a relationship, one of the things that you don’t want to sacrifice is your own first-hand knowledge of the financial situation.

Even if you delegate investment decisions to one party because they’re more expert, you should still know on a regular basis how your finances are. They shouldn’t hide the reports every month and say, "None of your business." You should share those.

So the wife that says, "I have no idea what my husband makes. He gets bonus checks, he spends them on golf, and I don’t know whether I can spend this or not, but he gives me a stipend of $20 a week to spend on groceries."

Yeah, so that’s not a marriage. That’s not a partnership.

It’s a marriage, but it’s not a partnership.

It’s not a good marriage, it’s an employer relationship.

Now, you’ve brought up a point about playfulness. Where does that come into a good partnership?

I think a partnership—the people, although they’re serious about their love for each other, they’re serious about morality, but they’re light-hearted with each other, and including in sex. They’re happy, they’re playful. They find life to be joyous. They use humor in a benevolent way, not in a sarcastic way, not to make fun of people, not to mock in front of others. For instance, let’s say something funny happened. The spouse would say to the guest, "Sweetheart, can I tell this funny story about when we went out to play golf?" And if they say no, then you don’t tell it, because maybe they’re embarrassed. Maybe they say yes, that was funny, but you respect them enough to say, if it bothers them, you don’t.

You take it seriously. You don’t say, "Well, it doesn’t bother me, so who cares if it bothers them?"

I think also, in a good marriage, you have to grow together, psychologically, intellectually, in knowledge and confidence and grow somewhat in the same direction. And many, many divorces are caused by growing—one grows, the other doesn’t grow, or they grow in totally different directions. So to maintain the love, you need to grow together. And if you value each other, usually you can do that.

And one very important point, okay, we’re down to the last minute. Never let relatives come before your partner.

Wonderful. Not ever.

Not ever.

But my mother-in-law wants to move in with us. Remember I do...

Never, never sacrifice your spouse to the feelings of a relative.

But my sister needs some money, and I know we don’t have them...

You do it jointly. And if it has to hurt somebody, you hurt them to respect your spouse. So relatives can destroy a marriage, because you can never, you should never put them ahead of your spouse.

But it’s my father! How can I say no to...

So if you’re going to be a mama’s boy, then don’t marry me.

Okay, okay. Well, thank you so much for joining us today, Dr. Locke. It’s been wonderful to talk to you. We’ve been talking about what it takes to have a wonderful romantic partnership, and we’ve talked about many things: good manners, don’t let relatives intrude on you, having a playfulness in the relationship, having a sense of joint decision making—it’s not unilateral, one-sided, it’s mutual—and this sense of just sharing with one another, emotional intimacy, sharing your days with one another. Thank you so much for joining us, Dr. Locke, and hope to talk with you again soon.

Thank you for having me.

For more Dr. Kenner podcasts, go to DrKenner.com and please listen to this.

Here’s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance, the serious romance guidebook by clinical psychologist Dr. Ellen Kenner and co-author Dr. Edwin Locke.

Partners need to communicate constantly, but most do not. Why is communication not a conscious priority? Most partners feel that because they’re in a settled relationship, they no longer need to talk as much about their feelings toward one another. They focus on everyday, practical matters, yes, but expressions of tenderness, concern, and interest in one another’s lives go untended. They go on automatic and don’t talk unless their subconscious mind happens to feed them something. It is precisely because they are in love that partners need to communicate in order to maintain and deepen that love.

You can download chapter one for free by going to DrKenner.com and you can buy The Selfish Path to Romance at Amazon.com.