The relationship paradox: Why have them if they end?

THE RELATIONSHIP PARADOX: Why have them if they end?

Growing up, I never understood the idea of making your bed. Sure, if you are having a party or people are coming over to look at the house, you want things to be neat and tidy. But for everyday living, why make the bed? You are just going to climb into it later and mess it up again. It seems like an exercise in futility, especially if you are the only one who ever sees the bed. To this day, I don't make my bed very often. Relationships are not exactly like making the bed. Certainly, they are more complex, with added benefits that the satisfaction of hospital corners just can't match. However, just like a made bed gets unmade, so many relationships end. This leads me to wonder this week if relationships are really worth the trouble.

I owe a debt of gratitude this week to a long-time friend that i'll have to cover up as GUS. I was having coffee with him recently and the conversation turned to relationships. Gus is a little older than I am, and he has been in his share of relationships, as I have. He was wondering aloud why we bother getting into relationships if they all just end. After all, we invest a lot into a relationship -- not just our time and money, but our emotions and the emotions of our friends and family. When a relationship ends through death, anger or attrition, it leaves everything a little worse than it was before.

It seems like a cynical view on the surface. Life doesn't come with guarantees, and relationships are always a risky venture. And just because life ends at a certain point, that doesn't invalidate the value of a lifetime spent together. The issue for me is about the effort of it. For most of us, we don't marry our high school sweetheart and stay together for 50 years. We string together a lifetime of fits and starts in the dating world, racking up experience points along the way. After a few decades of dating, bookended by "this is forever" and "it sounded good at the time," it is easy to feel a little battle-weary from the experience. Still, is that any reason to throw in the towel altogether?

Past relationships that have ended in failure can create better people to be in a relationship with, if the parties involved learn any lessons from the experience. Quite often, people stumble from relationship to identical relationship without ever recognizing their own patterns or mistakes. For them, I think giving up on the notion of eternal happiness with one other person is a noble gesture. Those who learn and grow from relationships might finally meet someone else who has matured, but the odds seem very unlikely. Statistics show that the majority of relationships are going to end -- so, clearly, your chances are slim indeed.

Despite all that pessimism, I think that there is great value in relationships, no matter how they work out. There are benefits in sharing experiences with someone, even if they aren't still around to share the memory with you 20 years later. Life is a great adventure meant to be taken in the company of others. Pain in life comes with the job, and shutting yourself off may spare your emotions but it also provides a life half lived. While it is true that I continue to have no interest in making my bed, I do think I will continue to give relationships a try. After all, it is more fun to spend time in an unmade bed with someone else.