Is selfishness the main reason people break up?

gimme_another_inch

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I broke up with my girlfriend a week ago. I feel devastated. But this thread has showed me why I am in this situation. It's not that we cheated or lied or were mean to each other. It just, slowly faded away.

Thank you all for your comments and contributions.

That's normal in (almost) all kind of relationships, the ability, in my opinion, is to keep it alive, to find out how to renew it from time to time, to keep the fire lighting, maybe not the same burning one like by the beginning but the flame needs air to breathe.

If you try and keep trying to keep the flame up but the other part just turns on the other side or refuses she is not "the right one" or, as a matter of topic, too selfish, that's up to you to find out but I can completely and fully agree and be sympathetic with your pain; no words can make you feel better, time will heal and once you build confidence back you will have again the right attitude to try with another one but never give anything for granted, mutual will, mutual trust and a lot of other mutual things are required to make so that a relationship picks up.

Good luck!!!
 

gimme_another_inch

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Last year I was in bed with my ex gf, and the covers were big but apparently not big enough for the both of us.

She took the covers several times and I took them back just as hard.
One night, I just gave her all of the covers and said you need it more then I do and went back to sleep.

It was a selfless act but for selfish reasons.
I showed her a type of behaviour that I'd hope she'd pick up on.

I don't think being selfishness is that defining in the succes of a relationship but it plays a part.

I don't think and never wrote selfishness is "the reason" but for sure it takes a big part in a breakdown.
 

gimme_another_inch

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zIf it seems like the same woman... that is only because all relationships are the same in this respect.

partially true, some couples might not agree but for a big share I think it's very true

And, yes... everything is negotiated... its just that we do not realize we are negotiating. We don't realize that concessions are being made, and a hundred small powers fought over, and ultimately, allocated.

Let's not forget that when the relationship moves to the next step, call it marriage, many couples do sign a regular contract so, yes, matter of negotiation

Because we do not approach it openly, with both parties fully aware that a bargain is being struck, both parties fully aware that they are making promises to which they will be held, we end up not realizing that "letting something go" is making a concession... is giving up authority or power.

agree 100%!

And when we do not even realize the things to which we are agreeing are understood as agreements by our partner... then resentment builds... the accommodations we make chafe... and our opinions of our partner drift in light of a deep feeling that they are 'unfair', not holding their end up, or demanding too much.

this might be due to lack of communication, with regards to my experience I got to know other couple in potentially worse situation than mine who then had the ability to talk to each other and to find a compromise, lack of communication accounts for big part of the "selfishness" problem and then, as you say, the balance bends on one side and the other side feels literally screwed up by not being kept up with the "agreements"

A man who falls for and marries a sweet lovely woman, 5 or 8 years on finds she has let herself go... was that his understanding on marrying her? that she would allow herself to become so unattractive?

A very common situation especially in the area where I live, women think once they "hooked" him and they got a child they can let themselves to go and this is one big mistake, they do then regret being betrayed and they go like "ah, I knew that sooner or later you would have gone out with somebody younger than I" while the thing should be "do your best so that I don't need to hook up a younger one to get what you don't want to allow yourself any longer as, in the end, to let yourself go you deprive yourself the attention the other part used to give you but, in my opinion, this can be worked out if there is communication and the will to keep it alive

And Woman who marries a man who was trim and athletic and well groomed thru their courtship, finds herself married to a crude, pot bellied, beer swilling oaf who no longer has the time or attention to romance her? Is that what she understood she was signing up for?

exactly same as above


Yes, I want what I want in relationship... but, as in the Dalai Lama's comment, I have to have compassion for the fact that this person I want these things from, this person I purport to love, has things she wants from me, too...

And the truth is, I can't control her, I can not make her be honorable in keeping those promises, both overt, and tacit, that were made in the steam of passion...

true but there is where mutual will comes into play, if it fades away on both sides then why to keep it on?


The only thing I can control is what I choose to do. How honorably I live up to my own promises.
And, perhaps, if I have chosen wisely, she see my effort and will rise to reciprocate.

:confused: living in for hope... again I think communication would do much more and much better, then if chosen wisely or not still has a big %age of importance but communication and no fea to express own thoughts and desires is the key until you don't hit a wall of selfishness like "I am like this, accept me as I am or get somebody else"

So the only hope any of us have for getting the things we so selfishly want, is to give up being selfish and focus on Giving the things we know are needed by that person we mean to love.

I always thought, and still think even though just coming out from such a bad experience with regards to selfishness, that to love is like to give without to expect anything in return but, as you said, on the long run you feel sorta screwed into not being reciprocated and, in my case, I felt like I gae up on my self being to try to satisfy the other part that when I realized it was mostly a one way kinda relationship with regards of giving/taking, I felt screwed up twice and rather than with lube with sandpaper

now don't get me wrong, all I did while I was well aware that it was more to give than to take (this accordingly to my point of view as on the other part am sure it was the same but inverted parts) I did it with full knowledge of what I was doing since I was (and I still am) in love with my partner and I did wish that some day I would have been at least acknowledged for what I did and gave, if I would do it again is another matter, by knowing it would be too easy to state but in the same situation, same person I am sure I would!


In this way we learn to be less selfish, and perhaps, get something far more wonderful than merely what we want.



When conscious loving is practiced... when we know that every morning we have that obligation to look at our love with the same fresh and wondering eyes with which we first saw them.... when we know that nothing goes without saying, and no word spoken can ever be unspoken...

this still involves two persons, does it have to be mutual or you think that if this happens on just one of the two involved parts it works same way?

When we look at ourselves, first, to ask the question of whether we are worthy, this day, of the love we wish for...

Perhaps then we can really learn what genuine selfless love feels like.

Some selfishness for sure helps in life, like everything, in the right amount it makes no harm