Life of Matt

This is the fifth article in “Things You Don’t Talk About at the Dinner Table“, a series about how to create an environment of trust an openness, where anything can be discussed.

Today I want to take some time to dispel a number of common yet harmful mindsets around the issue of creating and maintaining relationships.    They all center around this issue of what I call the myth of compatibility.

The myth of compatibility in a nutshell, is this:

Some people are meant to connect with each other, and some aren’t.

From this erroneous belief, stem other harmful and false mindsets, which hurt your ability to connect with others. First, that connecting with others should be effortless and simple, and second, that superficial commonalities determine the success of a relationship.

The Myths of Compatibility

Myth 1: Connection Should Be Effortless

This myth was brought to my attention in a comment on one of my other articles about how to create relationships.  The gist of the comment was that because the article talked about how to CREATE connection, it was automatically a bad idea, because connection should not have to be created.

While I see where the commenter is coming from, I categorically disagree with the sentiment.  In every worthwhile relationship I’ve had, there’s always been a point where the relationship becomes strained, and it takes some work to rebuild the connection. I would venture a guess that if you look at your own relationships, you’ll discover a similar situation.  Wouldn’t it be silly to discount a relationship, just because this period of lower connection comes at the beginning of the relationship instead of at the middle?

Reality: Relationships are hard work.

Myth 2:  We Have Nothing in Common

This is a common one I see.  There’s actually two beliefs that bring this statement about, both of them false.  The first erroneous belief is that it’s actually possible to have nothing in common with another human being.  The truth is, you have more in common with any given person than you have differences with them (The Second Formulation of the Law of Average Joes).

We can start with the most obvious way to disprove this: Do you both have two eyes, a nose, and a mouth?  On the most basic level, you’re both human.  But honestly, that’s a pretty stupid argument, who connects on aspects of their anatomy?

What I’m going to argue is much deeper.  I’m going to argue that deep down, in all of us, there’s a basic human goodness.  There’s an inherent value deep inside our being, which is common to every human being on the planet. It’s THAT commonality that you can connect on, and that’s why I think you always have something in common with another person.

Reality: Everyone has a deep inherent value in common with everyone else.

There’s also another myth hidden in this statement, and that’s the idea that you must have something in common with somebody else in order to connect with them.

However, have you ever met someone who had such different beliefs from your own that you were immediately fascinated by them?  Ever had the experience of trading differing beliefs with somebody, and feeling closer to them because of it? You didn’t connect on commonalities, you connected on differences. (I also talk about this briefly in my article about how to begin to create relationships.)

Reality: You can connect on differences just as easily as commonalities.

The Reality of Relationships

The misconceptions above, and the idea of compatibility itself all stem from a fundamentally flawed mindset.  It’s a mindset which says that relationships are something which happen TO you, a mindset of reaction.  I want you to consider coming from a more proactive mindset.  Love, trust, connection, understanding, these are not things which you simply HAVE, they’re things which you must DO, ways that you must BE. Instead  of whining that there’s no trust in a relationship, BE more trusting.  Instead of complaining about not understanding someone else, BE more understanding.

With hard work on yourself and a relationship, I believe that you truly can connect with anybody.  Hopefully I’ve convinced you that compatibility is a myth… the rest is up to you.

Click Here to Read the Rest of this Series.