Sean Illing What makes good marriages good?
Eli Finkel That we bring significant expectations to them, and they meet those expectations.[...]
Eli Finkel Well, I wouldn’t necessarily say we’re asking less of it. We're asking less when it comes to things at the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs — basic things like security and safety. What I think we don't really appreciate these days is that 200 years ago, people literally looked to marriage for food, clothing, and shelter. It was precarious to live if you weren’t married. We need marriage less in those ways than we did before. Our expectations are lower in those ways, but they're higher in emotional and psychological sorts of ways. [...]
We have goals, we have aspirations. We're reasonably proud of who we are, but we can think of ways that we can be better, more ambitious, more energetic, or maybe better at relaxing. We're trying to achieve those goals, and the reality is that humans aren't individual, isolated goal-pursuers. Our social relationships have profound influence on the extent to which we get closer to versus further from our ideal self.
The best marriages these days take that seriously. They take the responsibility for trying to help each other grow and live authentic lives to an extent that would have seemed bizarre in 1950. [...]
I talk a lot about calibrating expectations to what the marriage can realistically provide. In some sense, it's basically a modified supply and demand perspective. It says you're welcome to ask for as much as you want of the marriage, but you need to make sure that the marriage can actually achieve those things. That the marriage can supply enough to meet the demand. When I say supply, I'm talking about, yes, compatibility, but also time, commitment, and effort.
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