Lessons on Remorse for a Struggling Marriage: The Brink of Hope

VISUALIZE HOLDING A CRYSTAL BALL THAT COULD TELL YOU IF YOUR MARRIAGE WOULD STAND THE TEST OF TIME IN TEN, FIFTEEN, OR TWENT Imagine yourself looking into the smoky orb and wondering: Will staying make me happy? If I go, will my issues follow me? Is our marriage destined to be disregarded, unkind, and blame-filled no matter what we do?

Such inquiries are really about remorse and how it relates to a troubled relationship. They try to weigh the benefits of moving forward versus waiting. They are effective because they prod at our expectations, anxieties, and—most significantly—the unknown.

As a relationship specialist, I believe that our decision to stay in a failing marriage or leave it and our readiness to take risks are both influenced by our dread of regret. Conflict in marriage is a whirlwind of conflicting feelings. People experience complete paralysis or be overcome by righteous wrath. We might teeter on the edge of optimism or decide not to take a chance on a relationship. This causes fatigue and defeat. It makes sense that we might feel uncomfortable when children are involved because the stakes are so high. One of the hardest choices that many of us will have to make in our lifetimes is whether to end a marriage.

 

It’s common to feel paralyzed since the implications of staying or leaving loom so huge. What can regret psychology offer us about marital turning points where we consider ending a marriage and abrogating our vows, I wonder.

More specifically, may our thoughts about leaving our marriage after the kids are grown up or committing to the long run despite years of stalemate or a lack of sensuality have an impact? Perhaps picturing our future selves in regrettable settings makes us practice tragedies and creates the conditions for self-fulfilling prophecies that finally tear us apart. Maybe believing we have limited choices and believing we are unlovable by nature consigns us to a comfortable but routine life?

When it comes down to it, the question is straightforward: Will taking action in my relationship cause it to improve or deteriorate? But here’s the catch: what exactly is action? Is deciding to improve your relationship and staying in an unhappy marriage taking action? Are you leaving your marriage? What about staying still? Is that an instance in which inaction is action in and of itself?

 

Marital issues eventually spiral out of control if ignored. It becomes increasingly rare, challenging, and unproductive for us to adequately minister to our partner’s feelings with a few good words, a hug, or a kind act. It seems tough to get over past wrongs or remember happy times for some strange reason. Therefore, (understandably), we start to think that saving our marriage is impossible, that the relationship has failed, and that perhaps it is best to split up—to save our spouse of ourselves or oneself of one’s partner.

This is the country of negative sentiment override (NSO), a phrase Dr. John Gottman coined to describe the propensity to see our spouse and the course of our relationship through a dimly lit lens. It is both a state and a symptom. Our memories, once infused with fondness, are recast in our minds’ eye and get hidden by darkness, which is characterized by a loss of hope.

In essence, NSO is a cumulative byproduct of missed opportunities for connection, or “sliding door moments,” where we ignore (or fight) critical moments that call for our care and presence. For example, we repeatedly forget to inquire about the biopsy, forget to let our partner know we’ll be late, or ignore the depressed expression on their face. You’re probably tired, lonely, and wondering if relationships are intended to take this much effort if you’re here.

You might even feel tempted to resolve the conflict in your marriage by using force and determination. In your mind’s eye, the large red button labeled “Divorce” is flashing, and your fingertip is trembling. Most of us are able to resist pressing that button (until we don’t). After all, it is far simpler to stay in a well-known hell than to enter a mysterious heaven. We instinctively know that challenging the status quo requires taking chances, and since our minds are programmed to fear uncertainty, we put it off.

 

To further complicate matters, relationships can seem to change overnight from agreeable to disagreeable, giving a relatively small window of opportunity between marriage and divorcing. According to Gottman’s research, half of marriages that end in divorce do so within the first seven years, yet the typical couple waits six years after the commencement of a problem to begin couples counseling. It appears that hindsight is when we realize that all the warning flags were present, such as the gut instinct we ignored or the remark we chose to brush aside. Relationships have their seasons, and I’m referring to the beginning of fall, when we have an almost supernatural sense of when the seasons are changing.

Nature whispers that change is coming, and we feel it in our bones, even before we see that first gold leaf set against a field of green. The gloaming, a window when the days glitter brightly while at the same time starting to fade gently so that we do not notice the portent of what is yet to come, is what Joan Didion talks about in her memoir, Blue Nights. Winter.

That is how relationships are. We fail to notice the rising water, the approaching sea shift, and the impending disaster just beyond. By the time we see trouble, we are drowning and submerged. Many of our daily regrets are suppressed, distorted, and quash without our awareness, according to research on the psychology of regret. A smaller subset of regrets are what are left (and continue to torment us), which makes me question if the suppression of regret goes hand in hand with an allergy to hope.

Apparently if we never dare to dream, we will never experience disappointment, so we silently give up on our hopes and ambitions. In dimly lit alleyways, we strike deals to temporarily placate our subconscious. We put our signatures on the dotted line and stay in dead but livable marriages. What would it feel like to hope, I ask you?

 

THE Controversy OF Alternative and Choice

In our culture, we have a propensity to believe that a life well-lived is one that is filled with options. We only need to conduct a simple shampoo search on Amazon to find a dizzying assortment of choices. This illusion of abundance also applies to people. Social media platforms tempt us with brief connections, professional networking sites promise a profusion of potential mates, and online dating services seem to predict an abundance of perfect matches. However, regret research argues the opposite. It claims there is a downside to supposing our alternatives to be endless. The Opportunity Principle, which was coined by scholars Roese and Summerville in 2005, holds that having many options has a cost.

In other words, we encounter crucial crossroads in life—moments when we can choose to take a risk or play it safe—and, according to the research, we frequently feel regret when we think we could have chosen a different course but opted out. The concept that relationships end because of something other than knockdown, drag-out battles or even an infidelity is frightening. Instead, unseen forces work together to create a montage of regret-filled memories from all the unspoken words, unmade gestures, and silently turned away moments.

This is the influence of the path not traveled—the source of regret. Things raises the possibility that we choose to play it safe and retain the status quo simply because we think we have limited choices. It takes faith in something greater to risk expressing pain when we often respond to rage or shutting down; to set boundaries with an abusive spouse; to quit being codependent and stop enabling an addict.

One of such beliefs can be that one is inherently lovable, flaws and all. It might take the form of peaceful humility, a soft acceptance of things as they are, and faith in powers greater and more important than oneself. Whatever it is, it is undeniably incredibly difficult to muster. We are inherently cautious beings that live in a society that values abundance and scarcity. How do we muster enough bravery in a world when finding a new partner, better shampoo, or more fulfilling job is as easy as clicking a button but is interminably elusive?

The opportunity principle makes the implication that our heart’s affairs place us in a difficult situation. On the one hand, having the conviction that we have choices and are deserving of love and belonging can, at its finest, motivate us to take action, such as demanding that an unreliable partner treat us fairly, yield to our influence, and lose their scorn. Brené Brown said that anything is possible once we realize that love and belonging—our worthiness—are not things we have to work for but rather are something we are born with. On the other side, some of us prematurely default to a commitment crisis, we repeatedly endanger the connection, we carry an unfounded assumption of general responsibility, and we have a false perception that abundance is elsewhere.

 

ERRORS IN BOLDNESS

In an interview with The Power of Regret author Dan Pink, Brown and Pink make the claim that, over time, we regret what we did not do more than what we did; regrets of inaction are much more frequent than regrets of action. This is consistent with regret research, which demonstrates that regret is inherently temporal. It is logical. Memory changes throughout time. We constantly expand our knowledge of ourselves, our relationships, and our partners as a result of our experiences in life. Because of this, our understanding of the effects of our acts (and inactions) changes over time and is a continuous work in progress.

In an interview with The Power of Regret author Dan Pink, Brown and Pink make the claim that, over time, we regret what we did not do more than what we did; regrets of inaction are much more frequent than regrets of action. This is consistent with regret research, which demonstrates that regret is inherently temporal. It is logical. Memory changes throughout time. We constantly expand our knowledge of ourselves, our relationships, and our partners as a result of our experiences in life. Because of this, our understanding of the effects of our acts (and inactions) changes over time and is a continuous work in progress.

 

We regret our actions most frequently when we don’t act with kindness, bravery, or boldness. When we chose to deceive ourselves into thinking we can pass on vulnerability and chose to stay a spectator in the arena of life, only to later find ourselves face-down in the mud of regret and the filth of if-only.

 

The most important question we can pose when faced with an unreversible decision is whether or not we will regret our actions in the future and, if so, how?

 

If this is the case, perhaps the best we can do is compile a list of all the unknowns regarding our afterlife. Then take note of what ideas emerge as we imagine various scenarios. Imagine yourself at the age of 75, married, and in a long-lasting union, just like the one you have today. Imagine you chose to play it safe by doing nothing. What gains and losses resulted from keeping things as they are? Do the benefits exceed the expenses? You had any courage? Are you good?

 

Imagine what happened in your marriage when you abandoned conducting business as usual, insisted on equal consideration, and dove headfirst into heartbreak. Repeat this thought experiment. Does your future self, even if the marriage fails, lead a rich and fulfilling life? Take note of your feelings in each situation. Consider what a good-enough relationship is and what love is. Is it acceptable to aspire higher than adequate? List the characteristics you believe make up a healthy relationship in order of significance. Do the most important parts of love come naturally to you? What does the phrase “work on a relationship” actually mean? What does it mean when a relationship’s work involves letting it go?

We need not deceive ourselves into thinking otherwise; I assume that a life well lived is a life full with regrets. Instead, we might take a deep breath, let go of the burden of having no regrets, and focus on the lessons love keeps presenting to us. Because it is simpler to understand that our marriages begin and finish every day, as they always have and always will, if we step back and consider the overall picture—the kisses, knockdown dragout battles, tears, and poignant moments.

There are opportunities to love more effectively, differently, and healthily throughout life. We can be certain of this.