The Key to Lasting Love Is Endless Curiosity

Remember when you first started dating?

Remember how curious you were about each other? What happened?

That’s right. You stopped.

It’s easy to be curious about someone in the initial dating stages when you’re riding the honeymoon highs and showing your best self.

Everything feels like magic, even the quirks, as the feeling of new romance smooths everything over.

You minimize problems at work, experience stress reduction, and your phone becomes a thrilling landscape of texts, pictures, memes, and emojis.

After the honeymoon, however, the problems start to arise.

No longer fueled by chemicals, novelty, and initial curiosity, you start to argue a bit, and the quirks you thought were adorable now begin to annoy you.

The person is perpetually late, scatterbrained, a little too busy, or one or two values are out of alignment. Perhaps one of you is addicted to social media, and the other hasn’t checked Instagram in a week.

Perhaps one of you is a morning person, and the other can’t fall asleep before midnight.

Intolerance creeps in, and before you know it, you’re in the power struggle stage.

Now you’ve had one or two all-out fights, and you’re wondering if the whole relationship is a mistake. Perhaps you’re required to make more sacrifices than you intended, or the other person creates drama over things you believe to be inconsequential.

Underneath it all is an eroded sense of curiosity about each other, and the dreaded familiarity creeps in.

You’re not as interested in sex, or they’re not.

You find more excuses to work, drink, play video games, hang out with friends, and so on.

One or both of you start to feel numb as the arguments, lack of communication, and misunderstandings have calcified into resentments, and it seems like all hope is lost.

But there is hope.

That Thing You Had in the Beginning

There is hope for couples in the power struggle stage of the relationship, as well as in the subsequent stages.

There is also hope for the couple who’ve been together for decades, but the kids are old enough to take care of themselves, and the need to stay together has passed.

Sure, you value the comfort of the relationship and the life you’ve built with that person, but it doesn’t feel like enough. It feels like there’s more to life than the monotonous, often boring life you’ve grown accustomed to, and checked all the boxes you can think of.

Perhaps you’re feeling like it’s time to leave, but there’s hope for this situation, as well.

It’s called…

That’s right — that magical thing you had in the initial dating stages that seemed to be overflowing.

It was easy then. It’s hard now.

“Curious about what?” you might think. “Haven’t I learned all there is to know about my partner?”

It’s tempting to think that, especially when meeting someone new and exciting seems like the answer.

But feeling like there’s no more curiosity doesn’t mean it’s a fact.

Because here’s the thing: no one is the same person from one day to the next.

We are constantly changing, always learning, and always evolving. We read books, listen to podcasts, or hear some paradigm-shifting wisdom on YouTube.

I can’t name a single person who is alive and conscious who isn’t learning at least one new thing each day, even if it’s from a mistake they made while making breakfast. The point is, there is always something new to talk about if you’re willing.

That willingness to talk about anything from the smallest “ah-ha” to some discovery in therapy is the antidote to most relationship struggles.

Most relationships don’t dissolve from a lack of love; they dissolve from a lack of curiosity about each other and the intimate communication that ensues.

Opportunities for Understanding

The research from John M. Gottman, the notable author of The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work, found that the quantity and quality of a couple’s communication is at the heart of the relationship’s longevity, and those who forgo curiosity often end up building walls of resentment, leading to contentious, damaging fights.

Gottman uses the term “bids for connection” that every couple employs, either consciously or not, and it’s these bids that get buried, ignored, converted, or minimized.

An example of a bid for connection is when a woman comes to a man with a problem, and unless she’s looking for advice, wants to talk it out, process her feelings, and let a solution surface.

If a guy isn’t curious about her, he’ll basically say, “You need a wrench — here. Tighten that thing, loosen that thing, problem solved. Can I go back to watching the game?”

Wrong.

Or she might come to him with a generalization —

“You’re never on time. Why are you always late? You obviously don’t care about me anymore!”

Wrong.

The solution?

That’s right. Get curious. Here’s what I mean.

In both scenarios, individuals should seek to understand first, then communicate how this situation makes them feel and their interpretation of the action or inaction.

Him

Instead of, “Let me solve your problem so I can relax,” the man could become curious about two things:

What the woman is trying to communicate
What kind of support she’s requesting

In doing so, she doesn’t feel that he’s dismissing her bid to communicate her emotions, nor does she think that her life is just a problem to be solved.

Furthermore, the man could communicate how her venting makes him feel and the meaning or stories he places on this behavior.

Perhaps he feels overwhelmed at the assumption that she wants or needs him to fix things for her. Maybe he’s operating off a past pattern when his mother expected him to fix her problems as a child.

When we get curious about one another, these self-realizations surface, leading not only to a deeper understanding of our partners but also to a deeper understanding of ourselves.

Her

Instead of, “You always [fill in the blank] or you never [fill in the blank] and [insert overgeneralized assumption],” the woman can get curious about what’s behind the recurring issue or behavior.

She could:

Ask what the man is experiencing when committing to a time
Ask what support he could use to be on time moving forward

Like the man, she could address the feelings that arise when he’s perpetually late and any stories she might be telling herself.

Perhaps she experienced broken promises as a child when her father said he would show up but didn’t, or her own perfectionism around punctuality is a result of being admonished for being late.

The “I’m Fine” Trap

Another way that couples deny the opportunity to communicate and connect is by using the phrase “I’m fine.”

You’ve heard it — you know that your partner is upset about something, but when you ask what’s wrong, they reply with “I’m fine.”

No, they’re not fine.

Women tend to do this more than men, but men do it too, and either way, it’s dismissive, disconnected, and immature. The better way to handle it is to express what’s going on straightforwardly and maturely, and to convey thoughts and feelings as they are.

Of course, this takes practice, especially if you learned the “I’m fine” tactic in childhood. Still, nothing good comes from denying one’s emotional state out of manipulation or an unwillingness to address the issue.

What “I’m fine” usually means is “I’m not fine and I need you to fix what I’m not sharing with you.” Sounds maddening, right? It is.

A different approach would be to take the necessary time and space to calm down if triggered, then get clear about the root issue. In this case, getting curious about yourself is vital.

If you need to address something with your partner, then do so with the same curiosity as exemplified in the situations above. If it’s purely internal or doesn’t involve your partner, there’s no rule that you have to share it with them, but saying “I’m fine” when you’re not erodes trust in the relationship.

If your partner is getting curious about your apparent emotional state and wants to understand what’s below the surface, genuinely, then giving some realistic cue of the situation both validates your partner’s perception and keeps the communication honest.

Curiosity vs. Judgment

A major blocker of curiosity is judgment.

As you actively integrate curiosity into your relationship repertoire, notice what judgments arise about your partner and their behaviors.

Do you say things like, “That’s not how I was raised,” or make damaging diagnoses like “You’re a narcissist” or “You’re a terrible person!”

Of course, you could be dealing with a narcissist, but chances are you’re playing psychologist when all you have is an opinion. The inner judge loves to categorize people’s behaviors as either good or bad, resulting in overgeneralized black and white assessments.

Therefore, you should develop an understanding of how judgment blocks you from becoming curious, which leads to greater understanding and a quieter inner judge.

Chances are, your judgments about others are a reflection of how you judge yourself, so turning the attention inward can benefit your own self-awareness.

Reducing judgment doesn’t mean you should tolerate intolerable behavior. It’s about avoiding the either/or/good/bad thinking that keeps us safe but disconnected.

Conclusion

Getting curious, especially when emotions flare up and past traumas trigger us, is difficult. Full stop.

If our parents didn’t exemplify emotional maturity, control, and accountability, we’ll need to learn it now, then practice it until pausing before reacting becomes our default behavior.

When we become curious, we increase our understanding and empathy towards others, rather than personalizing things, which leads to more harmonious relationships that tend to last.

I’ve told many coaching clients that whatever you do, do not let the wall of resentment build because it’s so hard to tear it down. It’s easier to establish good communication practices than to heal a damaged relationship.

Men are known to ignore the signs a woman gives that she’s fed up and ready to exit the relationship until it’s too late, while women are known to communicate in ways that men don’t understand.

Getting curious about one another is the first step in finding common ground and understanding, because it forms the foundation for active listening, asking powerful questions, empathizing, and instituting changes or acceptance.

And lastly, become curious about your inner judge and how it’s blocking you from curiosity about your partner. Learn what your judgments can teach you about yourself, your beliefs, and what negative biases you place on others before knowing the whole picture.

Unfortunately, the feeling of love tends to fade as familiarity increases, so remember your ABCs and always be curious. See your partner as someone new each day and keep the novelty alive by asking questions, acknowledging bids for connection, and navigating the rough patches with maturity.