Two Happy People Make A Happy Relationship
In romantic relationships you’re meant to love and care for one another deeply and that means supporting each other to achieve your respective goals. You may think that your partner’s goals are not right for them, or you may feel that they conflict with your own individual goals or your mutual couple goals, but you still need to support them. And I’ll explain why.
Whilst this may feel counterintuitive – as supporting your partner’s goals may come at the detriment of your own goals, their health and happiness or yours, or even the temporary wellbeing of your romantic relationship – two happy people make a happy relationship.
And if you want your spouse to be happy, you need to let them be their authentic selves and grow as they desire.
You know that phrase, ‘their happiness is your happiness’? It is the case. In a long-term study spanning 35 years researchers found that the happiness trajectory of one spouse was closely associated with the happiness of the other spouse; spouses’ happiness levels waxed and waned at roughly the same time across the decades [1].
And if you’re both focused on each other’s happiness as well as your own, things work out much easier and better for you both in the long-run anyway!
With that in mind, I’ll explain which types of support work and which don’t, and why, despite the perceived costs, supporting your partner works out best for both of you.
Different Types Of Support
So which types of support help your partner’s ability to achieve their goals, and which hinder?
In a review of 36 studies with a total of 10,130 participants in romantic relationships, researchers looked at how three types of support – (i) responsive, (ii) practical, and (iii) negative support – affected romantic partners’ goal outcomes based on three parameters – (a) progress, (b) commitment, and (c) self-efficacy (the belief that one has the capacity to execute behaviours to achieve a specific outcome) [2].
‘Responsive support’ encapsulates emotional support such as reassurance, encouragement or understanding.
‘Practical support’ refers to practical help such as advice, assistance or information.
‘Negative support’ includes things like control, coercion or interference.
Whilst responsive and practical support were positively associated with the partners’ goal outcomes, and to a similar degree, negative support was negatively associated with the partners’ goal outcomes.
So emotional and practical support helped, whilst negative support hindered.
Emotional support benefitted (a) progress and (b) commitment and (c) self-efficacy, equally. Practical support helped (a) progress and (b) commitment but produced mixed results for (c) self-efficacy, possibly, as stated by some of the original researchers, because practical support can help some people’s self-efficacy whilst hindering it in others.
Harmonious And Non-Harmonious Goals
In an experimental study testing the effects of goals that romantic partners feel are in conflict with their own goals or the romantic relationship itself, i.e. non-harmonious goals, researchers found that non-harmonious goals can hinder goal pursuit in terms of the goal-striver’s commitment, motivation, and progress towards opportunities [3].
More specifically, non-harmonious goals resulted in partners being less likely to seek support, less likely to provide support, more likely to view their partner as being less supportive, and ultimately, feel less committed toward their goals.
Long-Term Goal Conflict
In another study, researchers found that when dating partners reported higher goal conflict regarding long-term goals, they also reported lower relationship quality and lower subjective wellbeing; plus, when one partner reported higher goal conflict, their partner also reported lower subjective wellbeing [4].
So, higher long-term goal conflict can affect relationship quality and the wellbeing of both partners.
How Supporting Your Partner Helps, Despite Perceived Costs
So why am I saying that you need to support your partner despite the perceived costs?
Because personal growth is incredibly important to the health and happiness of ‘healthy’ individuals.* If you strive to make them happy and they strive to make you happy, then you’ll always find a happy medium that works good enough to ensure you’re both happy.
That might mean, for example, finding different ways to have more time together, finding ways to not let their goals affect your relationship or wellbeing, focusing on the gains you’ll both reap in the long-term instead of the pain in the short-term, and so on.
Whatever the challenge, you’ll find a way around it when you’re both motivated by your own happiness and each other’s happiness, too.
Furthermore, even if you think your partner is pursuing a goal that is not right for them, or is too small for them, or too big for them, or that they are using the wrong vehicle for pursuing it, or that they are striving towards it in a long-winded way, etc, whatever your views and concerns may be, you need to let them find their own way. That’s part of their personal growth.
Yes, communicate your concerns in a compassionate, respectful way, and if they love you, they’ll care, but as per the aforementioned study, don’t try to control them as it will only hinder their progress. Plus, it will take away their sense of freedom and dampen their wellbeing. And you certainly don’t want to do any of that.
People need to make their own mistakes sometimes; let them. It’s good for them. And it’s good for your relationship long-term. Only when a person has exhausted their own ideas about how to fulfil their vision, do they know for sure, whether it was right or not, whether they attain their goal, or fail to do so.
And when you give something your all, you can walk away with peace of mind. If, on the other hand, you get in the way of your partner pursuing their important goals with all their heart and in the manner they see fit, you will have robbed them of that opportunity to see if it worked, if it was worth it, and should it come to it, walking away with their peace of mind.
Your job as a loving spouse is to give your beloved peace of mind, and be there to help as they want you to. You never want to be the reason for their ‘what-ifs’. And you also don’t ever want to be the reason for their unhappiness, now or in the future as they look back. Let them explore and grow to the best of their ability.
And it doesn’t matter what other people mistakenly think, as long as you and your partner are on the same page about the pursuit of your individual and mutual goals, and the journeys you are traversing, even if you don’t agree but support one another to allow each other the space and time to explore, that’s all that matters.
If your partner truly loves you, he/she will make the necessary adjustments to make their goals harmonious with your relationship, mutual goals, and both your and their individual goals, but it has to come from them. Support them, keep the communication going and, as a result, you’ll help each other to feel happy and satisfied within your romantic relationship, too.
Personal Growth Matters
Personal growth helps people to feel good about themselves and be mentally healthy and it can come in a number of ways. It could be learning to think differently, getting into better physical shape, getting better at running your household responsibilities, or reaching the top echelons of your industry. Make room for that.
You never want to be the person that stood in the way of your beloved’s dreams and personal growth, and you never want your partner to feel that way about you either. And when you love each other deeply, you will each make decisions that, on the whole, balance your respective needs, goals and wellbeing, and those of your relationship.
And remember that emotional support such as reassurance, encouragement and understanding, and practical support such as advice, assistance and information, work best, emotional support especially so, and that their happiness is your happiness, overall.
References
1. Hoppmann, C. A., Gerstorf, D., Willis,S. L., & Schaie, K. W. (2011). Spousal interrelations in happiness in the Seattle Longitudinal Study: Considerable similarities in levels and change over time. Developmental Psychology, 47(1), 1-8.
2. Vowels, L. M., & Carnelley, K. B. (2022). Partner support and goal outcomes: A multilevel meta‐analysis and a methodological critique. European Journal of Social Psychology, 52(4), 679–694. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2846
3. Vowels, L.M., Carnelley, K.B., Kumashiro, M., & Rowe, A. C. (2023). The impact of non-harmonious goals on partner support and taking on opportunities. Current Psychology, 42, 23166–23183. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-022-03463-7
4. Gere, J., & Schimmack, U. (2013). When Romantic Partners’ Goals Conflict: Effects on Relationship Quality and Subjective Well-Being. Journal of Happiness Studies, 14, 37–49. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-011-9314-2
*Personal growth is incredibly important to the health and happiness of ‘healthy’ individuals. If this doesn’t fit with your experience of your partner, it may be because your partner suffers from clinical or subclinical narcissism in which case this article may help you to recognise that their true underlying motivation is not personal growth and that, despite giving it your best effort, the support and striving to make one another happy is fairly, or significantly, one-sided.
