I am clear that for the most part, the world has gotten the ground rules for making relationships work completely wrong. It is drilled into us from childhood that making a relationship work is a 50% / 50% paradigm, with each partner being responsible for their 50% of the relationship. If you look at that paradigm, it is not hard to see that while it is well intentioned, the 50% / 50% paradigm for making relationships work does not work, and in fact has never, ever worked. I say that it does not work because while it charges each of us to be 50% responsible for making our relationships work, it also leaves room for each of us to be 50% not responsible for making our relationships work. So rather, it is not a 50% / 50% paradigm that works for making a relationship work with each partner being responsible for their 50% of the relationship, but rather it is a 100% paradigm that works for making a relationship work. Do you get that? Wait! Did you hear me say that it is a 100% / 100% paradigm that works for making a relationship work with each partner being responsible for 100% of it? I did not say that. What I said was that it is a 100% paradigm that works for making a relationship work. In other words, I am responsbile for all of the relationship independently of you being responsible for any of it or all of it or even none of it. In this paradigm, you are free to choose to be responsible for 100% of the relationship too, and you don't have to. ...........................Angotra