[santaclause33]

Three notes I would add:

1) In response to the "know yourself" bullet: I met my now wife at 15 - we learned a lot about ourselves between then and when we married at age 22. But we were pretty much committed to marrying by age 18, even though we learned a lot after. You can learn with another person.

2) Life pro tip on understanding other people (this is a quick reinforcement of a bunch of points in the article): if someone is behaving irrationally, 99% of the time its because they are subconciously insecure about something.

3) The odds of first marriage are better than 50/50. That statistic is for total marriages, but people who divorce once on average divorce multiple times. Success rate of first marriage is something like 65%. Also, that success rate goes higher if you're high income, like most of HN.

[acheron]

The odds of first marriage are better than 50/50. That statistic is for total marriages, but people who divorce once on average divorce multiple times. Success rate of first marriage is something like 65%. Also, that success rate goes higher if you're high income, like most of HN.

Yes, thanks, I was about to post the same thing. Also divorce rates are lower among college graduates (which is correlated with income of course).

[koder2016]

Not just that, the divorce rate increases with the number of previous sexual partners (especially for women): http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/21/more-sexual-partner...

[rdrey]

I have no data to back this up, but I would guess that college / university graduates also get married later in life.

[thedufer]

Based on the first Google result [1], average age of first marriage goes up by ~2.5 years for men and ~3.5 years for women with a bachelor's degree over just a high school diploma.

1 http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2013/article/marriage-and-divorc...

[stvswn]

Your #1 hits home for me. Similar timeframe -- met at 16, married at 23, have been married happily for 7 years. We aren't the same people as when we first started dating.

It's hard for me to argue, rationally, that I happened to meet my one-and-only soulmate in high school. I think I got lucky because I married someone who valued marriage the same way I do. We both consider the marriage itself to be more important than either of us individually. We both came from stable families, so we have good examples to follow. It might not sound romantic, but we both could have probably committed fully to any number of people. As it stands, we committed to each other and the sum is greater than the parts.

I know other people are in tough situations, and I'm not saying that everyone should just "suck it up." I just think that marriages are more resilient when each person is secure in the knowledge that the other isn't considering leaving. It's hard to commit fully if divorce is an option on the table. When your thinking goes in that direction, you start resenting your partner for depriving you of that other life.

[zxcvvcxz]

> 2) Life pro tip on understanding other people (this is a quick reinforcement of a bunch of points in the article): if someone is behaving irrationally, 99% of the time its because they are subconciously insecure about something.

How about the possibility that they are tired of their partner? The irrationality might come from the fact that they are bound to them (e.g. marriage) and feel pressure to not break that apart. That'd be quite an internal conflict, and might produce irrational behavior.

If this is a possible explanation (I've seen it many times at least), do you really think it's an only 1% of the time cause? I think that's being unrealistically optimistic. Because then your narrative sounds very convenient and comforting: "Oh, I just have to help them get over their insecurities and it's happily ever after." Not to be a downer, but I think people need to be more realistic about these things so they have better odds of finding a partner with which they have a good dynamic.

(It's kind of like being stuck at a job you don't like, but you need the money. That's bad for both the employee and the business.)

[grahamburger]

But of course you could take a step back and ask why they're tired of their partner. Sometimes that's a result of an internal insecurity, too.

Put another way, you might say that a person who is 'tired' of their partner is in some perhaps fixable way insecure about the relationship itself, of which they are a part.

[hammock]

So if every (or most) relationships are fixable, what does it matter who you pick as partner?

[grahamburger]

I think who you pick as a partner is a pretty weak indicator for relationship longevity. Being/becoming the right partner counts more. As with many things in life, the day to day execution is much more important than the initial state.

[ph0rque]

You've discovered the secret! It doesn't.

[StavrosK]

It may not matter whether you can make it work, but it'll matter if you're having fun while you're trying...

[nostrademons]

You can have fun with a wide variety of people. It may require letting go of your preconceived notions of "fun" and being open to new experiences, though.

[thaumasiotes]

It has a dramatic effect on what your children are like.

[nashashmi]

> How about the possibility that they are tired of their partner?

Then that goes to point #3. People who are "tired" of their marriage are the type who have little patience, persistence, hope, tools to fix their marriage. That is why they keep divorcing, because they can never feel complacent with what they have.

As far as the insecurity goes, it is like a pandora's box where all ills are born. They don't just affect marriage. They affect everything.

[Obi_Juan_Kenobi]

I don't think you two necessarily disagree.

One way to reconcile these ideas is to point out that it's entirely rational to push someone away you don't want to be with.

However, I think the grandparent comment is really talking about otherwise stable relationships where one party can, quite suddenly, start behaving very differently. Usually when this happens, someone will try to justify themself, saying that the reason is X or Y, often blaming the other party. E.g. they'll pick something close at hand, some bad habits or old points of conflict to justify the mood.

Consider two examples, with 'your' bad habit being leaving dirty dishes. If you just left a huge mess in the kitchen, an argument that evening is not irrational. If it happened earlier in the week without consequence (you cleaned up later), but suddenly it's being brought up as the cause of conflict, be suspicious that there's something else going on.

Honestly, sometimes when this happens to you, your relatively normal perception of the situation can make the really irrational stuff seem almost comical. However, it's so easy to get baited into an argument that that's what often happens. A little awareness and firmness in not getting drawn in can go a long way. There are patterns to recognize.

The key isn't to excuse irrational behavior (after all, the tailgater is still being dangerous), but to take it into account in how you respond. You can save yourself immense grief with half a second of realization that "something's up."

[pmarreck]

This is one of those cases where evidence instead of supposition helps a lot.

> The odds of first marriage are better than 50/50

That depends on a shocking number of variables. For example, http://www.maselliwarren.com/2014/03/20/divorce-rates-increa... "60 percent of marriages for couples between the ages of 20 and 25 end in divorce. For couples who are even younger, the prognosis becomes bleaker still."

http://www.maselliwarren.com/2014/02/28/factors-affect-divor... "“Marriages are more likely to last for longer periods of time when people marry at an older age, have a higher education and earn more"

There was another source citing evidence that too much relationship experience prior to marriage can confound marriage happiness somewhat, but it was from a Christian (and therefore biased and/or scientifically suspect) source. Here's something more scientific:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/7893...

[k__]

Yes, same goes for my brother, but I don't know how much of it relies on premise, that they can't live without each other anymore, because their life's are so entangled.

I mean he is 31 and they came together when he was 16 and she was 15. They experienced their whole adult life together. They split for about 4 months but came together again, probably because of this.

On the other hand, I'm the complete opposite, so it's hard for me to understand.

I had my first relationship with 19 and we were together only one year. I'm 30 now and had about 7 relationships. Right now I have my two longest relationships of 2 and 2,5 years.

Maybe it's a good thing to get together with 15, so you make the most important experiences in life together, to weld you together more strongly.

When I started dating with 19 I already had many expectations and a own life, which needed another person to fit in somehow. And most didn't...

[Obi_Juan_Kenobi]

I've heard many people talk about a "two-year cliff". The exact date is immaterial, but for many there's a point in a relationship where it's going to continue a long time or die out. I think this plays a major role.

Basically, that's about how long it takes to really recognize people's patterns. Everyone has stuff like this, particular irrationalities and foibles that are, in general, not so good. The first time they happen, it's a new experience and you just deal with it. The next time it happens, there might be some added frustration and a sense of familiarity. The third or fourth, and you're really starting to get desperate if you haven't found a way to deal with it.

If you can recognize your partner's patterns and deal with them, you'll both benefit greatly. Sometimes it's like a switch has been flipped and you know with certainty that they're being irrational in their particular way. With some empathy and perhaps a little cleverness, you can deal with this effectively. However, if you miss your chance, the frustration kicks in with a vengeance. The same well-worn argument can feel inevitable and downright despairing.

I think most successful relationships deal with this through some combination of patience and empathy, but also with some good match-making. Some people are just better able to tolerate particular faults better than others.

[k__]

The best "pattern" we found, is, that we can talk about everything.

We reinvented these relationships multiple times, when something was wrong.

[cm2012]

I do always relate our relationship to two trees that grew together into one (only between us, though!)

Edit: I am also santaclause33, I had a different account logged in on mobile when I made the first post.

[ant6n]

Wait, you have two relationships right now?

[kough]

Welcome to the world of Berkeley-rational-polyamory! Overlaps more than you'd think with the HN crowd, I'm kind of surprised that you're surprised.

[k__]

Yes, for over 2 years now.

Both of those relationships are better than any one I got before.

[gohrt]

> if someone is behaving irrationally, 99% of the time its because they are subconciously insecure about something.

I'd generalize that to "they are reacting rationally to factors that are invisible to you"

[dsajames]

Dude, your #2 is spot on. It has caused untold problems in my marriage and almost led to a divorce.

[lacker]

If someone is behaving irrationally, 99% of the time its because they are subconciously insecure about something.

Or because they are sleep-deprived. I guess that applies more later once you have kids though ;-)