A Faithful Gene? | article

I was just reading about The Science of a Happy Marriage,
(click to read what I read) and found the research
interesting, and the fact that the research was done,
even more interesting.

We are always trying to understand and fix things.
They're supposed to be a certain way, right? If so,
when they're not, something has to be wrong, and
if we can understand it, we can find the thing to
blame and/or fix it.

There are layers to everything, and our biology is
one of them. However, I think it is important to
consider what we base our investigations on. The
idea of being faithful is not one that everyone
would feel is integral to a happy relationship/
marriage. In addition, despite the vows of "to
death do us part," perhaps the idea that not all
relationships are meant to be forever is worth
consideration. Hanging on to a bad relationship
for the wrong reasons only adds to the suffering
of the partners, and those around them, which
can include the children - the ones that
(supposedly) they're trying to protect.

Communication and respect, to me, are the two
most important things in a relationship, with
everything else being a result of how these two
things are interacted with. The other pieces may
be interesting, but they're working with the
superficial aspects of a dynamic that most
people fear and/or want to control.

What if we learned to communicate, and knew
that we could do it safely with our loved ones,
and that we could always come to a place of
respect, even in disagreement...Might we feel
less of a need to research things this way?
Might we actually have a good relationship/
marriage instead of treating the symptoms
of an unhealthy one?

What do you think?