Full disclosure here-Jim and I met in February and were married in June so I’m not against a crazy whirlwind romance. We had in fact enjoyed a five yearlong honeymoon fueled by the crazy in love energy that we experienced. Then year six and seven hit us like a freight train. Thank God we had some Marriage Boot Camp tools! So I’m not against the whirlwind romance, but I am against thinking you can build a relationship on a flimsy foundation. This is a sad case of Kaley Cuoco and Ryan Sweeting.
At the Marriage Boot Camp we teach our boot campers to speak two languages: An emotional language and a logical language. In a nutshell, if your wife asks you, “Do I look fat in this dress” and you are walking into a black tie event you speak one language. If on the other hand she asks you the very same question but you’re standing in the Macy’s dressing room you should be speaking a different language. An emotional language is asking for affirmation the logical language is asking for information.
What does this have to do with a whirlwind romance? Almost everything. Strong emotions, strong attractions, and a hopeful, heady, magical spirit characterize the typical whirlwind romance. A whirlwind romance speaks the language of the heart, an emotional language that is thrilling and intoxicating. And what happens when you’re intoxicated? Well, sometimes you make bad decisions.
The key to love is blending the emotional and the logical in a perfectly balanced, romantic cocktail. Let’s start with the logical. At the Marriage Boot Camp we use the acronym “TAPES” as the starting point of understanding who you are. From here you can start determining what characteristics you need in a mate.
“TAPES” stands for the five axes of the whole person: Temperament, Adaptation, Passion, Experience, and Spirituality. TEMPERAMENT - Temperament is something that you were born with and it is virtually unchanging over a lifetime. You’re born an introvert or an extravert, you are born with the tendency to be spontaneous and random or you are born with a tendency to be structured and sequential. You tend to make decisions with your heart or with your head. If you’d like to know more about temperament a good place to start is with the Myers-Briggs temperament inventory or the MBT I. There are several online tests you can take they give you a wealth of information. ADAPTATION - So now that you understand you’re hardwiring, we get to the A in TAPES. The world will not align with your particular temperament all the time so you have to adapt. You have to be on time even if it doesn’t come naturally to you. You have to have some semblance of organization in your life even if it doesn’t come naturally to you. And you have to be flexible and adaptable if you want to be in relationship with another human being. PASSION - What are you passionate about? It is important that you connect with someone who either shares your passion or values your passion. EXPERIENCE – no matter how sheltered your life we all have baggage. Make no mistake, the stuff that you bring into a relationship will affect the relationship and the stuff that your mate brings into the relationship will do the same. SPIRITUALITY – This is an important conversation to have with your potential Mr. or Mrs. Right. You must make certain that you are compatible in this arena or you are setting yourself up for failure.
Now that you have all of this logical, informational fuel you can create a checklist for the roadmap of what you’re looking for and what would be the most compatible with who you are. It’s like the difference between going to the grocery store with a list and going to the grocery store hungry and without a list. The end result will look very different. At the Marriage Boot Camp we recommend that all of our singles create a list of what they’re looking for in their ideal mate making sure that they look at all five axes of the personality.
Now back to Kaley and Ryan. This relationship appears to have been built almost entirely in the emotional realm. My guess is that if they had done the pre-work and created a checklist and then had a conversation about what they were looking for they may have avoided the hook up/marriage/divorce.
When I met Jim, I had a well-crafted checklist with many details; including handedness. I know it seems crazy but I was looking for left-handed man. I also had my 3P’s standard – a man should Provide, Protect, and Pursue. Now its up to you. Take some time and think through your personal non-negotiable’s so that when the whirlwind of chemistry blows through your life you’ll be prepared.