It seems to me that agreements comprise of at least two promises or personal pledges.
The agreement is the ultimate connection between the two people making the agreed promises. And of course the agreed promises are only as good as the information available at the time for the forming of the agreement so having it open and available for both parties to learn new information is a no-brainer, for healthy business or personal relationships, in my view.
The more detailed information included in the promises or personal pledges the better. That is, explicit detail verses implicit. Unfortunately, most failed agreements, seem to have surprises embedded in them.
One agreement that I am interested in is the boy friend or girl friend agreement.
Usually implicit by its nature, it seems to me to be defined as someone we are seeing while we’re seeing if someone else (better) comes along. Of course this is not commonly expressed in the BF or GF agreement but I don’t think anyone can deny that this is the thinking behind such a relationship or as a mate of mine refers to it as “upgrading”.
In fact I get accused of being a cynic for even making such an observation.
But imagine if we were more explicit in our promises for these agreements?
Surely the quality of the agreement would be improved by such information being expressed. I know that personally I would rather be the first to know that this upgrading was about to take place rather than the last to know, which is usually the case, in general.
You see, the only thing that is usually explicit about being in a BF or GF relationship is that sex is with that person only. But participating in the setting up other relationship opportunities, in the event of ditching the other or being ditched, is open to be abused.
This is probably why, to date I have never participated in such an antiquated process,
ie technically I have never had a GF, (or a BF for that matter).
It would also explain, to me, why so many personal relationships fail if they are built on such flimsy foundations of implicit promises rather than explicit ones, when forming agreements.
rethink PERFECT 
Hi Desmond,
Thanks for writing your book and posts, I was reading a portion of this post to a close friend and he said ‘it’s not new, there’s no dating in the bible!’ lol.
I agree with what you have written, as a 28yr old woman who has never understood dating and is fine with it, I can see some other thoughts that align with mine. I’ve had friendships and whenever the guys try to say, “hey lets be BF and GF”, I ask, “why? what are we doing as friends now that changes when putting this label on?” they couldn’t answer truthfully, and I’m no longer friends with many of them. It also has reduced the number of heartbreaks in my life and freed me up to love people without these artificial bonds. I could go on, but I’ll stop here for now.
Many Thanks
Hi Toni, thanks for reading my post, I don’t get many comments, so it is nice to receive feedback.
I agree that the idea is not new but I prefer to use reasoning as to how to behave rather than religious dogma, no offence. Having been a born again christian in my distant past and then getting kicked out for asking too many questions, I see tradition and dogma as the cause of most of our stagnation. I am not saying that it is necessarily bad per se, but that it just seem to me to hold us back or slows us down from evolving and the learning new ways of thinking that is so needed if we are to move forward.
So I am sure my thoughts corelate with yours but maybe for different reasons as “god” or “jesus” is no longer part of my thinking but being treated well and treating in the same manner is a big part of my life as it sounds so reasonable to me.
What do you think?
We all use reasoning, if not why are we given the ability to do so.
You say you have been a born again Christian, I wonder why you decided to become one or why you thought you were one and then left.
As to tradition and dogma, that’s normal, it’s in every institution, everyone holds on to something and indeed they do hold us back in some things.
However we need to ask ourselves which ones are good for us and the community, because there are good things e.g Love your neighbour.
I wouldn’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Tradition is important for many reasons, not all things besides some people make it a tradition to do /learn something new every month, year.
Well I guess i am pretty radical Toni, I have a learning curve that goes in spurts so I have not got a tradition of learning but sort of a desire that occurs about once a day. I do know or think I know that feedback really stimulates my learning and if you do not get what I am saying then I ask myself how can I say it so that you can get it better.
Anyway…. I do believe that we are all on our own learning journey and some people only learn something new once a year or a month and some learn something new every hour or even minute. Finding someone on a similar learning curve, I think, is very useful for finding a partner, both business and personal.
So then the question is how do we measure this?
So what about you Toni what do you think your learning rate is?
I am 55 and single all my life with no GF as I mentioned above, and have never found a woman to match my learning curve and somehow I doubt I ever will. But I guess this keeps me safe (reduces the number of heartbreaks) too as you mentioned in your comment.
I thought I read somewhere that you were married once.
Well, I am very curious and get bored easily, I’m particularly attracted to things that go against the grain, the norm. Still can’t remember how I got to your blog, but I was really happy I found it.
If I can learn something new every minute, I will. I also like to mull over my thoughts, I’m much more eloquent in my mind so I need time for that.
I’m driven by my *inner life/insights rather than external expectations of me* paraphrased from Steve jobs on Woz.
People generally think I’m weird, I’m not very keen on feedback but love to discuss my thoughts. If people don’t get what I’m saying, I feel they aren’t thinking hard enough, but i’m getting out of that attitude slowly but surely.
Finding someone on a similar learning curve is great but we might be asking for a replica of ourselves. I think we are adaptable enough to sync with someone who has a slower/faster curve, because both parties can learn and appreciate others without becoming like them.
oh and the answer to your Q, I became a “christian” because I had some guilt but learned later that an even better way to reduce/remove them, other than believing in some man made entity, was to simply share them, simple. ie no secrets, no guilt. I am now creating or discovering my own “religion” and losing the one I was given since I was a boy. And 30 years on I am more relaxed and happy (for want of a word) than I have ever been. ie the more I learn the happier I get.
I agree Toni that there is room for variance but I still think couples need to be pretty closein the learning curve, I am weird too so we might be a match.
I was sort of married, it was part of an experiment I had, I married a woman that asked me to help her to stay in Australia and she offered to help me test all of my theories on relationships. An offer too good to refuse at the time. And she got her residency and I got my experiment and data which helped me write this book.
Ok, so other than you believe in Jesus and I would say I believe in people and agreements more so, we might be an interesting pair.
How do I know that you are not a bot or some guy sitting a back room typing out heaps of lines trying to trap unsuspecting, and gullible guys?
On your ‘Christianity’ I’m really sorry you encountered a man-made entity. Hope one day you get to meet/know the real thing.
What I’m picking up from you though is, you are mostly intellect, I’m too much of a romantic to be well matched.
A bot eh? lol, I’ve been called all sorts of things, never that, lol. Well, you are just going to have faith that I’m a real person, you could google, find out more about me or keep chatting some how to build your trust.
Ok, will do, lets keep going and see.
I agree I am mostly intellect but we still could be matched as I just can’t imagine two intellects or two romantics together. But that is just me. I think complimentary personalities are the go. ie ebony and ivory…ha!
But spending 30 years of my life trying to work out what conversation is for, to me is a very romantic quest and most people would probably argue that I am a dreamer with my head in the clouds. So maybe I am a bit of both.
Oh and what I think conversation is for is to converge ie
Conver-sation = Conver-ge
I thnk that that is kinda romantic in its simplicity and implications.
Maybe we could converge Toni?
Maybe. You are right though, in a way it’s charming, still, one suspects that they will only be looked upon as the cherished hamster in the scientist’s lab.
I agree Toni, I see you and everyone else as a potential lab rat or hamster. But even more so I see myself as one also. Being open and upfront about an experiment is imperative, in my view. As it is so unfair and can really change the results by being deceptive. ie people reacting consciously or subconsciously because of the deception or the weirdness of the situation.
So here I am open about what I am aiming to achieve with you, to learn how to participate in a relationship better, on both sides. And for my open disclosure I seem to drive people away.
But if anyone were to look objectively at everything or one new that we are about to embark upon or talk to, I think that they would see that they are all part of an experiment but usually not disclosed as such. So games end up being played that wind up being unfair with one disclosing more and the other less than the other.
This is not what I want, (although I don’t expect our disclosure to ever be perfect), hence I stay single and happier, especially when I can see that I am sort of a martyr for the cause, well, I am in my own lunch time. ha!
Such is life….(break out the violins!)