Sharing Responsibilities in Relationships: Why Its Important

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“It’s as if I’m the only person functioning at home. I take care of the kids. I cook for everyone and make sure the house is spotless. I’m at the brink of emptying myself.”

Regardless of how healthy and loving your relationship is, thoughts like this may still creep into your mind and fester in its shadowed areas. You don’t have to be extremely fatigued to feel a deep sense of inequality. But there’s only so much that a person can carry alone, especially regarding chores.

This is why sharing responsibilities in relationships is integral. Obviously, this applies best to those who are already living together. But there are also things even those who are still starting need to share.

Love requires many things to thrive, two of which are balance and equity, where both need to be seen and treated fairly. This means there needs to be an equal amount of effort from each end and an open acceptance of the responsibilities that come with the relationship to keep it afloat.

Why Is Sharing Responsibilities in Relationships Important?

Think of relationships as rafts with partners working together, manually paddling or protecting them to keep them floating straight. Now imagine what would happen if one side becomes complacent, reducing effort or stopping completely caring about the raft. Now the one mate must go back and forth to row on both sides to keep the raft going straight placing an unnecessarily heavy burden on the person as they’re left with no other choice but to work alone.

Eventually, they’ll tire out from doing everything and feel the injustice crashing until they’re left with no motivation to continue and leave the raft struggling.

A similar thing happens when partners don’t equally share responsibilities in their relationships. It will only be a matter of time before one becomes burned out from carrying the relationship on their own.

Avoiding This Burn Out

This may seem trivial, but as responsibilities are fundamental in life, couples must establish a formula for balancing and juggling them. It can be easy for people to lose sight of what matters most in a hectic world, and unbalanced activities can maim a good relationship.

Author John A. Gehrisch has emphasized the importance of sharing responsibilities in relationships in his book The Golf Pro Has Heart.

To establish a guide in finding and identifying your ideal love match, Gehrisch used his parents’ 50 years of fruitful marriage as a blueprint for helping others find their other halves. He had also studied other couples who met the criteria of being married for 50 years or more, in a fulfilling relationship, happy, still madly in love, and best friends. He sought to discover what dynamics strengthened these unique couple’s relationship and discovered they all had 18 common traits. They also all lived around a formula of responsibilities that worked for them.

Throughout the decades of their marriages, these unique couples found a healthy balance—from sharing household responsibilities to seeing each other’s perspectives.

After all, sharing responsibilities in relationships goes beyond doing an equal number of chores.

What Is Shared Responsibility in a Relationship?

Life is filled with responsibilities that doubles when you’re with someone. Suddenly, you’re cooking for two and cleaning after two—and these are only a fraction of the changes that will ensue.

Couples have many things to agree on, and division of labor is one of them.

A lot of things need to be done. But on top of these, couples typically also have different schedules and expectations to work with. So, how do both of you cope with such a beast of a burden?

The 50/50 Mentality

When it comes to sharing responsibilities in relationships, the ideal approach would be to split everything in the middle. You do 50% of the responsibilities, and your partner does the other.

Fair, right?

That would be the ideal concept, but the execution might be where the trouble lies. Unfortunately, 50/50 does not work as easily as with finances. What happens when your partner gets extremely busy and forgets to do half of the list? Will one mate end up doing everything, or will the house be half-unkempt for a while?

The bottom line is that the simple 50/50 arrangement may be the easiest route and might work, but it’s not normally sustainable. If you’re planning on doing this, make sure you have contingencies planned, especially if both of you are busy with other things in life.

So, How Is Fair Achieved?

If going for the easy 50/50 isn’t doable, what should you do with your partner?

The fact is, sharing responsibilities in relationships doesn’t always have to be equal. You can’t always do the same number of chores each. Instead, you must be flexible and willing to do more or vice versa. To avoid resentment, you must start the division with clear communication and expectations. Clarify what each of you can do alone, which may need help, and which can be impossible to achieve. Clarification makes the whole thing easier and better.

Communicate which tasks fit your schedule. Remember to consider your and your partner’s mental space for doing everything on top of work and other appointments. Have an honest conversation about this, and when a list is made, make sure to remain open to sudden changes.

There’s no other way to tackle responsibilities than by being a cohesive team.

From the conversation to testing and finalizing the task allocation, you and your partner must work as a team. Work together for a solution and never to point fingers and compare. If you think there is a bit of unfairness while dividing responsibilities, speak up calmly and discuss it, but do so without assuming that your partner is doing it consciously. There is normally no malicious intent behind the decisions made.

Most problems can be fixed with an open and honest conversation if both parties are open to it.

Sharing responsibilities in relationships may be challenging, but this doesn’t have to damage a healthy relationship. Talk everything out with your partner, and you’ll find a dynamic that works best for you.

If you want to know how John A. Gehrisch’s parents did it, grab a copy of The Golf Pro Has Heart! Learn the secrets from his parents and the other couples he studied that were married for 50 years or more, in a fulfilling relationship, happy, still madly in love, and best friends. Don’t we all want to know what secrets those unique couples know?

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