New Relationship – How New Relationships Start

Whatever the specific cultural or social pressures on a couple, there is a sequence of events which is fairly uniform and which almost every new relationship goes through sooner or later.

The first part of this process is meeting and becoming attracted. In Western societies this often takes the form of ‘falling in love’, although this is by no means the only way of starting a new relationship, and in some ways carries a greater risk of instability than moving from friendship to dating, or even the more traditional ‘arranged’ marriages.

Happily ever after?

If the couple do fall in love, there is usually a stage in which they idealize their new relationship and each other. Some people have likened this to a form of temporary insanity in which the person in love loses contact with reality, and may even suffer from ideas of being all-powerful, or believe that everything will be perfect for them forever. ‘They lived happily ever after’ is the typical ending to a fairy tale, and some lovers believe this about themselves.

Accompanying this "new relationship" feeling is the wish to be in the presence of the loved one, to share all their hopes and fears, to have no secrets and to be the perfect couple.

When the differences emerge

This feeling of euphoria from a new relationship does not always last very long, and other realities make their presence felt. The clash of personalities may often be the first problem encountered, for example one partner wanting to spend money freely while the other wants to save. The partners may have very different tastes in music or leisure activities. They may disagree about politics, they may have friends who don’t get along with their new partner, or they may have different educational backgrounds, or different sexual drive levels. All these will conspire to weaken the heady feeling of being in love that comes from this new relationship, and expecting to remain ‘on the cloud’ forever.

On the other hand, this loss of an idealistic honeymoon situation could be seen as giving the partners the opportunity of getting to know each other as real people, and ‘growing up’ in the process. So for a new relationship to progress into something strong and longer term, there are quite a few emotional states for the partners to go through.