Compatibility

"How long can you wait for a person to tell you that love is not enough? That all of the wonderful things that make a great couple are just too much? That energy, passion and opinions can't compete with cool, lovely and nice?

I suppose there must come a time when Defeat holds up its flag and tells you that you're pathetic, but also that you are more than what you are sinking into, and therefore you need to buck up and move on. Waiting to be discarded, or to be told that the energy is too much, that Love is too complicated and not worth a hop - let alone a leap - of faith is something that can kill any crevice of optimism and romance that a person may hold."

I wrote the above a little while ago as a way to explore a non-development. It's interesting to look at this now in a different context, feeling slightly more cynical. Or maybe it's not even cynicism, but rather realism.

I read something earlier today in Malcolm Gladwell's excellent 'The Tipping Point', which put an interesting slant on compatibility and perhaps why Failure must slap you in the face from time to time:

Perhaps most important, though, we store information with other people. Couples do this automatically... Wegner [Daniel, University of Virginia psychologist] argues that when people know each other well, they create an implicit joint memory system - a transactive memory system - which is based on an understanding about who is best suited to remember what kinds of things. "Relationship development is often understood as a process of mutual self-discolsure," he writes. "Although it is probably more romantic to cast this process as one of interpersonal revelation and acceptance, it can also be appreciated as a necessary precursor to transactive memory." Transactive memory is part of what intimacy means. In fact, Wegner argues, it is the loss of this kind of joint memory that helps to make divorce so painful... The loss of transactive memory feels like losing a part of one's own mind."

Practically, I think this can help to explain why some people just cannot work together. If you are so out of sync with each other, with completely different temperaments, alternative ideals and contrasting politics, then you are both likely to approach your environments in completely different ways. Although this could be a harmonious coupling, where each individual will remember what they are best suited to remember and bring different valuable things to the relationship, it could also be a source of frustration. Expectations are sometimes not met, and one half of the couple is left wondering why the hell the other has put so much weight on something they consider to be trivial, and consequently see the other as redundant. And vice versa.

The individuals will be left disappointed and frustrated, and expectations will not be met.

Perhaps this could be applied practically in a work scenario: you have spotted three recurring mistakes in a client's short automatic email. This email reaches hundreds of people per year and could have a negative impact on their business, and consequently your own. (See this BBC article as an indication of why easy business can be lost.) You'd like to advise them of their mistake but are unsure about how to approach it delicately, though you feel strongly that it is an appropriate course of action to contact them.

Just to be sure, you ask a colleague their opinion. Highlight the paragraph to them, and show them the three mistakes. Then ask them how they think the errors can be communicated. The colleague responds unexpectedly by saying that only two of the three mistakes should be highlighted, because in his opinion only two can really be noticed and the third is less important.

Perhaps he thinks that this approach is a softer blow to the person who has made the mistakes? To me, the colleague's answer is wholly stupid, and merely fuels ignorance. The fact is that there are three mistakes, and he is too much of a dolt to understand them all. However, if his partner of over two years asks him the same advice, she is likely to accept it as sound as they are so harmonious together. They bring different ideas and memory systems to the table in their relationship and get on brilliantly. In their world, their individual thoughts, opinions and memories are cohesive. In my world the ignorance - granted, of something relatively small - is unacceptable. Of course, we would never get on and never be able to build anything like a transactive memory system.

With this in mind, suddenly, thinking about relationships and compatibility makes more sense. You offer different things to the table so that you benefit each other, but each individual notices and appreciates the offering, making it clear that the offering is valued and applauded. This failure that sometimes happens? It's just a practical wake up call that you need, to encourage you to try something different.