Think of two people who have never met before. They do not know each other at all. Each of them is on an individual pursuit of happiness as the primary purpose of life. Every day they wake up and go to different places to meet other people or get things that would help them achieve this happiness. Because happiness is the entire purpose of each in their individual lives, they pursue it in every situation of life. Very often they are happy because of the goals they are able to achieve in each day and each of them is ever mindful of the fact that no other person could pursue happiness better than the person who has decided on that happiness – the individual self – because they would know, more than anyone, the meaning of achieving it. For that reason, one tends to be more motivated to achieve their own individual happiness for which they are directly and personally responsible.

One great morning the paths of these two strangers come to cross, somewhere near the door of a local restaurant. From the onset, they become instant friends and before long, they share with each other their aspirations in life. With each encounter, sharing themselves with each other becomes effortless because they get to perceive how much they both have in common. After all, a close relationship requires that people are singular in purpose, which makes it possible for harmony to prevail.

They both believe they have found the best partner in the world to help them pursue the happiness that up until then had been their sole and individual responsibility. They begin to create a joint pool of happiness made of all their individual aspirations combined into one. This is happiness as defined by the two of them – their shared happiness which they would pursue together or individually as their own.

They have fallen in love and their mutual happiness is the primary pursuit of their relationship. Now working together to achieve their shared happiness, they are going to pursue it in every situation of their lives and with whatever mental and physical means at their disposal. In everything they do, they are motivated by love – the happiness of relating – which inspires them to ever learn and understand how best to meet each other’s needs. With this union, the two become one.

Whenever they spend the entire day together, there is never a need to explain anything that happened during that day because they were in it together. The decisions that had to be made during that day were made there and then, some of them jointly and others individually. Each of their decisions is made in consideration of what is good for their union and it further enhances the happiness of their togetherness. The time spent together helps them adjust well to the dynamics of their individual personalities and they become ever more convinced that they both value this mutual happiness enough to be responsible for it – whether together or individually – in every situation of their lives and with whatever means they have. This is the beginning of their trust in each other.

Lovers could be one in mind and purpose, but the practical aspects of living require that they move and go separately to different places in pursuit of their mutual happiness. They are not always able to physically take part in each other’s day. They would have to rely on the purpose in their minds and their mutual trust to remember this purpose, which would assure them that they would still be working towards the same goal, even when they are in different places and on their own. They then go and spend most of their day elsewhere, doing different things with other people. The trust is based on the believe that wherever they are, the other would not value anything more than the shared happiness created in this relationship, because to value anything more would be to spend more time and effort on it than on the union itself.

Wherever they are, the happiness of their togetherness keeps them ever reminded of each other and of how each situation they are in could be used to deepen their shared happiness. They then go through the day with the anticipation of later on sharing their achievements with their lover – that other part of themselves that is not there where they are at the moment.

Later on, the lovers get back together again and share the events of their day. The sharing is open and fluid. It touches on every aspect of their day. They communicate with bodies, voices, words, descriptions, facial expressions, impressions, pictures, gestures and use various aspects of their environment to paint a clear picture of their day to each other. The clarity makes each other feel like they were there together with the other through their day, even when in reality they were physically separate and were together only in mind – in purpose. The clarity of their communication makes them know each other’s minds on the different situations that they share. They feel together and are motivated to continue trusting for the fact that the other never ceases to work for the mutual happiness with every opportunity they get during the day.

Each partner is able to communicate every detail of their day because they know that their shared happiness is sustained by it. For that reason, they have nothing to hide. The ability to clearly communicate with each other helps them close the physical distance between them and to feel each other’s presence and collaboration as they live through each day. Whenever a resolution is needed in any matter, both of them are able to take part with a direct and clearer understanding which helps to resolve the problem more speedily and quickly restores their happiness. Whenever a problem is resolved by two people who have a common purpose, it does not linger longer because in that case two heads and joint efforts are indeed better than one. When problems are resolved speedily, we spend more time in a state of happiness – where they have been resolved – than in states of perpetually seeking solution where for that long, happiness is delayed and mostly unrealized. Only when we resolve our problems speedily do we feel we are living up to the very purpose of life – shared happiness.

Relationships go bad when trust wanes. Trust wanes when communication declines. Communication declines whenever we decide to keep someone from knowing about something. We decide not to share with another whenever we believe sharing is not going to result in happiness, possibly because we have done something that does not complement our mutual happiness, or we believe the other is likely to understand it as such.

Communication suffers whenever we decide to hide something in our minds. Whatever we hide from our partner, we exclude them from it. We hide things in our minds through silence. Sometimes we want to seem to communicate even when we still want to hide our thoughts. In that case, our communication becomes deceptive. Deceptive communication is one where we speak without allowing the other person to know our true intentions at that moment. It is one characterised by ambiguity, deviations, distractions and figures of speech, where the intention is to keep the other person from directly understanding the meaning of what we are saying or doing.

Whenever communication in a relationship ceases to be clear, one partner gets to know that something needs to be communicated to them but is not clear. The curiosity is what sets them to ask questions with the hope of finding clarity. However, communication between someone who wants to hide something and someone who tries their best to uncover it could result in more drama that could either distort the message further or instantly reveal it. An instant and unexpected revelation of a hidden intention is what often causes a state of shock to the relationship. The shock is caused by one partner not feeling ready to digest the communication they had just received, or the other who intended to hide it because they were still not sure how to deal with its ramifications.

The moment one of the partners becomes aware of the failure of communication in the relationship, this creates a suspicion that the other may be working on some exclusive happiness that is not part of their shared happiness and for that reason do not want to share it openly.  This rattles the relationship because mutual happiness is the foundation on which it is based. Should the situation continue unresolved, this is where the aggrieved partner gets to realise that they can no longer trust their partner with their own happiness. This is where they begin to take back responsibility for their own happiness and may even give themselves permission to also work alone and not share with the other. They do this because they believe their partner had also taken exclusive responsibility of their own happiness, which they refuse to share.

Before long, the primary focus of the relationship changes from that of sharing with each other to the one where we do our best to hide those things that we do not want the other to know about. Secrets, fights and competition become its new reality as it continues to defeat the purpose for which it was created. Jealousy in a relationship is a result of two people who compete by showing that they have other exclusive means, beyond each other, of being happy. This is done with the intention to create inadequacy in another which then serves as a weapon in a competitive new state of the relationship.  Anything that does not live up to its purpose and where the partners are no longer motivated to realign it back, no longer serves the reason for which it was created and is better ended.

Trust – just like faith – is only made necessary by the distance between us and the person we trust or that we have faith in. Without mental and physical distance, we are together and directly aware of what is happening in a situation, without the need for trust or having faith. The only way to avoid issues of faith and trust in a relationship is to close the distance between ourselves and the one we are relating with. We do this through direct involvement or communicating reliably.

Direct involvement in a situation helps us to understand the relationship of cause and effect that are involved in it, which determines what kind of happiness is possible in the situation and how it could be derived. It is only when we have this better understanding – especially in our relationships – that we are able to be in it the right way – by knowing how being in it helps us achieve our happiness. Happiness is the only reason we ever do or avoid anything and is the reason we ever begin or end any relationship.