What Am I Missing In My Marriage?

"We never fight," she tells me.
"He treats me well, and is fair about finances.
But I've long overstayed this marriage's welcome, and I want out.
" I heard it from Maura, married to Maurice for 25 years, and waiting with bated breath for her youngest child to go away to school until she could leave.
Her circumstances may sound unusual, but they're not at all.
Dr.
Paul Amato, sociologist at Penn State University, has researched divorce, as well as its impact on children.
Here's a statistic from him that I find staggering: Around 55-60 percent of divorces occur in low-conflict marriages.
Dr.
Amato calls these marriages "good enough" marriages, with the distinct implication that these relationships could be salvaged.
So why would someone in a low-conflict marriage like this divorce? What unique problems do such partners that make their marriages seem untenable to them anymore? There are, of course, a multiplicity of reasons that people leave marriages that seem 'good enough.
' One interesting piece of research that might address this issue deals with relationships and self-building--and, to my delight, my son.
Briefly, Eli (that's Dr.
Finkel, of Northwestern University's psychology department) worked with his thesis advisor, Caryl Rusbolt on an international review of papers on the "Michelangelo Phenomenon.
" Michelangelo said, famously, "Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.
" So social psychologists took that idea and ran with it.
A strong partner will see our ideal selves in the raw material that is our current presentation, and, by that partner's reaction to what s/he sees inside, encourage us to believe in and create that reality of our own best selves.
And here's perhaps where low-conflict marriages like Maura's may grind to a screeching halt.
The Michelangelo Phenomenon is not about supporting your partner, or treating him/her well.
As Eli said in his interview with Northwestern University NewsCenter, "Even if partners treat us in perfectly loving, supportive ways, if the treatment is not consistent with the person we dream of becoming, we have to pay attention to those red flags," Finkel warned.
"Is that the person you want to be married to 10 years down the road?" So love and support simply aren't enough, this research tells us.
Rather our spouse needs to be actively working with us to sculpt our idealized selves.
And this may be a rather tricky row to hoe, since these dreams we have of our selves may not always jive with our spouses' senses of who we truly are.
It seems it takes a personality artist to see what's hidden inside us-and not every one of us married someone of the timber of Michelangelo.
But even with that research firmly established and its premise gaining ground, let's ask a final question of those in low-conflict marriages.
Even if they aren't being properly sculpted by their partner to be 'all that they can be,' are they right to divorce, given the hardships they--and their children--will face as divorced entities? I can't answer the question for any given individual, but I do believe there are valid opinions on both sides.
You may just feel you need to marry a sculptor-and feel your idealized self is shriveling inside your exterior of stone with your current spouse-and that may be what's missing inside your seemingly pleasant-enough marriage.