How to Get Through the Bottleneck Period or Adjustment Period in a Relationship?

Managing the Transition from Romance to Companionship

When a relationship moves from the passionate love stage to the adjustment period or bottleneck period, both parties may start to lose patience with each other’s flaws. As time spent together increases, so do conflicts and friction due to heightened dependence on each other, leading to frequent minor disagreements. How should this period be dealt with or resolved?

First, let’s look at how the adjustment period and bottleneck period are defined. In his book “The Wisdom of Life,” Schopenhauer proposed the three basic elements that determine a person’s fate: What am I, what do I represent, and what do I possess? Based on this line of thinking, there are three fundamental questions that people need to answer in life: their relationship with the world, their relationship with others, and their relationship with themselves. Among these three questions, the relationship with oneself influences and dominates the relationship with the world and with others. When you enter into an intimate relationship with someone, this model needs to change. Your partner stands out from all other people, and “our relationship” becomes a new element in this model, with its position being equally important as “my relationship with myself.”

There are two common bottlenecks in a relationship: one is when the passionate love period is about to end, and the other is when the relationship transitions from being a couple to being married.

Two Bottlenecks

Transitioning from passionate love to cohabitation is essentially a process of gradually relinquishing a part of the “self” to the “other,” marking a redefinition of boundaries. Before falling in love, we are accustomed to being self-centered and seeking from the world and others. During passionate love, due to the intense emotional and sensual pleasure, we largely abandon the “self” and completely revolve around the other person.

When the passionate love period ends, we begin to realize that in order to sustain the previous satisfaction and happiness, we cannot continue to be selfless and need to reestablish a balance. We cannot solely focus on taking, but need to consider the other person’s feelings as well. However, everything cannot revolve around the other person, as the temperature of emotions and the demands of life do not allow for it.

The transition from a romantic relationship to marriage is a process of extending the impact of “us as a unit” on the current and future relationships with the world and others. Marriage will affect the future relationship with the world and others, and the course of life will be completely different because of it. Each individual has their own plans for their future life, including setting goals in terms of material possessions and social relationships. When we start contemplating marriage, these goals need to be adjusted to accommodate and fulfill the overall needs of “us as a unit.”

In simple terms, the bottleneck after the passionate love period is a challenge of transitioning from being an individual to being a part of a couple, while entering into marriage is a challenge of transitioning from living in the present to planning for the future.

Getting Through the Bottleneck After Passionate Love

The bottleneck after passionate love is a process of redefining boundaries. Couples who get stuck at this stage often struggle to balance the “self” and the “other” in the relationship. Some people want to maintain their personal space, while others seek more intimacy with their partner. Some want to maintain a sense of mystery, while others desire complete transparency. Some prefer to share expenses and responsibilities, while others want to maintain financial independence. Some prefer to keep their social circles separate, while others want complete integration. A common mistake at this stage is that many people, in order to please their partner and avoid conflict, neglect the necessary behavior of redefining boundaries and fail to discuss and explore reasonable boundary settings with their partner. For example, during the passionate love phase, they may meet 4–5 times a week, but in the long term, meeting 2–3 times a week may be a more reasonable arrangement for both their lives and relationship. However, due to the fear of being the first to suggest “taking a step back,” neither party dares to bring it up, and they continue to maintain the relationship in an overly exhausting state. If this state persists, it is very likely that one or both parties will feel an imbalance in the relationship, leading to the brewing of negative emotions and ultimately, conflict.

Therefore, the most important task after the passionate love period, in my opinion, is for both parties to accept the cooling off of emotions as a normal phenomenon in long-term rational cohabitation, and then to openly and rationally discuss the boundaries in various aspects of their lives.

Now the question arises, if I am not sure where my boundaries lie and uncertain about what kind of boundary settings the other party is willing to accept, how do I find this balance? Here are three suggestions for you.

First, you can revisit past emotional experiences together and communicate to discover and clarify each other’s expectations for setting boundaries in the relationship. The topic of past relationships may be embarrassing for many people to discuss, or they may feel it is too personal to reveal. The focus here is not for you to divulge your privacy, but for both of you to propose what you believe to be reasonable boundary settings and ways of getting along based on past experiences in the relationship.

Second, you need to cherish every disagreement. Yes, it sounds a bit strange, but I believe that every disagreement in the early stages of a relationship is a valuable opportunity to promote the relationship, as the conflicts and dissatisfaction at this stage are actually expressions of the relationship’s demands. If both parties can face them with trust and a positive attitude, and use this process to understand each other’s expectations for boundaries and reach a consensus, then the relationship can easily enter a state of stable understanding and consensus.

Third, if your relationship is too mundane, then create some experiences. The most effective way to do this is to travel together. I believe that traveling is a very intimate and personal experience, and this process is a microcosm of long-term cohabitation for two people. It allows for a concentrated display and conflict of each other’s goals, preferences, and ways of doing things, which is very conducive to understanding each other and clarifying boundaries.

In conclusion, the three most important things need to be said three times:

Don’t be afraid of quarrels during the adjustment period, as without conflicts, the best way of getting along cannot be found!