When you get involved with a woman, you have a lot of expectations. How much sex you’ll have. How much time you’ll have with the guys. And she has even more dreams and hopes. Can you deliver? No way! It’s absolutely not possible for a man to live up to her fantasies.

In my opinion, the only way a man can succeed in a relationship is to adjust his own and her expectations. Adjust, not lower.

Stephen Frueh has written a book called “With These Rings” that claims to have a solution to the “gap between hope and delivery.” I haven’t read the book, but I agree with him that couples tend to promise too much to each other when they marry. It’s hard to keep a marriage together, and both the man and woman should have realistic expectations and dreams for their future.

If we don’t know what marriage is, our vows will sound like promises ‘to be good.’ If you’re a grown up, the quality of your relationship is not going to be significantly affected three or four or ten years into the marriage by a vow you made years earlier that wasn’t your own in the first place and that had little conscious connection to what you really were committing to.

The use of credit cards demonstrates the gap between hope and delivery. Long after the shine has gone and the buyer enchantment has faded we’re still making payments. We’ve forgotten the inspired moment of purchase and are now dutifully making our payments.

Similarly our model of marriage, our vows and promises, our notion of wedding, and our ‘honeymoons’ have little to do with the huge promise available in the decision to marry and the consciousness it takes to sustain enthusiasm for relationship.