Is Cheating All About Your Own Needs?
Cheating & Values
There’s been a number of different articles on the site about cheating and why it happens.
You can check out ‘ A Healthy Marriage Sees Partners Cheat – Why? ‘ as one example I wrote back in September 2010.
The missing part of that post was around the underlying reasons that it relates directly to the cheater’s own personal value system.
What is a value system?
It’s essentially what’s most important to a person – and bear in mind, these things change with time as well.
So in my recent ‘ Top Reasons Why Partners Cheat ‘ post, I outlined the major points for cheating include:
- Lack of Love and Affection
- A decline in sexual relations
- A breakdown in regular and open communication
- One partner becoming lonely
- A lack of togetherness and time together
All are strong signs of an unhealthy relationship and a warning both partners need to take proactive and affirmative relationship mending action.
Now, these are really a byproduct of the real underlying issue – understanding your partner’s value system.
Hitachi
Stage One: How Does a Healthy Relationship and a Value System Breakdown?
In the beginning, we all typically start in a romantic relationship.
Each individuals’ value system would revolve around things such as a woman’s valued need for security; so her mate would bring along financial stability, leadership, strength etc.
And on average, the man’s value system might include beauty and sexual fulfillment.
He’s happy those areas are covered, in his new partner.
Lovense
Stage Two: Romantic Relationship Maturity and then Breakdown
As a couple starts living together and becoming accustomed to each other, they start acting as ‘one’.
The downside to this is each others’ previous high values start changing. If both aren’t conscious of the others’ important values, thoughts start straying.
In the previous example of the woman’s security values changing due to financial circumstances, she starts getting worried.
The possibility exists she’ll think it might be better to find someone else to satisfy her yearning for financial stability.
Equally, for the man, maturing relationships often decrease in sexual frequency, experimentation as well as perceived satisfaction.
Think also that at the relationship beginning, the woman would have often been ripping his clothes off to have sex and try different things.
Maturing relationships bring other emotions into play such as work stress, financial ups, and downs as well as timetable challenges – all these have a potential downside of diminishing a woman’s libido.
We-Vibe
Stage Three: Browsing Into Other Casual Relationship
So we’re now in a situation where individuals in the relationship are no longer getting what they need to satisfy their value systems.
The man is lacking the vital key of sexual fulfillment and the woman might be feeling financially insecure.
There’s a real possibility they’ll simply seek out or accidentally become involved in a situation where these values do get met. And the requirement to re-establishing a lost strong value element can be strong and intoxicating.
From the other partners’ point of view, the straying partner is evil and conniving. You could look at it as a person looking for an alternative solution to fulfilling a deep and powerful set of pre-existing values they cherish.
Personally, cheating on your partner is wrong, as I’ve said before.
This is simply a possible alternate explanation to the root cause.
Speak Your Mind, With Your Opinion
Nice to see you made it to the end of the post. Here’s what you can do next:
- Can you see why lack of sexual frequency can cause real harm?
- What’s one thing you think we could all do to minimize the chance of cheating?
And thanks for reading too – Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
