A client arrived at my office recently distraught over a two-month dating experience that fizzled in the midst of what the client thought were very promising possibilities. This client echoes the frustration of many regarding burgeoning relationships that stall or simply just end.

This relationship pitfall – finding one’s self involved in a relationship that is simply not going anywhere –  often has an underlying reality determining the success or the demise of relationship fulfillment.   The reality that impacts the possibilities for a relationship is confusing potential with readiness.

When I mentioned this invisible, yet significant factor determining relationship success, there was a stunned look on my client’s face as the realization of making relationship choices based on partner’s potential rather than readiness was indeed the source of the disappointingly quick dissolution of the relationship.

An individual can have great potential for a fulfilling relationship – shared values, attraction and other relevant factors in place – yet not necessarily be ready for relationship. My entire therapy practice is based on individuals readying themselves to accommodate their potential. Again, we often unconsciously confuse potential with readiness in the objects of our affection. Not everyone with potential is ready.

Far too often we assume relationship failures reflect a flaw in our capacity to navigate relationship success when in reality the overwhelming culprit that undermines relationship success is the other individual (or yourself) is simply not ready to accommodate their relationship potential.

For example, an individual may resist making further commitments in a relationship because past experience – disappointment with experience in loving a mother or father – has forged an unconscious association reflecting love is accompanied with devastating disappointment. This association can trigger resistance to making commitments regarding love that, frankly, have little to do with the other individual.

It is our conditioning that can permit or undermine our innate capacity for fulfillment. We are all conditioned by our experiences and one’s conditioning presents an individual with two options:

–              Conditioning as catalyst

–              Conditioning as imprisonment

When the conditioning from our experience becomes a catalyst for change we find ourselves seeking healthy ways to liberate ourselves from any undermining mental associations.  This endeavor to liberate well-being from the tyranny of conditioning is what creates the readiness for fulfillment. Conditioning is no longer preventing potential (relationship satisfaction) from being realized. On the other hand, if our conditioning continues to ferment into an emotional prison it impedes readiness to engage. The consequence is conscious or unconscious resistance to commit truly to success with self or another.

To promote relationship fulfillment it is wise to discern whether the individual of your attraction is exhibiting readiness or only potential. They are not necessarily the same. This discernment saves much heartache in love as you are more apt to assess whether you are falling (or fallen) in love with potential or readiness. When one falls in love with potential there is a greater tendency to encounter resistance to commitment; conversely, when one falls in love with readiness in the other individual, there is a greater tendency towards continuous relationship growth.

Choose readiness for yourself (by engaging actions that promote readiness, e.g., therapy, inner work, etc.) and use the readiness factor to filter the object of your affection and, in effect, you are choosing fulfillment over conditioning; a choice that always leads to greater well-being.