We live in a world with over seven billion other people. Seven billion. Yet, look around. Everyday people find the person they want to be with for the rest of their lives. Two people, finding each other among all the other billions of people. Is it luck? Is it something else? Once in a relationship, does luck still matter? In honor of St Patrick’s Day, let’s take a look at the role of luck in romantic relationships.
Meeting your Match. A little luck can make a difference when you’re looking for love. For a relationship to begin, luck, or chance, must work its magic so that two people find themselves in the same space at the same time; this shared geography initiates the potential for favorable interactions that generate attraction (Newcomb, 1958). So, from one perspective: a set of events must already be in motion so that two people cross paths… hello luck!
But is finding someone to love entirely left to the whims of chance? Certainly not. Behaviors affect the probability that a rare and desirable event, like meeting a romantic partner, will occur. Instead of sitting on the couch waiting for luck and love, people can get out and go to social events and social settings where there is an increased chance (luck!) of meeting other people. Being open to online dating, blind dates, and new friends can help boost your chances of meeting a compatible partner.
Is Your Match, Your Match? You meet someone great, and now you’re wondering: is he/she the one? Has luck’s cousin fate stepped in and found me my perfect match? How you ask and answer this question may be linked to your implicit, or unconscious, beliefs and expectations about romantic relationships. Are you someone who believes in destiny, relying on luck and fate to keep you connected with your soul mate? Or are you someone who believes that relationships are growth opportunities, and must be cultivated?
Knee (1998) suggests that implicit destiny or growth beliefs have a profound influence on how you view your relationship and how much you’re willing to work to solve relationship problems. People who rely heavily on destiny see bumps in the road as indications that it “wasn’t meant to be,” while people with growth beliefs engage in active coping to help work through relationship events. Luck, it seems, might help bring people together, but an overreliance on external forces, like luck or destiny, can inhibit behaviors crucial to the maintenance of healthy relationships.
Feeling Lucky in Love. How lucky are you to be with your romantic partner? Evidence suggests that your beliefs about how lucky you are may be linked to your relationship success. Appreciation for one’s romantic partner translates to positive relationship behaviors (Gordon, Impett, Kogan, Oveis, & Keltner, 2012) and expressing gratitude increases people’s sense of responsibility for and connection to others (Lambert, Clark, Durtschi, Fincham, & Graham, 2010). Such findings suggest that healthy relationships can become even more satisfying through partners’ active efforts to recognize and express how lucky they are to be with each other.
In Conclusion. The luck of the Irish can come in handy as people navigate through the pairing process, but much of a relationship’s success is tied to individuals’ implicit beliefs about relationships, their beliefs about their partners, and their behaviors. For people in on-going relationships who are looking to add new life to their partnership, an exercise in counterfactual thinking might help. To bring those feelings of luckiness to the surface, imagine a hypothetical reality in which you never met your partner. Such thoughts tend to highlight the benefits and upsides of having your partner in your life, which increases the meaning ascribed to that relationship (Kray et al., 2010). To be lucky in love is a blessing worth attention in our relationships.
Other Reads:
How Health are On-Again/Off-Again Relationships?
Seven Fashion Secrets for Romance
When Being Single is Not an Option
Couples who Sweat Together, Stay Together
Pulled Apart, then Coming Back Together
References
Gordon, A. M., Impett, E. A., Kogan, A., Oveis, C., & Keltner, D. (2012). To have and to hold: gratitude promotes relationship maintenance in intimate bonds. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 103, 257-274.
Knee, C. R. (1998). Implicit theories of relationships: Assessment and prediction of romantic relationship initiation, coping, and longevity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74(2), 360-370.
Kray, L. J., George, L. G., Liljenquist, K. A., Galinsky, A. D., Tetlock, P. E., & Roese, N. J. (2010). From what might have been to what must have been: Counterfactual thinking creates meaning. Journal of personality and social psychology, 98, 106-118.
Lambert, N. M., Clark, M. S., Durtschi, J., Fincham, F. D., & Graham, S. M. (2010). Benefits of expressing gratitude: Expressing gratitude to a partner changes one’s view of the relationship. Psychological Science, 21, 574-580.
Newcomb, T. M. (1956). The prediction of interpersonal attraction. American Psychologist, 11, 575-586.