What are some mistakes people make in navigating the life cycle of a romantic relationship?

What are some mistakes people make in navigating the life cycle of a romantic relationship?

Here's the thing about the phases of the relationship: you have to go through them. A very good friend of mine just went through a terrible divorce, and I came to realize in talking to her afterwards they had fallen in love and married in the second phase of the relationship when they were still idealizing each other. She spent the last 4 or 5 years of their marriage saying, "How come he can't be the guy I fell in love with?" The answer, unfortunately, is that he was never that guy. That was your projection of who he was. You can't skip the steps. Obviously we all start with attraction but you have to build up some idealization. You have to go through reality. You have to try to commit to each other to see if it'll work out, and then you can go on to a more permanent relationship.