Why Love Isn’t Enough: How to Assess Compatibility Before Marriage (Avoid Future Breakups)
Most couples get married based on love—but love alone isn’t enough to sustain a long-term relationship.
In this episode, relationship coach Forest Williams breaks down the unconscious trap that leads couples into painful breakups years down the line: avoiding honest conversations about compatibility.
You’ll learn how to face the fear of “what if we’re not compatible,” why emotional security starts within, and how assessing compatibility can actually deepen trust and strengthen your relationship over time.
If you’re thinking about marriage—or already in a committed relationship—this episode will challenge the mainstream narrative and give you a more grounded, conscious approach to building something that actually lasts.
CHAPTERS
0:00 – The Relationship Trap Most Couples Fall Into
Why basing marriage on love alone sets couples up for failure—and how incompatibility reveals itself over time.
2:30 – The Cost of Avoiding Compatibility Conversations
What happens when you ignore misalignment (and why it gets exponentially harder to leave later).
5:00 – Mainstream Conditioning Around Marriage
How societal norms, unplanned circumstances, and passive relationship dynamics lead to unconscious commitments.
8:30 – Why Assessing Compatibility Feels So Hard
The real reason couples avoid this conversation: fear of the relationship ending.
12:00 – Avoiding vs Fixing: Two Ways We Resist the Truth
How people unconsciously bypass incompatibility instead of facing reality.
15:00 – What Real Relationship Security Actually Comes From
Why security isn’t created by marriage, commitment, or time—but from within.
18:30 – Can You Imagine Life Without Your Partner?
A powerful test of self-security (and why it actually strengthens your relationship).
22:00 – The Anatomy of a Secure Relationship
Why healthy relationships require two whole individuals—not emotional dependency.
25:00 – Why You’ll Never Feel Secure If You Avoid the Truth
How skipping compatibility conversations leads to long-term anxiety and doubt.
29:00 – The Spiritual Layer: Facing the “Death” of a Relationship
Why confronting the potential end of a relationship is key to clarity and truth.
33:00 – Nervous System Regulation: The Missing Skill
How fear shows up in your body—and why regulation is essential for honest conversations.
36:00 – Practical Tools to Regulate Fear
Somatic techniques: shaking, journaling, singing, and creating space to process emotions.
40:00 – Becoming “Neutral” to Fear
Why the goal isn’t to eliminate fear—but to stay grounded in it so you can access truth.
43:00 – What’s Next: How to Actually Assess Compatibility
Preview of upcoming episode + deeper ways to evaluate alignment in your relationship.
If you've found your person, you're ready to take things to the next step, and you're considering getting married, it is really crucial to avoid falling into this unconscious trap that can sabotage the success of your relationship over time. The mainstream norm is to get married based off of a feeling, based off of how much you love each other. And that's important, obviously, love is an essential ingredient. However, love is half the battle. It's really important to assess compatibility soberly. So if you can get neutral to the fear of, oh my goodness, what if we're not compatible? That's why most people avoid having this conversation, is because the fear feels overwhelming. But if you cannot get neutral to the fear and have that sober conversation about, hey, are we actually compatible enough to be in a long-term relationship? Then what you might find yourself falling into is, let's say, five, ten years down the line, that incompatibility reveals itself. You can't hide it. It will show itself over time because the truth will be revealed. And what's really hard about a breakup five to ten years down the line is that you're super intertwined in each other's lives. Maybe you even have kids together at that point or maybe you're sharing housing. And it's a lot harder logistically to break up. But emotionally, it's devastating when you're really building a life with someone and you're like, oh my God, I want this to work. But it looks like actually these incompatibilities are just not going to let it work as much as we love each other. So you don't want to fall into that, right? Because you can't make up that lost time. And in order to not fall into that, you really, really, really, really have to be able to get senior to the fear of, you know, the existential question of can this relationship survive? Because love is not enough, you know, and that's a hard thing to sit with. But where people get stuck is in that fantasy or that wishful thinking of like, I'm just going to willfully ignore the incompatibilities because I want this to work. But the thing is, you can't force incompatibilities because your relationship is going to suffer over time. Yeah, maybe you could stay together your whole life, but you're not going to enjoy it, right? If you're forcing something, it's incompatible. So what I'm going to share with you today is how to develop that security within yourself to be able to face that fear and get senior to the fear and have a sober conversation amidst the fear. And actually how your ability to assess compatibility can feed the relationship over time. So I'm not talking about whether your relationship can be successful long term. If it's compatible enough and if there's love, then it will be. But if you're able to have this conversation together, it will really feed the relationship and deepen the trust more so than if you didn't have this conversation. So let's get into it. If you're deeply committed to your relationship, but keep getting pulled into the same reactive loops that feel disconnecting, you're not alone. I'm Forest Williams, certified relationship coach, and I guide devoted couples to untangle the unconscious dynamics that get in the way of intimacy and quietly erode connection over time. Here, we explore conscious relating as a spiritual practice where your relationship becomes a sanctuary for healing, growth, and a steady source of joy instead of struggle. So let's start with the mainstream norm. This is the thing you want to avoid. And this is what actually most people do. So most people do not have the level of intentionality around getting married. They'll base it off of a feeling. They'll base it off of love. And, you know, oftentimes, if you're in a hetero relationship and you're able to get pregnant accidentally, sometimes there's a level of urgency to get married because there's an unplanned pregnancy. And so there's not that intentionality around assessing compatibility. It kind of almost puts you in a survival mode of like, oh, my goodness, we need to take care of this baby. You know, and like my parents are an example of that. So no shame. I'm not like making a judgment. I'm just saying it's like actually a really common norm for people to get into long-term relationship without that intentionality. It's just based off of circumstances. Or, you know, there's this patriarchal norm where the woman will kind of wait around passively for the man to essentially propose. Right? And there's this kind of Hollywood mainstream idea that it's romantic if the proposal is a surprise. And it's this affirmation that you're lovable, that you're chosen. But, you know, you can feel lovable and you can feel chosen in a way more conscious way where you're not passively waiting around, where you can both come together and say, is it worth getting married? Are we compatible enough? Do we have aligned values? Do we have the same vision for our lives? Do we want to take this next step together? It will completely change not only the probability of success that your relationship can last a lifetime, but it's also going to make the relationship get better and better over time versus this thing that you just get stuck in and, you know, you're reaching the finish line in blood, sweat, and tears. And maybe you're kind of drifting apart over time, or maybe even start hating each other over time. But you're like, well, stuck in this financial commitment. So what can I do? That's not the vibe. You know, if you want to live in a life of abundance, you can choose that you can create the conditions for not only long term relationship, but relationship that deepens and just gets better and better, which is not the mainstream norm.
So let's talk about what gets in the way, what makes it so hard, or let's say countercultural about assessing your compatibility before taking that next step to get married. On paper, assessing your compatibility sounds like a pretty simple instruction, but it is just loaded with emotion. And that's what actually makes it hard. And I know because I'm going through this right now, which is what inspired me to make this podcast. So when you're assessing compatibility, it naturally brings up fear, because what you're essentially facing is the potential death of the relationship, you're questioning the existence of the relationship in the future, is this compatible enough for us to stay together? Or does it make more sense for us to part ways, maybe before we get too intertwined, and it becomes harder and even more painful to separate? That is a very conscious conversation to have. And it takes an insane amount of emotional maturity to have that because, you know, especially in the United States, there's this phobia of death, people don't talk about it, it's very taboo. And so when you're talking about, you know, facing the death, the potential death of the relationship, there's this natural avoidance that wants to come out because the fear feels too overwhelming.
So if you actually follow the impulse of that fear, you're either going to avoid it, or you might try to fix it. You might say, hmm, well, we're incompatible here, but oh, we can fix it if we just stretch a little, or if X, Y, Z, you try to resolve the incompatibility. But whether you're fixing it, or avoiding it, what you're doing is resisting the truth. And this is the thing that makes it unconscious, right? Is it you're not being in reality, you're being in fantasy. Maybe there's a big desire, right? To for the relationship to last long, you want it to be compatible, of course. but you have to realistically be in reality about what is the capacity for the longevity of this relationship? What are the deal breakers? What are the essential things that we need to agree on? Or we need to be compatible with for this to move forward into a lifelong commitment.
how does assessing your compatibility deepen trust and set you up for long-term success in a way where the relationship can get better and better over time? It's because your ability to soberly be with the truth and not hiding from it or, you know, trying to resist it really reveals that you are secure in yourself. And a big part of feeling secure in your relationship is feeling secure in yourself. That is how you deepen trust. So let's say if you are not feeling secure in yourself, like, let's say you can't imagine your life without your person, which I get like, I've been through this actually a lot lately, where I'm like, okay, is this a deal breaker? Like, there's a lot of love in the relationship. But when we're thinking about, okay, is this going to be a lifelong relationship? Where do we need to align? And where is it okay to have like a little bit of misalignment? It's never going to be a hundred percent. That's fine. But I've gone into imagining like, what would I do without this person in my life? You know, like what I just moved to Latin America, which is probably what I would do. That's what I always think about. I used to live in Latin America and I miss it. So I think about that a lot. But the idea is like, you know that you're secure in yourself if you can imagine a life without this person. And maybe you don't want to imagine a life without this person. I don't want to. But I do find that I do feel more secure in myself if I'm like, okay, I'm going to be devastated and heartbroken if we break up. That's not what I want at all. I would still love this person probably forever if we broke up. Because if you're breaking up due to an incompatibility and not because there's no love, it makes sense for that love to continue lasting, you know? But at the end of the day, I know, okay, I've had my heart broken how many times now? You know, like, I'll survive. I'll get through that. So if you know that you can be okay on your own, you don't need this person in your life to survive, like, your life will move on, then there is a level of security that you feel in yourself. Whereas if you're not feeling that level of security in yourself, your sense of security comes entirely from the relationship.
That's a losing equation because secure relationships have two whole people in them. And if you're relying entirely on your partner to feel secure in yourself, there's only one person in the relationship or maybe even less than one person in the relationship if your partner is also not feeling secure in themself and they're leaning on you for a sense of security. So secure relationships have two whole people in them. You feel secure in yourself, your partner feels secure in yourself, and then the relationship itself has a sense of security. So there's kind of three entities there. There's you, your partner, and then there's the spirit of the relationship, and there's security in all three of those. If one of you is missing a sense of safety or security in yourself, it's impossible for the relationship to actually be secure. If someone's missing that sense of security in themself, there's either going to be some avoidance or some anxious attachment that's triggered by that. So it's not enjoyable to face your fears, especially an existential fear. Will this be the death of the relationship? What if the relationship does die, right? But you have to be willing to face the possibility of death in order to get neutral to the fear so that you're not falling to that unconscious impulse of resisting the truth, of avoiding or fixing. And it's when you can be in truth and when your partner can be in truth, that's when you know the actual answer to can this relationship last a long time? Does it have the potential to last a lifetime? And if you are actually soberly able to face that truth amidst the fear, then you're going to feel super-duper fucking secure in your relationship because there's this deep knowing. Whereas, let's say you get married, you move forward without assessing soberly. Are you compatible? Does this have the potential to last a lifetime? You're never going to feel secure in the relationship. You can share a mortgage. You can have kids together. You can have all these external forces that tie your lives together, but that real sense of security comes from that inner truth, that inner knowing. And if you're unable to face the truth, you're never going to know, right? You could be 20 years into a relationship, and I've seen this many times in marriage dynamics, where people have been together for, like, let's say decades, and they're still feeling insecure in their relationship. They still don't know if their partner even loves them or, like, could potentially leave them. And I think the stakes feel higher for a lot of people the older they get, where they're like, oh my gosh, I have to reenter the dating scene at 50? This is a lot harder than if I'm in my 20s, you know? And so it's kind of unsettling, and it's hard to actually enjoy your relationship to the fullest when there's this constant question lingering in the background of, is this going to last? Because marriage, in a way, is kind of just like a band-aid if you're unwilling to face the truth. The real security comes from the inside, not from the outside, not from a legal document that you sign, not from a ring that you wear. It comes from your ability to soberly face the fear so you can be in truth, you can live in reality. Much easier said than done. It's a very advanced practice. It takes emotional maturity, emotional intelligence, and I think, honestly, a level of, like, spirituality, right? This idea of facing death, I think, is a deeply spiritual principle. Because the ego is terrified of death. The ego doesn't want to fuck with that, really. But, you know, there is, like, a level of spiritual maturity in being willing to even face the possibility of death. And to consider what it could be life after, what it could be like after death. So what can you do to develop that security in yourself if you do have a hard time being honest about compatibility? In order to be secure enough in yourself to be able to face the truth of, can this relationship last? You have to be able to regulate your nervous system. It doesn't have to be perfect, but you have to have some tools and some skills and some practice you can lean on to help you face the fear. So what happens when you're afraid? Your breathing gets shallow. You can get adrenalized or kind of jittery. Your heart rate elevates. You can get hypervigilant or start overthinking like your mind is racing. You might even get kind of sweaty. There's a lot that happens in the, on a nervous system level in the body when you're feeling afraid and it can feel overwhelming. You know, you can get kind of drunk, like oversaturated in emotion in a way that prevents you from being able to be with the truth. And so what helps you counteract that is being able to regulate your nervous system. There's a million ways to regulate your nervous system. Um, you know, singing is my go-to way or drumming. I could really release a lot of emotion by getting into a rhythm with drums, like almost getting into a trance state. And then what I like to do is improvise song. I'll just sing what I'm feeling almost like journaling through song. I also have a Pisces moon. So that's just kind of my, my personality that works well for me, but you can also, um, do some shaking that can help kind of process some of the adrenaline from the body. If you've ever seen, um, like a deer in nature being chased by a predator, you'll naturally see their whole body shake afterwards. They do it super quickly. I can't really imitate it. And humans have this natural ability. It's instinctive, right? Human animals, we're all animals. So animals have this instinct to, to shake, to kind of reset their nervous system after, um, escaping a threat. And that's how you come back to safety and security in yourself. But what happens is it becomes a social stigma and it gets socialized out of us. So when you're a kid, you naturally do this, but then you reach a certain age where you feel embarrassed about doing this. So if you can get into shaking, it really does help regulate the nervous system. I would also recommend journaling. Um, you can do that by writing or, you know, you can do an audio note, like a voice note and listen back to it, or even like record yourself. Sometimes I'll get, um, just on my computer, I'll like record a video of myself, just processing emotion, and then I'll delete it. Sometimes I'll watch it and it helps me process things more. But the idea is you want to face the fear. You want to confront these feelings. And so journaling in some kind of way is a structured way to face it. But really what all of these things have in common is they need space. You need to create the space to be with your fear. Because if you're not willing to create the space, you're being an avoidance. You're being in resistance to the truth. So it's not going to feel comfortable. You might not like it. Um, but you have to create the space in order to let the feelings flow, to let them be there. So the more willing you are to create the space and to feel the intensity of that feeling in your body, it's actually going to feel less and less intense each time, right? If you have no exposure to something, it's going to feel really intense. The more you do it, actually the more senior or the more neutral you can get to it. So the ideal outcome isn't that you have no fear at all. The ideal outcome is that you know what to do when the fear shows up. So you're not losing your space to the fear. You're not falling into that unconscious impulse of avoiding or fixing, resisting the truth. You can get senior to the fear and hold your space to it so that you can still have that conversation about compatibility and face the truth. If you need extra support with that nervous system regulation, you can check out any of my classes. They all involve that. You can also hire me one-on-one. I do coaching sessions with people. Um, you can just go to my website, consciousrelating. org. There's a link in the description below. Soon, I'm going to post an episode about what kind of questions you can ask to actually assess compatibility. So if you want to deepen into this topic, make sure to subscribe to the podcast, click the bell for notifications. You could be the first to know when that comes out. My signature course, The Conscious Couple, is designed to help you create a super stable foundation for the long-term success of your relationship. So if you are thinking about getting married, or maybe you're already married, but maybe you skipped some of these conversations beforehand, you might be interested in my course. It is a very thorough container. It's designed to help you not only become aware of those unconscious mainstream norms that can create distance over time, but it really helps you sharpen your skills, get super clear and conscious about your agreements, and it helps you implement change so you can feel the tangible difference in your relationship, make it feel more useful and more joyful over time.
So if you want to see what you're doing, you can also see what you're doing. So if you want to see what you're doing, you can also see what you're doing. So if you want to see what you're doing, you can see what you're in the description below, or you can go to conscious relating. org, click on events. And if you want a taste of what that could be like and see if you resonate with my teaching style, check out my four week class, love without losing yourself. This starts in May, and it's all about maintaining sovereignty in your relationship so you can deepen your bond. Again, there's a link in the description below, or you can go to conscious relating. org and click on events, or if you want more personalized support, I do also offer a couple sessions so you can go to conscious relating. org or click the link in the description to sign up for those. Thanks for being here. Peace be with you.
