Work is a lot more relationship than you expect.
Or is it relationships are a lot more work than you expect?
I doubt I’m alone on this, but I always assumed that working with a significant other would be a dilemma we wouldn’t have to face until our post-education era, as we sit in corner offices, operating rooms or courthouses.
Upon further analysis, it turns out the “working” boundary is not reserved for the worker in her mid-20s and above. That “coworker” label can shift from a partner on class projects and a peer studying for exams to a choreographer in a performance and a barista filling coffee cups.
In actuality, we’ve been working with our girlfriends and boyfriends for years and it is not the horrible event stereotypically assumed to leave a relationship in ruins.
It is not by chance that we tend to gravitate toward people who share our interests or extracurricular activities. In fact, depending on the number of papers, midterms or hours you work in a week, the only opportunity you have to “meet people” is while you’re doing these things.
It may be by default that we tend to date within our intellectual, artistic or occupational circles, but it’s meant to be this way.
I don’t really believe in the saying, “Opposites attract.” Perhaps opposites attract for lustful sexual encounters, but I’ve never seen or experienced anything of substance with someone I had absolutely nothing in common with.
I’m not sure how many hours, let alone years, I could tolerate listening to a football-playing boyfriend obsess over his coach’s new plays. And trust me when I say I’ll never date anyone who thinks “anyways” or “irregardless” are acceptable words of the English language.
So that leaves us with a wading pool of romantic choices: those we learn with, those we create with and those we work with.
Almost everything we do, excluding select leisure activities, requires a hierarchal structure where some boundaries are in place. Often crossed, those boundaries become a fuzzy pair of drunk goggles once you begin to date and sleep with someone you need to work with.
A shift at the coffeehouse becomes a battle against jealousy, while a rehearsal becomes a matter of forced efficiency.
Natalie Lundgren, a second-year world arts and cultures student, had a taste of this blurred boundary when she organized an arts festival with her boyfriend of two years.
“I would say it was generally awkward and slightly uncomfortable. It’s not an environment you are used to having that kind of relationship involved with,” she said.
Lundgren added that she had to be extra cautious when talking to other male colleagues so as not to spark a fight filled with issues of jealousy and trust. When working together, “me” becomes “we,” which can be distracting. One begins worrying about that person’s feelings as your significant other rather than your coworker.
I’m currently experiencing this weird, cautious phenomenon. I’m working with my tap-dancing boyfriend in choreographing my senior piece for my dance concentration. We now fight about everything from counts in music to places on the stage.
But even though we disagree on these small, creative matters, the outcome is wonderful. We have not only put in effort to produce something together, but we have also come out stronger as a couple with a history and an understanding of one another that stems deeper than trivial favorite color or movie information can reveal.
Some couples don’t have a choice but to work together. But it isn’t necessarily the end of the world. “It can be difficult mixing your personal life with your professional life. But if you trust each other enough, I’m sure you’ll do just fine,” Lundgren said.
Countless pieces of advice suggest that living with, working with, planning with or even performing with a significant other all have the potential to damage your relationship.
But not doing so has the potential to keep you from having a substantial relationship altogether.
Furthermore, at the risk of sounding cheesy, I believe rules prohibiting coworkers, classmates or people in the same general vicinity from dating are actually hindering the possibility of falling in love.
While there are exceptions to this approach, working together by no means signifies the death of an existing relationship or the inability to begin a new one.
After all, if the two of you can’t survive making a decision about what count that shuffle-ball change starts on, you aren’t going to survive much else anyway.
Love to be the boss? E-mail Forde at nforde@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.