Relationship Risk-Return Profile

(Sorry to those non-finance students...hehehe)

A basic tenet of investment is that the more you risk, the more possible return you might get. If I remembered more finance I could probably graph it for you, but as it stands, I'm confused as to whether the graph would be an exponential one or merely a straight line. (Hmph. 3 years of finance and I can't even draw a simple graph...shhh, don't tell the possible finance related employers!)

Anyway, this principle is not only a financy one, but it's echoed throughout all parts of life. Except, when it comes to relationships it would seem. I know what the graph of the "relationship payoff" to "amount invested" would look like....it'd be one of those random scatter graphs from which no trends or correlations can be drawn.

It pisses me off.

You can get someone who is an utter twat (yes, yes I have coined a new word) in a relationship (like, they treat the other person badly...are never there for them...whinge alot...are high maintenance...etc etc), but do they get dumped!? No! The other person patiently plods along beside them, picking up the pieces as they go. In that case, I'd plot a point for the first-mentioned person at a low amount invested, but a high relationship payoff.

Then, there's the other side of the spectrum, where you've invested so much of yourself, your time, your energy into a relationship...and yet everything goes bung, and ultimately you get a relationship payoff of a big fat ZERO (i.e., you break up and the relationship comes to nothing). So this person has a high amount invested, but a low relationship payoff.

If only people were a little bit more rational, a little bit less subject to a million and one factors, a little bit more predictable. Sometimes I can't help but think that there is too much at stake (my time, my heart and my very self) for this not to work out...

I think I invested too much in a bad risk, but it's too late to go back.

Sigh.