I'm sorry to seem like I'm still arguing this - I'm not at all - but just making sure I'm understood: I'm saying that it's faulty to assume that this is where the tension is. YOU have to be honest with yourself. If you're one of those people that are "Democrat" or "Jewish" and just are stuck on the idea that anyone who isn't is "stupid/Godless/lesser/whatever", then make it an issue in your selection. But I just see too many people that made their decision based on that kind of thing, then ended up ten years later realizing that was the least of their concerns. I've written about this before in the "Lonely Hearts" thread; for someone like me, who's sort of an amateur psychologist, being 45 and in the dating scene was like a trip to the toy store. LITERALLY 100's of women with deeply detailed profiles about all the things they liked and disliked, and yet... still looking, still searching. "Democrat Dave Matthews Band fans over 6'0"" is NOT a limiting category.
No worries Stadler, it's good healthy discussion. Of course there's no way to remove all sources of potential relationship destroying tension. My list only tries to reduce that potential. But yeah, there are plenty that check those boxes and still don't make it. I do know a few myself, but I know a lot more that have made it. I also agree that you can make that relationships "needs" list too long and too detailed. I don't think mine was too long, but someone else might.
In the end, it worked out really well for me. But no matter what boxes are checked, marriage still takes a lot of work to make it successful. Even the most compatable of couples can still find themselves dangling at the end of divorce papers if they aren't always vigilant.
Also, you've experienced divorce. That gives you a perspective I don't have.
I'm sorry, there's no way to say this without sounding more dickish than I mean to, but hopefully the other divorcees can back me up on this. Until you've gone through it... for me, even though it was, in hindsight, a good thing for me and my kid, and I wouldn't change a thing (other than having gone through it sooner!), it was still, in the moment, the hardest thing I've ever done, by far (and I've done some shit). Having said that, the bold was me and my ex-wife. On paper, it was perfect. Same politics, same religion, we both liked to boat and have a couple drinks, we enjoyed concerts, she was ex-military (I wasn't but I'm from a military family), right on down the line. But it didn't work, and it wasn't ever really going to work, I realized after a time. We're actually on good terms now, as we have both grown up a bit and both got honest with ourselves and (to an extent, let's not get crazy here; she's still got deep issues to be resolved) each other.
And before certain people jump on me, I am well aware that I am not the paradigm for the world. I don't offer this as gospel or as rules, or to suggest that my way is the only way. I offer it as only one example out of many, and one empirical data point that just because the "likes" line up, it's no guarantee.