I would like to share my favorite story with you. This story has been the words of wisdom that have helped shaped my “adult” life. So here it is….
Emma was planning a trip to Tahoe with her sister and a another girl friend. The three women were going to take the weekend and go see a concert that they were all very excited about. Now Emma is a newlywed, but married a man that has been a family friend since they were kids. So Emma and her husband, Tom had a very open and trusting relationship. Emma and Tom were well known for their spontaneous weekend trips so it should have been no surprise when Emma came home one Friday and started packing for her weekend. When the invite was extended to Tom not only did he decline, but he threw a fit and told her that she could not go. Emma shocked asked what the problem was and like a man that has problems communicating he didn’t give her a straight answer. Emma would rather die than have a man tell her what she can and cannot do. So she told him to go fly a kite, packed her bags, and had a fantastic girls only weekend. That Sunday she came home and Tom was more inclined to talk about why he didn’t want her to go. He had been scheduled to work part of that weekend so he was unable to attend. It wasn’t that he didn’t want her to go he only wanted her to wait until he was available. When Emma tells this story she concludes by saying, “If he just would have asked and not demanded I would have done whatever he wanted.”
Since taking a supervisor role in my professional life and building up an emotional wall in my personal life I have learned there are certain ways to talk to people to get what you want/ need out of them. I am not talking about manipulation, but more of the line between aggression and compromise. Take my story from above for example.
Tom didn’t want Emma to go on the trip. There are two outcomes to his problem 1) She goes on the trip 2) She doesn’t go on the trip. In my personal opinion Tom did what most men would do. He asserted his dominance by telling his new wife that she could not go. No self respecting woman wants to be with a man that isn’t open to compromise. It is important to know what you want, establish what your needs are with your partner, listen (Key Word: LISTEN) to their thought process, then make your decision to move forward with them or without them. Whatever the ramifications are after your choice is something you have to live with. BUT Ladies when stating your argument stay calm and use LOGIC, not emotions. Your man would be less inclined to write you off if you avoid emotional outbursts.
In my personal quest to find a man that fits me, the ability to balance self awareness and compromise has been paramount. I am someone who puts everything out in the open. I choose my words and timing carefully, but once I am certain that my thoughts are concrete I share them and am ready to listen to what my partner’s response is. I am willing to compromise if it doesn’t jeopardize what I believe my core values and life desires to be. A hypothetical example would be: Mark and I are dating for 3 years and he is unhappy with his job. He wants to quit being a personal banker and go work as a fisherman in Alaska. Now if you know me then you know Alaska is the last place I want to live (I have an irrational fear of bears). However this is something that is important to Mark’s happiness and therefore well being. If he came to me and said I’m moving to Alaska you can come or stay, then I’d defiantly stay because the use of ultimatums is against my core values. Now if it was a conversation that showed he put equal thought into my well being as he did in his then the conversation would be open , even if I wasn’t initially a fan of the move.
It’s okay to know what you want in life and to live without fear of disapproval, but if you want a successful relationship, in my opinion, there has to be a honest open calm dialogue. Men respect women that stand up for themselves. So like in the story of Emma and Tom (married 32 years now) don’t give up who you are or things you like to do for your partner. Stay true to yourself and they’ll either respect you and stick around or peace out, in which case you’re better off without them!
*Both stories of Emma/Tom and Mark were taken from actual people in my life, names obviously changed.
I love Kimbra she’s got style and soul. She has just hit the radio waves in the song with Gotye in Someone I Used To Know, which of course the radio managed to butcher with a crap remix in its first week. This is her song, Two Way Street. She has a couple of awesome videos so you may see me use her music again.
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