This is an exercise for established, committed, long-term relationships. If you met somebody amazing 4 days ago, that is also an extremely valuable relationship but this exercise won’t work for you. This is for couples who have been together in deep, profound relationships for a long time.
Make a list of 3 things that you love, admire, and adore about your partner. Now make a list of 3 things that annoy, bug, and disturb you about her or him.
While you are making your list, let me share mine. The things I love about my partner are:
1. He is very sensitive and emotionally generous.
2. He has no intellectual rigidity whatsoever.
3. He is very meticulous and organized.
And the things I don’t like that much about him are:
1. He’s so damn sensitive! There are so many emotions all of the time, and he expects everybody (meaning me) to walk on egg-shells around them.
2. He’s very fatalistic to the point of being superstitious.
3. Small things impact him excessively. For instance, he needs to get his 8 hours of sleep and will get them even if the end of the world begins.
Now, both of these lists are not really about my partner. These are the qualities that I possess but, for a variety of psychological, social, familial, personal, etc reasons can’t allow myself to exhibit. So he’s carrying the burden for me and enacts the characteristics I feel I can’t afford to have.
Of course, these are all genuinely his qualities. But he’s also enacting them a lot more strongly than he would without me being around.
So if your partner drives you nuts with, say, being irresponsible and profligate, maybe it’s time for you to allow yourself to be a little less responsible and frugal so that he or she doesn’t have to do it for two.
For me this means that I have to stop being the Iron Lady who overcomes every hardship and subsists on very little sleep. Of course, this is easier said than done but understanding the problem is the first step to solving it.
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