Yep, read that again.

I feel spicy 🌶️ today, so here’s one that rubs it in, but alas, I’ll write it anyway.

Men we date or are married to are not the problem. Women we date or are married to are not the problem. I have a couple where I’ve had countless conversations with the woman. She blames everything on her husband. All the misery of her failed life, in her view, is the fault of her husband. Whenever I ask, so if he is such sht, why have you stayed married all these years, the response is always the same: so what do you want me to do now? 😀 Me, nothing, but I can think of a thing or two you could and should have done.

Generalizing here, but typically relationships are held together by:

• Fragmented awareness
• Negotiated blind spots
• Unspoken compromises

which run on the back of:

• Plausible deniability. Did you know this is actually taught in some business schools as a means to control the narrative without having to take any responsibility for failures?
• Slow power games
• “We are getting there” narratives

When there’s a bigger crisis, eventually the unspoken, unacknowledged baseline agreement is for everyone to pretend to buy into the new narrative.

This starts another cycle of, you guessed it:

• Partial awareness
• Negotiated blind spots
• And unspoken compromises

on the back of “this will bring the changes we’ve been looking for,” which are essentially the exact same thing, dressed up in new clothes and with a new haircut.

As a social experiment, it’s highly amusing to watch.

Just in case you think I’m bashing good-willed people, hold that thought before you turn it into a story I never told, but imagined for yourself. I have done this myself, more than once.

So why does this still happen on repeat over and over and over and over again?

When we want a situation to be reset, upgraded, changed for the better, our natural tendency is to externalize the problem. I say natural tendency because it comes down to the survival instinct, and anything and everything that threatens the persona we so skillfully built throughout our lives must be erased, destroyed, and denied. This is why relationships go through these make-believe changes. Move to a new house, have another kid, because that has always been the solution to a broken marriage… oh wait, not. Dump the partner, get another one, go to a therapist so you can tell them about all the ways you are a victim of crappy people. We change the décor and the players, but the play remains the same. Every single time.

You know that saying with the good, the bad, and the ugly? We welcome the good, we can tolerate some bad, but we do not, for all the glory of God, face and admit the ugly. So we make it seem like it’s not about that little corner hidden somewhere in ourselves, the one we desperately try to pretend we don’t know exists, but that it’s the other people that need fixing.

So, when was the last time you looked in the mirror and were willing to name something that made you blush, feel weak, or dishonest?