Hey friends and welcome back to the show! Today we are talking about expectations. Expectations of your partner.
What are your expectations? Are they realistic? Do they come from love? Does your partner even know what your expectations are?
By the way, you can find the transcript for this episode at partnershipaligned.com/6
Today I am going to introduce you to a concept called The Manual. I’m going to warn you now, this is a concept that requires some emotional maturity. This is for those of you who are willing to look at what’s true as opposed to what you think should be. This concept is for the lover of inner work.
The Manual is a rule book you have for how your partner should behave. It’s basically an instruction book that you’ve written for them.
We all have manuals for everyone in our lives. We have expectations and ideas about how we think people should act and relate to us. But our strongest manuals are usually with our significant other.
Having expectations is normal. The problem is that we don’t even realize that we are doing this. We think that our expectations are reasonable, and we don’t see why they don’t.
And I often find that my clients don’t even really communicate their manuals to their partner. They just think they should know! But no two brains are alike, and they don’t know.
When I was a therapist, I was trained to help couples meet each other’s needs. The wall I kept hitting with that modality was that it leaned on the idea that we need someone else to take care of our emotional life. It also insinuated that we were responsible for our partner’s emotional life.
So then I was left working with a couple who was hyper focused on being the person their partner needed them to be without doing any inner work. It was exhausting.
Now I do have content about expressing your needs and listening to your partner’s needs. I’m a big believer in that conversation. But in the name of more intimacy. It’s communication building. It’s honesty. But it’s not to hold them hostage to fulfilling that need.
Why you ask? Because you cannot control anyone but yourself. When I figure out how to control others, I will let you know!
The manual is this heavy book of rules you carry for your partner and what you make it mean when they don’t follow them.
So what is your manual for your partner? How do you want them to behave differently than they already do? And why do you want them to behave that way?
The answer is that you think you will feel different if they change their behavior.
But I have some news for you, my friends. Your feelings about your partner actually come from your thoughts about your partner, NOT from how your partner is acting.
So back to your relationship manual, I know you think that you will feel better if your partner would just act the way you want them to. BUT what actually happens is that when your partner acts in congruence with your manual, you then CHOOSE to think that they respect you or that they are a good partner or whatever you want to think and then you feel better.
On the other side of that same coin, when your partner acts in a way you don’t like, you choose to think that they don’t care about your feelings, or that they aren’t a good partner. And now you feel shitty.
So you might be thinking that the problem here is that you cannot control your partner or make them align with your manual. But the real problem here is that you have now handed your emotional life over to someone outside of yourself!
The manual says, “If you don’t behave in this way, then I am going to feel something.” So maybe you say to your partner, “If you don’t get home on time for dinner, I am going to be really upset.” This is what we call emotional blackmail… trying to get someone to act different by putting our emotions on them.
So I know that by now you’re thinking, “what so I’m not supposed to ask my husband to fold the laundry or take me on a date?” No, that’s not what I am saying. Making requests is great!
It’s the tying your emotional happiness to whether they fulfill that request that is going to get you in trouble.
In the last episode, I touched on the concept of proactive vs. reactive living. This applies here too. Well, this applies everywhere really but for the sake of this episode, let’s look at the freedom you give away when you try and enforce a manual in order to make yourself feel better.
Now you are at the mercy of whether your partner decides to be the person you want them to be in that moment! You are living reactively, you base your emotions on what they do or say.
So, enough about the problem. What’s the solution? Stop trying to change them into who you want them to be. It will turn you into a crazy person. Take responsibility for your own emotional life. Release them of your manual… for your own sanity.
Feel free to make requests but know that if they choose not to honor them that is about them, not about you.
So, let’s look at an example. In a past relationship, I had a partner who loved to play video games. This bothered me…. a lot. This did not fit into my manual. I wanted him to not want to play video games.
This took a dark turn when he started playing video games into the night instead of coming to bed with me. I made that mean that he cared more about video games then he did about spending time with me.
Sometimes I made it mean that he didn’t want to have sex with me, other times I made it mean that he didn’t respect me. We would fight about it and sometimes he would come to bed just to sidestep a fight, but it wasn’t because he wanted to. And I don’t know about you but manipulating my partner into doing something they don’t want to do just doesn’t seem to give me the result I’m looking for.
Then I was introduced to the work I’m sharing here with you. And through some powerful coaching, I released him. I acknowledged that my negative emotions were coming from what I made it all mean, not from the actual video game playing.
After doing some of this inner work on myself and taking responsibility for my own emotional life, I told him that while I would love for him to play less video games, I wasn’t going to pressure him anymore and that he could do what he wanted without me giving him guilt trips.
Now you don’t have to tell your partner something like this, you can just change your behavior. But I did tell him and then I stuck to it. This opened up space for him to tell me what it was he was getting out of these video games. Turned out he was feeling pretty overwhelmed and depressed and the games were his escape.
It wasn’t about me.
When I stopped being so rigid about what I wanted him to do, I was able to be more compassionate and ultimately viewed him as his own person going through his own thing as opposed to just how he was affecting me.
This whole concept of manuals and expectations revolve around the false belief that if they would just be who you want them to be, that you would be happier. Now, partners who are more compatible with you will definitely make it easier to have positive thoughts about. But we are always responsible for our own thoughts and feelings.
The minute we hand that part of ourselves over to another human, we suffer.
It is possible to let go of all your rules and release them. Make requests with no strings attached. Notice how things change when you don’t try and control them but rather start focusing on yourself and how you choose to think, feel, and behave.
The result is that you will become a calmer person. Also, now you’ve opened up space for productive communication which is always my goal for you in your relationship.
So what’s in your manual? And if your partner followed your manual, what would you be thinking? All of your feelings come from your thinking!
Can you have that same thought about your partner without them following your manual? Can you feel better all on your own without your partner needing to fit into your mold?
Of course you can. And I can teach you how. Let’s have a clarity session. 90 minutes of private coaching to help you master this concept in a structured way. Go to partnershipaligned.com/clarity for more information.
I want you to think about how it feels when your partner or anyone for that matter wants you to be different then you are. Think of the last time someone emotionally punished you for just being you. It doesn’t feel great.
Adult people have the ability and freedom to behave however they would like, and that goes for you too! Let’s stop trying to control each other and focus our energy on our own inner work instead. It’s much more productive.
So next time your partner doesn’t act the way you want them to, release them and yourself of all the tension, guilt trips, and silent treatment. Drop the emotional manipulation and accept them as they are. That doesn’t mean you approve or condone, it just means you are not trying to change them.
Do you know what it’s like to live a life surrounded by people who can be their whole selves around you? It’s amazing!
