The other night Eric and I had another serious conversation, the upshot of which was I have not been being a good partner. He said something that really stung me, he asked if I was always so rough on him? Had he only now started to notice that he has more time  not working? He gave a simple example and as soon as I heard it, I saw he was right, I had been being rough on him:

 The example is we had gone out for a walk, it looked like it might rain, he expressed concern, but I told him not to worry. As we walked it turned to a light drizzle, he wanted to get somewhere with cover, but I pushed us to walk longer to get to exactly the brewery I wanted to go to, even after we had passed a few others where we could stop. Then when we left, and it was really coming down, I didn’t want to pay for an uber cancel fee, so even though we were caught in the rain, the uber further than he wanted to walk in the rain, I was hesitant to cancel it. Eric doesn’t like to get wet. He had said he wanted to stay dry several times. I ignored him. Why? Because getting wet is no big deal to me. I think he is being a pussy.

Since it getting wet isn’t important to me, I figure it’s not important at all. This is a pattern I have already observed in myself past, and it’s a wrong view that yields very ugly behavior. Still, I persist with it. The problem however is just because I don’t think something is important, it doesn’t mean it isn’t consequential — obviously, if I have angered Eric because of my trivializing /ignoring what is important to him, there are consequences. There is a fight, a strain on our relationship. The truth is, we have been here before, having the same sad, stressful conversation. Eric angry, me hearing him, knowing I did wrong, feeling like an asshole, a bad partner. I apologize, say I will try harder, but the truth has always been, I don’t know how to fix it. At least I didn’t until now…

I started thinking a bit about how this is actually the same issue I was having with my mom when I got angry she wasn’t being strict, to my standard, with her covid precautions when she came to visit me. What I at last saw was that each person has their own reasons for the level of precaution they take –their own health, their own information sources, their own politics, their own beliefs, their own risk tolerances, their own previous experiences with covid or disease, their own education levels — When I saw that, I realized there is no way everyone can have the same level of precaution, they all have their own unique causes and conditions going into the mix of determining their precaution level. If there is no reason anyone else would share my same covid precaution standards and practices, why should I expect it of my mother?

Mom is just like everyone else, each with their own causes and conditions coloring their risk tolerance and practices. It arbitrary to say just because she is my mom, she should follow my standards. My perception of her mineness is not one of the causes/conditions of her risk tolerance. When I saw this clearly, my anger at my mom just passed immediately. In fact, I was able to see that my mom, who doesn’t share my risk assessment of covid, was trying really hard to meet me on my terms. She had come to visit, she had masked the whole time. In this world, few people care enough to even bother trying, don’t I owe her gratitude for the effort, isn’t it worth appreciating on of the few people that would try to adapt to my level of crazy? With my mom, this was a turning point in our relationship. I no longer expected her to follow my standards, to meet my expectations of how she should be. The fuel for our long cycle of bickering was just gone. Since we have had a good relationship.

Back to Eric, I realized much like covid precautions, there is no reason why he should value the same things as me. No reason why what I find important and what he finds important should be the same. He, like everyone, has his own reasons –his own education, karma, family background, priorities, politics, visons, physical condition, goals, hobbies, friends, influences — that shape his values just as I have mine. There is no reason to expect that these should be the same. Its arbitrary to say that since he is my partner we must have shared values. I could just as easily say because the Dali Lama is the Dali Lama we should have shared values. Just fill-in any other person but ‘my’ partner/family/friend and its so clear this is nonsensical bullshit.

 These expectations that I have –these arbitrary assignments of who should be the same as me and who should be different –exist in my head alone. Are made up by me, do not reflect the real causes and conditions that shape one’s values. In fact, the partnership itself is arbitrary –any number of other people could have been my spouse — over lifetimes any number have been. Would I expect all of them also to share my values, especially across all time and subject?

When I let go of the expectation that he and I will have the same values, something else becomes pretty clear too — By dismissing his values, by belittling what he thinks is important  just because I feel it is unimportant,  I am actually failing pretty hard in my duty as a partner. Afterall, the role of partner is ego stroker in chief, that is the prime duty. Trivializing what he thinks is important basically does the opposite, it makes him feel small, unheard. Of course he is angry and hurt. Of course I feel like an asshole. I am. 

Back when I had considered dukka, I had an example of when I had to take on an employees responsibilities at work after he left: I saw that a job is a duty. A duty is a burden. And a burden is a burden even if you don’t see it as such when you pick it up. Even if you enjoy benefits from it. Even if you are reluctant to put it down. My problem –above and beyond being so self-centered as to believe that only the things I think are important are actually important – is that fundamentally, I have been seeing the relationship all wrong. I thought it was a fun, not a duty. I thought it was supposed to affirm me, the things I value and think are important. So of course, I didn’t know how to fix being an asshole to Eric, how could I when, at the end of the day, I thought he was supposed to agree with my sense of what is important, he was supposed to fluff me, validate me, and cater to me.

But in reality, is that his is a job? Even when I like my boss, I don’t expect that she exists to cater to me, I don’t think my important automatically is the same as hers and I sure don’t think it supersedes hers. My role is to meet her needs, to fulfill the duty I was hired for. To do otherwise endangers my position. So why would I treat my marriage – which has so much more importance to me than my job – any differently?

A few days later I considered it further. Eric actually took me on as a partner to have his ego stroked. Not to pander to me and stroke mine. He wants to be fluffed as important, and to him, I am important only in so far as I am able to do that. I look to him to confirm me, to make me feel special, but the behaviors of his I interpret are about me are only really about whether he is feeling himself being proven by the relationship. Its not actually about me at all.  And yet, by pretending it is, it should be, all I can confirm is I am being the asshole here.