sometimes, blind reliance on "process" is the wrong answer

[much_ado]

matthew has a philosophy that i've always thought seemed prudent: "It's not a question of whether or not you can trust people; it's a question of what you trust them to do." sometimes, you can trust people implicitly, even if it's only trusting them to be true to their own natures in the face of repeated contentions that their natural behaviours

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[much_ado]

Marriage is about compromise. My husband has his flaws, as, possibly, so
do I. However, if I were to say to him, "It hurts me when you do/say
this", my expectation is that we'd discuss the behavior, determine if my
hurt was a reasonable thing, or a manifestation of past hurts, and, based
upon that discussion decide that either I was being unreasonable, in
which case, when ever those feelings of hurt arose, I'd simply remind
myself of that, until eventually I got over myself, or, he would attempt
to correct the behavior, with my understanding that behaviors do not
change overnight.

oh, lady... we've tried this.

we've tried, and we've tried. we've gone around and around and around. we've discussed how i feel when he changes plans on the fly without telling me. we've discussed how he feels when i change plans on the fly without telling im.

we've talked so much that there are parts of this repetitive topic i can quote from one instance of the discussion to the next. we've had to talk about this issue no les than three times already this summer. every time it has come up, i have walked away thinking that finally, he understod, that finally, something in his behaviour would change.

gloria told me once, a long time ago, that sometmes talking isn't enough. sometimes, communicating feelings is insufficient. sometimes, a person - even one who loves you - is NOT going to change for you. it won't matter how many times you say, "i hurt, when you do X", X will continue to occur simply because whatever need is driving the internal behaviour is stronger in your partner than the need to consider your feelings and alter behaviours accordingly.

that's what i mean by, "it's okay to not like the patterns and feel hurt by them, but it's not okay to assume that just because you say it hurts, yu can EXPECT that the partner will change those behaviours. you can ask. you can hope; you cannot expect." (which was a late addition to the post last night, and may not have come across clearly)

we want to make choices that allow us to grow together, but not every decision process or change request will work out to MY personal benefit. sometimes i have to give some ground, too. right now he is unwilling or unable to change that pattern; i don't know why, HE doesn't know why. he has been trying; the failures suggest something internal that he can't see is fighting change, is the stronger need.

whether or not he chooses to investigate what that invisible, obstructive internal need is, is entirely up to him. i cannot make him change for me until he is ready to change for himself, first. and until then, i can only change those things over which i have control, namely mysel: my expectation, my responses. if i cannot efect change with him, i have to effect it in myself.