Five questions a woman should ask herself before attempting to control a man

As a woman never play the role of a man’s conscience. When our partners fail to meet our expectations, we have a tendency to come up with reasons to explain their shortcomings. While it is your right to have your needs met, it is not your responsibility to make a particular man meet them. If you find yourself heavily focused on the latter in your relationship, here are 5 questions to ask yourself.

1. Do I want to partner or possess?

A partnership is like a yoke, the wooden cross piece that joins two animals moving in the same direction at the same pace in a joint effort. There is a natural element of reciprocity there. No one is dragging the other along; you were both already headed the same way and carrying the same load, now you’re doing so together.

Possession, on the other hand, is the state of owning or controlling something.

Think of the many possessions and baggage that you may already have in your life, why choose a grown man to take on as a chore? Why exert additional effort forcing someone to do things? Imagine a partner who willingly decides to join your life and then helps you carry the load. That is partnership.

2. How does he treat me?

Action is the physical manifestation of how your partner truly feels about you. If you find yourself continually stressing and searching for the intention behind a man’s actions, consider that his actions have already revealed everything you need to know. How he treats you indicates how he values you. It’s your choice to take it or leave it.

Convincing someone to understand why you do not approve of their treatment prioritizes talk and excuses action. Have you ever told someone what to do step by step until it became so mentally exhausting that you should have just done it yourself? Instead of teaching him how to treat you, say less and reclaim your focus. Incorporate your own advice into how you treat yourself.

3. How can he be happy if I’m not?

Anything a man must do in order for you to be happy is misplaced security. Very quickly, you will discover that he continues to move through life prioritizing his individual happiness while you are left feeling unsettled every time he appears to be happy without you. His happiness is about him. Your happiness is about you. Find new reasons to smile and recognize that he was never your source.

4. How content am I without him?

Have you grown comfortable in your misery? Do you believe your man is supposed to get on your nerves? Has he become more of an inconvenience and, oftentimes, a disappointment in your life? I’ll raise my hand so you don’t have to.

I’ve cried over a man until I was literally challenged by a close friend to list how my life had become worse off without him post break-up. Eventually, my own tears became tired of me and dried out. I was concentrating so hard and still couldn’t list one single thing.

I allowed this man to become my pain to the point I no longer recognized pleasure. I had believed our drama would turn testimonial and I would be able to have a “we had to go through hell and high water to get here” love story. My hell and high water lasted the entire duration of the relationship to the point it became the definition of it. Pain is not a relationship rite of passage.

 

5. Can he do better without me?

If your reaction is “Absolutely not, I’m the best thing that ever did and ever will happen to him, I blessed his life, beyond measure…” and so on and so forth, I hear you, Still, I ask you to consider how much credit you’re giving yourself for his existence. No person is the purpose of another human being’s existence. And the same goes for you. It is up to you how you fare in life, with or without him.

Take a step back and look at how much energy you are investing into developing him to become the perfect man for you. Stop and focus on developing yourself instead.