By Kellen Kenlyn Nakaye
All around us, it is evident that one of the things that affect one’s career progress is who they choose to date and eventually marry. Cheryl Sandberg, former Meta COO also confirmed the observation when she said “The most important career choice you'll make is who you marry.”
Lady, if the man you are closely relating with is conscientious and cooperative, it is highly likely that he will influence and challenge you to give your best in your career as well as support you to follow through with your obligations.
Furthermore, if he is God revering, he will see to it that you stay in the safe space of your own ongoing relationship with God; a place from which you will draw your greatest strength to navigate life’s ups and downs.
Researchers from Washington University in St. Louis conducted a study covering almost 5,000 married people between the ages of 19 and 89 over a span of five years and found that the only spousal trait that was important to an employee’s work outcomes was conscientiousness.
For both male and female partners conscientiousness was seen to be the major personality trait that predicts future job satisfaction, income, and likelihood of promotion.
On the other, relating with a toxic man drains your energy, motivation, and time because they constantly need your attention and constant reassurance of your love for them so that they can validate themselves all that while not caring to reciprocate as it should be.
A toxic man does not know how to be happy on their own and is usually not on good terms with God so they seek an individual who they can use to entertain themselves and hence they have to be controlling to keep the individual in their grasp.
This dynamic eventually causes your work performance to decline because when you are being controlled and abused by a toxic person in a close relationship, you become too tired from giving all your attention to your partner’s every single need, sometimes involving in fights that take a toll on your mental wellbeing.
What usually ties women in toxic relationships is their inability to see their value. When a woman doesn’t acknowledge that she is valuable, she will not see what she offers the world and others and how it is equal in measure to what others have to offer.
Because she is so enamoured with thinking that other people’s company and love are a favour she does not deserve, she may attract/ put up with men who do not value women.
She goes on to easily forgive all types of abuse and violence out of fantasizing that her love interest has the potential to change and do much better than he is right now!
So many things including unhealed childhood trauma, taking our identity from the world instead of God, etc. cause so many women to undervalue themselves and end up settling for troublesome men. The only sure way for a woman to stir clear of toxic relationships is by learning to value herself enough to be selective of who she allows in her life.
If you need help healing from trauma, learning to value yourself as a Single Lady, and adopting a Christ-influenced approach to life and relationships, get a copy of my new book; “Journey to Wholeness; Learning to Value Yourself as a Single Lady” from www.kellenkenlyn.com