We all say that we want a woman in our life who is going to be an asset to our lives.
A woman who is going to take away some of the stresses we feel in our lives.
That will be our peace.
That will be a complement to whatever we have going on.
As we should. Because what self-respecting man out there would want a woman that will be a burden on them? Why shouldn’t we want women that are going to make our lives easier for us?
The question that I ask is when you do get her — will you be the type of man that will make her life easier as well?
For those men reading this who have that type of woman in their lives, I ask you — what are currently doing to make her life easier? To elevate her and what she has going on her herself?
You see, for much of my life, I hadn’t really thought about these questions too much. I was in that one track mindset of ‘as long as I’m paying bills and keeping a roof over our head, I’m doing what I need to do’.
I also thought that as long as I didn’t do anything majorly wrong, then I couldn’t go wrong in my relationships.
Until I entered a relationship with my current partner and more was required of me. I was required to think about the ways I could use my initiative to be of benefit to her.
I’m lucky to have a partner who was an asset to me in various ways and made my life easier, but I found that much of the issues we face occur due to my lack of putting in the work and actions to make her life easier in return.
If you are not being an asset, you are being a liability.
And the thing about that when it comes to relationships is if as a man you are not adding to your woman’s situation and she decides she is better off without you, she is justified in that thinking. Because why should one want to be with someone that isn’t adding to them? Why should they carry the load of two people when they don’t need to?
As men, it’s so important to do what we can to try to make our partner’s lives easier. To do what we can to elevate them and take away stress much as they would be willing to do for us.
For those that point to providing financially as the thing that they are doing to make their women’s lives easier, Ill say this — men have been contributing financially to households for centuries now, yet marriages are still ending. Families are still being broken up.
It’s about more than finances.
It’s about thinking about your partner as much as you would yourself and including her in your decisions. It’s about seeing areas in her life in which she could use support and doing what you can to plug gaps and improve that. It’s about seeing things she needs and doing something about it without needing to be prompted.
That is how you create a thriving relationship where you are both equally pulling your weight. That you are both elevating in, rather than one person pulling you both up. Eventually, that person won’t be able to handle it.
No wonder so many women end up leaving their men when they are faced with a situation where they feel like they are giving their partners energy, value, thought, and effort and getting nothing in return. When they feel like they are adding to their partner’s life but the man is giving them nothing in return but taking.
When I asked myself how I was making my partner’s life easier I told myself that I was sorting my own situation out and for that reason, I had nothing to give her which was equivalent to what she was giving me.
And in that was the problem.
Me not having anything to give to my partner is a reflection of the growth that I need to make as a man. A clear sign that I need to have more substance, initiative, and drive to me so I can be someone that can be an asset to my partner like she is for me.
I realize this now but if the penny dropped for me earlier in our relationship then I would have saved myself a lot of stress by being a burden on my partner.
So as I now take this into my life and relationships, I want all men, boyfriends, and husbands to think about this for themselves. What can you do today to make your partner’s life easier? Often it can be the smallest things you can do that will make the biggest difference to your relationship in making your woman feel appreciated.
In the short and long run, you’ll be better off and happier in your relationship by taking this thinking on board.
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Previously published on medium
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Photo credit: by Alex Iby on Unsplash