My Wife Has a Self-limiting Belief That We Can’t Work Together

My wife and I usually work on separate projects.

But we’re at a stage now where it would be beneficial if we combine our efforts, and we’ve started a business. Our temperaments and work styles are different, so it’ll be stressful; at least until we can figure out how to make it work.

One of our current challenges is that whenever we hit a bump, my wife becomes frustrated and blurts, “I don’t know if we can work together.”

I’m laser-focused. She has an ADHD brain and is an overcoming perfectionist, meaning she often allows thoughts and ideas to live in her head for a while before getting started and executing.

I am calm and avoid conflict while she is a bit anxious and direct. So it will be a challenge for us to work together in starting a business, but we’re determined to see if we can make it work.

Contrasting temperaments

Before we got married, my wife wanted to do all kinds of pre-marital counseling, not just with the church pastor who was doing the wedding ceremony. She thought that we could deal with all our issues prior to getting married and our relationship would be devoid of any problems.

We went to a therapist who gave us a Myers-Briggs Personality Type test. By the look on his face as he shared the results with us, it looked like he wanted to advise us not to get married because our personalities were polar opposites.

And the test didn’t lie. Our temperaments really are on opposite ends of the spectrum although I should mention that we’ve both grown since then, twenty-one years ago, and have changed, yet we’re still very different and always will be.

Contrasting work styles

Besides having different temperaments, my wife and I also have complete opposite work styles.

My wife is a visionary. She sees the big picture. But the problem often with visionaries is they can see the big picture, but don’t know how to get to down to business to get the work done.

I sometimes become frustrated while working together because I want to laser focus on a task while she wants to talk about the big picture. It’s obvious we need both of these work styles to make it work, but it’s challenge to blend our opposing work styles to function well together.

Commitment is the key

In their article, “This one couple’s secret for (successfully) working together,” Dina and Douglass Merrill, cofounders of zestfinance, say building a company with your spouse can be a rewarding, but also challenging experience.

“The trials and triumphs can make you closer, and you can also learn a lot about each other as you work toward a shared vision. Like with many great things, it comes with its share of challenges. But when you commit to tackling it together, you’ll be amazed at what you can achieve as a team.

— Dina and Douglass Merrill, Zestfinance

The Merrills give four tips for maintaining a successful business and marriage:

1. Define your roles and responsibilities at home and at work.
2. Maintain professional work communication
3. Strive for a work-life integration rather than (as is often said) a work-life balance
4. Create a kid-friendly workplace

“Here’s the truth: most of the time, we talk about work and kids,” the Merrills say. “We haven’t taken a vacation in 10+ years that wasn’t about the work or the kids. It’s not an easy road, but for us, it’s been gratifying.”

Self-limiting beliefs & liberating truths

Our greatest challenge in working together has been overcoming our self-limiting beliefs. We had a mini-breakthrough this week, thanks to Jamal Miller, during his five-day “Unlock Your Business Challenge” live event in Facebook

Jamal met his wife on Facebook. They created a business focused on helping Christian singles to prepare for marriage. He is now helping teach entrepreneurs to grow their online businesses.

Jamal was talking about self-limiting beliefs at the end of his presentation. You know, those negative thoughts we tell ourselves that can erode our confidence to achieve our dreams:

I don’t know how to run a business

I don’t have enough money

I’m too introverted.

It will never work

It needs to be perfect before I start

Jamal asked us the to identify our self-limiting beliefs and liberating truths to replace them.

“You have a limited belief that we can’t work together,” I told my wife.

It was the first time we saw this as a limiting belief. It was frustrating to me every time she said we can’t work together. I felt it reinforced this belief in her mind every time she said it and, ultimately, it could sabotage our efforts.

“So what’s the liberating truth?” Jamal asked

“We can learn to work together!” I said.

And that’s what we have to focus on, the liberating truth, not the self-limiting belief.

It’s going to take work

Maybe we need to watch The Notebook, and to be reminded of these words Noah said to Allie:

“So it’s not gonna be easy. It’s going to be really hard; we’re gonna have to work at this everyday, but I want to do that because I want you. I want all of you, forever, everyday.”

— Noah, The Notebook

It hurt to feel that my wife didn’t think we could work together after being married for 21 years. But I can be hard to work with because I bury myself in a hole and work until the job is done. I can even forget to eat, while my wife is going in the kitchen to get her third or fourth cup of tea.

While I like to forget about the world around as I work on a project until it’s done, my wife is the opposite. Sometimes she likes to get my input as she works on a project. Not necessarily because she needs the input or wants my input, but it helps her to work through a problem out loud.

So we will have to adapt to each other’s work styles to work together, and for me this means I need understand her as a visionary, be patient with her ADHD brain that is smart and creative. Likewise, she’ll have to do the deal with my tunnel vision and need to work work work work without stopping for tea until a job gets done.

Key qualities to our success

Working together on a business comes down to the same qualities that make up a marriage, and the two main ones are respect and learning to accept and embrace each other’s differences.

Is it going to easy? No. But I know we can do it.

Most of all, it starts with the belief that we can work together and not allow any self-limiting beliefs to hold us back from working together.

Thanks for reading my story.

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Previously Published on medium

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