I sat silently and waited while my girlfriend thought.
“My dad,” she said.
I kind of expected her answer. I knew how much she loved and revered her father. It wasn’t hard to see why. He was the head of a corporation, a college professor, and self-taught in his many hobbies.
I rationalized her answer by mentally noting how it wasn’t really a fair comparison. Her father had decades of life experience on me; significantly more time to acquire and apply his learnings. So I understood her choice. I wasn’t the smartest person my girlfriend knew. That was ok.
Then she told me the name of the second smartest person she knew. It wasn’t me, and I had a huge problem with that.
The second smartest person she knew was her brother-in-law. He was younger than me, but graduated from a prestigious university and was a practicing engineer. I knew he was intelligent. Clearly, he had already been professionally successful. But still, I was pissed.
My girlfriend told me I was the third smartest person she knew. Our conversation ended there. However, the conversation I had with myself in my head kicked into high gear.
I am not sure if I was angrier because she picked her brother-in law over me or because she didn’t just lie to soothe my ego. Her position quickly invalidated the fallacy I was clinging to that I was the smartest person she knew. I don’t even know why I had such a thought to begin with.
I haven’t always reacted well when hearing the truth about myself. In my life, unbridled optimism and self-delusion have often times masqueraded as each other. Such misinterpretation of reality has resulted in many sobering moments.
It is amazing how a belief played internally on repeat can appear as fact despite any proof. When I was a child I believed I could hum along to any song even if I had never heard it. I don’t know where I came up with such a ridiculous belief. I didn’t even really enjoy humming. But yet my humming confidence was profound.
Much of my life has felt similar. Beliefs will appear in my head, for one reason or another, plant deep roots and take up seemingly firm positions, only to be chopped down in an instant, taking my ego and sense of self with it.
If I had been paying closer attention to the reality of our relationship instead of being so butthurt about my girlfriend’s perceptions of my intellect, I might have had a greater realization in that moment. Neither of us was going to be what the other person needed in the long run.
But we never really talked about the long run. Our language was coded and opaque. Much more was left unsaid than clearly stated. Romantic relationships can dissolve from the perceived intent behind the words we do or do not hear.
—
I was desperately controlled by the perceived intent back then, always trying to understand what everything really meant. As if everybody was whispering behind my back (they weren’t) or judging me for the different choices I made (I was the one judging myself).
It was my fault for asking such a naive question in the first place. Nobody confident in their own intellect asks for validation of it. While I didn’t doubt my girlfriend’s feelings for me I was unfairly looking for her to supplement my deeper insecurities. I thought simply because I was older than my girlfriend, she would think I was smarter than I was. That was a mistake.
In my teens, I loved asking questions I couldn’t handle the answer to. Naturally, I didn’t realize I couldn’t handle the answers until I heard them. It took me some time to realize information has the power to overwhelm me and leave me feeling insecure. Those perilous questions are better left unasked. I had successfully avoided them for some time.
I would never ask any of my friends; “Hey, am I the smartest person you know?” Of course not. I knew better. I may not be the smartest person anybody knows. Something about this particular romantic relationship made me crave such affirmation from my partner. I had never once felt the need to be the smartest person any of my girlfriend’s had dated. I was dumber than a few and emotionally slower than most.
I asked my girlfriend about her smartest people at a strange time in my life. A year into an unexpected relationship and recently on my own as an optimistic but wildly unprepared entrepreneur, I felt unsure of my skills, my potential, and my future. I sought confidence not from shoring up my own position, but in the perceptions of the woman who was the closest to me.
Our relationship didn’t end until many months after that conversation. When I look back at that time I flash on several things; giggly moments, points of contention we could never get past, and my bronze medal intelligence. Had I been brighter I might have acknowledged our fate quicker.
I was still waiting for realizations instead of pursuing them, hoping for clarity instead of asking for it, avoiding truths instead of accepting them.
—
Some of our best relationships reflect back to us not who we are, but who we would like to believe we can be. It’s the opposite of a funhouse mirror, distorting our reality in a way most pleasing to us. Our partners can be echo chambers for better or worse, repeating everything from our whispered hopes to our shouted fears.
It feels very much like the hallmark of immature love to avoid asking the questions to which you aren’t ready to hear the answer. As I have gotten older I have realized to truly move forward we must ask the questions which have no comfortable answers. Our lives aren’t defined by our comfort level, they are defined by our growth. Sometimes, we don’t feel like growing. Sometimes we don’t have a choice.
There will always be emotions we feel that we shouldn’t say, sentiments that can do no good by being shared. The challenge lies in knowing when we are holding back because we are scared and when we are holding back because we are wise.
At least that is the way I see it now. And that is enough for me. My current girlfriend and I are very happy. I have never once asked her how smart she thinks I am. I don’t want to know. I love her too much to care.
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