On settling and waiting, in marriage, relationships or even dating
There's the sociopolitical element of power differentials in waiting, like how doctors can make you wait for an hour, but if you're late by 5 minutes, god forbid, you're out and have to book in 3 months.
It's important to think about ones relationship with time and power.
Expecting people to wait around and pick up where one leaves off, at one's whim, is at best, negligent, and at worst, an abuse of power.
Anyone who has ever held a job knows this. Most nonmen who date and enter relationships with men know this.
Your relationships are no different. Your friendships are no different.
Who are you waiting on? Who is expected to be waiting on you? Who is more or less invested? What is being offered or withheld?
What do you think you would lose if you stopped waiting? There could be an abandonment wound here.
It also helps to ask yourself the price you've paid in this process.
It's important to uncover what you need and what needs changing so you can begin getting your needs met consensually in the here and now.
The line between waiting and settling can be thin.
Sometimes, the answer to a lot of seemingly complex questions like "I am not sure what to do. My date leaves me waiting on even a brief response for days on end. Should I stay or go?"
or
"My husband gets defensive even when I express a reasonable complaint, gets dismissive when I do something nice for him or I've been asking and waiting for months and months to have a conversation about my unmet needs because I am despairing or losing hope, and he just won't show up. What can I do?" can be boiled down to the following:
Stop giving people more of what they already don't value.
Retract your priceless energy. It is finite. Focus on yourself, and seek support so you are held in this process.
In general, get clear on what you need, desire and want, and use it to carve a path forward. Focus on your pleasure and fulfillment, what that would like for you. Get descriptive.
Once you're clear on your own needs, visions, values and goals, articulate them with compassion and firmness, without compromising on your non negotiables.
See how you may respond skillfully and assertively in conflict or unlearn people pleasing or criticism and receive healing support around boundaries that keep you connected and protected both.
Even if a relationship/dating doesn't go as you'd have hoped, you will still have the benefit of self-trust, reduced hostility (not referring to abusive relationships here) and making a more grounded decision about its future.
And evaluate if the other person works to heal their intimacy wounds and develop new/improved relational skills on their end of the street, meets you mid way and shows up consistently, while articulating their own needs and values, so a reciprocal thriving connection can develop. If this happens, you are welcome to explore things further.
If this hasn't happened or does not happen, you get to make a more fulfilling, safe and dignifying choice for yourself and the quality of life and relationship you desire.
Stay open to support as the best path for you (which will rarely be the easy path) may take you far away from this waiting game you've accustomed yourself to and thus the relationship, because the only thing keeping it intact is self-abandonment.
Waiting to the point it erodes your self-esteem or having to wait in ways that dishonour your time, life and dignity says that you're not being treated like the priority you deserve to be. This is the definition of settling.
Priorities don't exist at the bottom of the list, awaiting their turn.
So, you need to intentionally treat yourself like a top of the line priority.
You deserve so much more than waiting for the bare minimum.
You deserve so much more than waiting just for clear timely responses, so you can evaluate the integrity or intention behind a relationship and its direction moving forward.
You deserve so much more than waiting to be met half-way after you've been traversing the wilderness love can be, all on your own, with a mouth full of despair.
It's also why I find a lot of situationships deeply toxic, because they're about nonmen (usually) waiting on healthy intimacy or waiting on commitment. Often the same pattern will continue after marriage or in long term relationships.
Remember that you deserve a full and blossoming relationship, not some hackneyed approximation that leaves you starved, confused and spent.
Start truly living in the significance of your desires and needs, because when you're waiting, there isn't a lot of living happening. But there is a lot of life that's passing you by. There's immense heartbreak and grief in that alone.
If they leave you waiting, you leave them behind.
Prioritize yourself, and only deal with/love people who prioritize and unreservedly cherish you.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
WORKING WITH ME:
If you are dating/partnered/married or recovering from heartbreak, my fully empirically grounded, trauma sensitive, 1:1 private coaching can help transform your current and/or future relationships, by shifting them in a deeply secure, skillful, fulfilling direction long- term.
If you are struggling with whether to stay or go, this coaching is for you and will help you arrive, in gentle guided steps, at a decision that is best for you and your family. This is generational healing.
If you are struggling with unresolved conflict, resentment, poor boundaries, codependency, defensiveness, criticism and disengagement in your relationship(s) or marriage, my 1:1 private coaching is for you.
It can help you gain core emotional responsiveness, boundary maintenance and conflict navigation (rooted in dialectical mindfulness work and the latest research in conflict repair and attachment science) skills + capacities needed to experience a more harmonious, secure and loving relationship/marriage.If you are single/partnered and looking to date pleasurably, find your most compatible partner(s) and co-create deeply secure, safe, passionate and fulfilling relationships long term, my coaching is designed to help you experience just that.
If you are in the pre-marital, early marital, early relationship phase and want to make sure you are skillfully navigating this crucial phase with the support needed to have solid relationship agreements, hone key relational skills known for boosting marital/relationship success and work through the intimacy fears and conflicts that come up in this stage, my private 1:1 coaching is for you.
It is customized to help you build a rock solid foundation for your relationship(s)/marriage.
Keep in mind unresolved or high levels of conflict in this stage are widely shown to result in a higher risk for relationship collapse, often in the 5-7 year period.
How the honeymoon period is navigated is crucial to the long term quality, safety and success of a relationship.
After conducting more research on this, particularly Dr. Ellyn Bader's research on differentiation and conflict in this phase, I designed a program just for folks in this early/pre-marital stage who want the best support to facilitate navigating this with compassion, care, effective boundaries and skill, for long term relationship resilience.
This too is generational healing and can help change the course of your relationships and/or dating, long term.
My coaching is as highly regarded as it is because it is designed for long-term sustainable impact, using tools like my trauma sensitive Dating and Relationship Success assessments using my custom software that nobody else is using in this industry.
And it uses my collaborative Relationship and/or Dating Success Living Blueprints that are a part of my signature Asooli Coaching method, which have brought tremendous success to clients (healing from toxic relationships, finding loving long term partnerships).
Folks also use these for years after they're done coaching with me because this work becomes a permanent tool that continues to support them as and when needed.
If you are done waiting/settling/struggling and want to receive exceptional, empirically grounded, high calibre support in your relationships/marriage/dating for the best possible results given your needs, visions and goals, I invite you to contact me for a zero pressure chat.
If we are a great fit for my programs, we can have you greeting 2023 with the resourcing and healing support needed to set you for long term relationship success without delay.
