Day 5 of courtship: refusing to be "not enough" for a partner

my now-wife & I had an experience on day 5 of our courtship. she was talking about a way in which she didn't like our dynamic and I said "if you're saying I'm not (mature.,) enough for you, I'm out. I'll go travel. maybe my own growth arc will lead me back to you, or not."

May 4, 2024

this was especially important to me given how much I'd spent years in past relationships (romantic but also other) trying to live up to some standard I didn't know how to live up to and constantly feeling like not enough and I was done. with. that.

Malcolm Ocean 🏴‍☠️ @Malcolm_Ocean · May 4, 2024

but if you're straining and still falling short, or you're coming nowhere close to adequate and you have no idea how (or same with the other person) then you're making the relationship be based on a kind of debt you have no basis for assuming will ever be dischargeable

...there isn't a particularly juicy story of how that resolved. she could tell I meant it. we paid close attention over the coming days and it seemed like some mix of: - I managed to show that I was mature in ways she was discounting - "you're not enough" wasn't what she was saying (I think she was more frustrated with herself too than I initially realized, not just me)

so we kept going! we had a few more arcs over the following months that were similar to that in various ways. we've had to do a bunch to bridge spiritual values and we still have a lot of parallax work to do there, but we both know we're game for that! 🤩

anyway, it was a ballsy move, that I was emboldened to make because I had a clear sense of how I wanted my courtship to work. if this resonates with your sense of what you want, check out my course starting next week on my approach: mating.nonnaivetrust.dance/?tw=enough