13: Explicit Contracts: Functions & Benefits, pt. II

16) Explicit Contracts can be highly empowering.

Tell us if the following situation sounds at all familiar..

It’s late at night, you and a dear friend are at a local haunt, nursing a couple of drinks, and just like countless times before, the conversation has turned, yet again, to their troubled relationship. Their partner treats them terribly, they’ve lied to your friend, have even cheated, so it’s clearly time for them to move on. Just how much is there left to say? You’ve tried being a sounding board, being as objective as possible, even going the tough-love route and hitting them with the hard truth, but nothing seems to work, they’re still in this holding pattern. How long have they been talking about ending it now? Six months? More? No matter what you say or do, the refrain you keep hearing is always; “Why do I keep ending up in the same kind of relationship?,” “Why am I only attracted to people who are bad for me?,” “Why do I become powerless every time I fall for someone?” Or even, “How much longer am I supposed to put up with this?,” “Just how long they expect me to tolerate this kind of treatment?,” “Do they seriously think I can just trust them after what happened?,” “Do they think I’m just going to wait forever?” “What am I supposed to do?,” and a slew of others. And none with any answers.

..Just who are they addressing these questions to if not themselves?

And why don’t they themselves ever answer them?

Sure, sure, they’re struggling and just trying to process coming to terms with such a huge life decision. And of course, doing so is both agonizing and lengthy. But c’mon, it’s been months. So like, literally, who? Who exactly is the intended recipient of these questions so they can be answered once and for all?! Because posing such questions over and over and never once answering them is strange, is it not?

Ostensibly they’re asking themselves, yet they never once bother to answer.
Arguably, then, it’s you, because you’re the one sitting across from them time after time. But every answer you’ve provided, every insight, every stab at tough-love, cold-truth, and harsh advice haven’t led to any discernible actions on their part, so that doesn’t seem to be quite it, either.

Over and over, night after night, drink after drink, text after text, such questions said aloud, posed to no one in particular, by one desperately searching for an answer. But from who?? (Someone eavesdropping on your conversation? Their partner who isn’t even here? The barista? The bartender? The cosmic ether? The Universe itself, perhaps?) Just never quite from themselves.

Why don’t they just once answer their own questions?!

What is the reason for this strange cognitive dissonance that so many people seem to suffer at the same time while in toxic relationships? And the reason it’s so confoundingly strange, obviously, is because such questions are posed well after the answer has abundantly been provided! The answer is a giant neon billboard right in front of you Carol; get out, leave, end it!

But from a purely analytical standpoint, what does this bizarre ritual signify, this asking the air in front of them for its advice? It’s not a philosophical question they’re asking. They’re not asking them in the rhetorical sense (and don’t actually want an answer). So why are they said as though such answers could ever come from anyone other than themselves? If you’ve ever been such a person’s go-to while they navigate the sad end of their partnership to a toxic person you know exactly what we’re talking about. So why do they persist in posing these questions aloud as if they really believe at some point the answer will fall from the sky? Again, why can’t they just take the wheel and answer these questions themselves?

The answer is that such questions, directed as they are to no one in particular, cannot be answered by themselves given the way they’ve approached their relationship. Such people, having failed to approach their relationships properly, and with preparedness, are now captives.

(By the way, this isn’t just someone else we’re talking about right now. It’s you, it’s us, it’s anyone. Because we all do this. We’re all Carol at one time or another.) Incidentally, We’re All Carol is also the name of our new sit-com, coming to Mondays this fall on NBC.

When we love someone genuinely, deeply, desperately, and have failed to set up a clear. informed approach to our intimate partner relationships, should that relationship turn toxic, we not only don’t want to be the one to end it, we actually can’t bear the enormity of that decision. (“What if I’m wrong?” “What if they change after all?” “What if by ending it they then realize how much I mean to them and I end up making the worst mistake of my life?”)

Because we don’t want to lose this relationship we’ve invested so much of ourselves in, and we can’t face the act of pulling that final lever, we instead permit ourselves to be prisoners of our partner’s will at a time when what should actually be happening is we assume control of that relationship’s closure. (Translation: in any relationship where one is the injured partner, the injured partner should be the one to end it.) Instead what we get is compounded agony and vastly greater amounts of lost time.

Failing to prepare for the end of relationships on OUR TERMS makes us always beholden to some entity other than ourselves because we don’t know what conduct on our partner’s part signifies a definitive end to what we’ll tolerate, nor what decisive step we should then take in such an unsalvageable partnership. (All of which can and ought to be determined and established before we actually date anyone.)

Explicit Contracts (within an equality and accountability-based relationship) eliminate all of this.

This is because they set both the criteria for what behavior is unacceptable and what behavior means it’s time to move on. (Bottom line; heartbreak does not have to mean powerlessness, however synonymous those two words appear or feel.)

But if the terms of conduct haven’t been clearly laid out, and precisely where one’s partner stands, the injured partner is left asking questions they’re not equipped to answer themselves (emotionally, psychologically), but their partner won’t answer honestly or reliably, either.

Does this mean the process won’t still be agonizing or even quite lengthy? Of course not. And it may likely be messy as well (and as hell), but it won’t be exclusively in the hands of someone else, nearly as long, and nearly so painful. Thus, the injured partner can emerge not so wounded, with more self-dignity and pride, and having lost not nearly so much precious time.

There is a learning curve for such empowerment, and it might take considerable time, even a relationship or three to master. And there’s nothing wrong with this.

But it means no more living in limbo,

equating love with powerlessness,

and living as a captive.

At roughly this point in reading our blog, we’ll admit we have a hunch as to what a few healthy skeptics out there might still be thinking. Something along the lines of, “Sorry to intrude mid-cartwheel on this adorable mass-delusion you’re all enjoying, but I have news for you. The kind of accountable person you’re talking about finding? The kind you think you can have an accountability-based relationship with? They don’t exist.”

..And you’d be right.

Accountable people don’t exist.

And in our next post we’ll explain why!