DiscoBiscuit
Meat Tornado
- Joined
- Apr 13, 2009
- Messages
- 14,794
- Enneagram
- 8w9
My ex was ENTJ. It's important to be aligned on a conceptual level. As long as we both were on the same page about what the plan was, then there was no conflict. Emotional management was more of a challenge. On a lot of levels there were no "breaks" to the relationship. Dating someone who could handle themselves as well as I could meant that we could do pretty much anything, but we didn't always do the best job to stop and ask whether we should do it. Nor was there anyone there to point out when a critical emotional threshold might have been met, and "checking in" might be needed. It was a lot of boom/bust as a result. I grew a shit ton, have some crazy stories from our time together and am without question a better and more whole person for having loved him.
One thing that worked for us was to ask in a disagreement on a scale of 1-10 what the other person's level of "caring" about a given situation was. If one party rated it higher and could give good reasons for it, the other party would just concede the point. It's a system that could be potentially abused, but neither of us really thought in that way, so it worked for us.
We both have a tendency to ignore our emotions about things, she's also 6 years my junior. Early on we would ignore things and they would blow up in our faces. We have had to learn to communicate with one another. She comes from a liberal family and is very culturally liberal, and I have had to work strongly on not being judgmental or dismissive of some of her interests. She however can also be very judgmental about things I like. The election season going the way it has hasn't helped, but God put me here to love her until there is no breath left in my lungs.
The growing has come in fits and starts, but we have to attack our problems head on. Me being older, and having seen more, I've been much more certain of my feelings for her sooner than she has for me. I said I love you first, I wanted her to move in with me relatively quickly etc. etc. I have had to learn to give her the time and space she needs to figure out her own desires for our relationship. To make sure I'm not being manipulative.
Working on our relationship has been one of the toughest and easily the most rewarding things I've ever done. But that work is never finished, and we will always be working to become our best selves.