From: weaver@jetsun.weitek.COM (Michael Gordon Weaver)
Newsgroups: alt.romance
Subject: Re: Yet another request for advice...
Date: 12 Nov 92 21:33:33 GMT
Organization: WEITEK Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

In article <1992Nov12.010655.6630@news2.cis.umn.edu> esper@cs35b.cs.umn.edu (Dave Sherohman) writes:
>In article <1992Nov10.225736.28390@jetsun.weitek.COM> weaver@jetsun.weitek.COM (Michael Gordon Weaver) writes:
>>I hope you understand that you made some tactical errors. I don't mean
>>this as a criticism of you. I know it is easy to get caught up in the
>>heat of the moment. But I think it might help you, especially if you
>>want to apologize.
>
>Tactical errors?  This wasn't a military exercise (yes, I'm a big wargamer, and
>that's the first thing the phrase suggested...), not was it a gambit to get her
>to make a decision in my favor.  It was a case of me trying to help a friend
>with a perceived problem.  And I wasn't caught up in the heat of the moment, as
>there was no heat, just concern.  As for apologizing, she and I agree that there
>is no need.
>
It seems that I erred in trying to infer your goals.  I apologize for
that.  I was not trying to suggest what your goals should be, but only
trying to give an alternative perspective on what happened.

No, it was not a military exercise, but in any situation that is
important, you need to take what you want into consideration. I said
'tactical errors' rather than 'errors', because I think that the
actions that I pointed out may make sense in some context, but I do not
think that they are likely to serve what I thought your goals were.

>>First, by pointing out her hypocrisy, you made her become unhypocritical
>>-- unfortunately the wrong way from your point of view. People are
>>afraid of being dependent, and most anything you do which makes them
>>more conscious of the degree of their dependence on you will make them
>>pull away.
>
>Quite the opposite, actually - by pointing out that she wasn't taking
>responsibility for her actions, I got her to consciously take charge of at
>least on aspect of her life.  True, I don't like the direction she chose to
>go with it, but the fact of the matter is, the only surprise in that was how
>difficult the decision was.  With the number and magnitude of conflicts between
>us dating and the rest of her life, I almost expected to be dismissed out of
>hand.
>
She has conflicting goals, and by pointing this out to her, you make
her resolve these conflicts according to her old priorities. If you had
given her time, she might instead have adopted new priorities. You
chose to reduce the ambiguity in your relationship, at the risk of
reducing the level of intimacy.  If you did that intentionally, then
you deserve a lot of credit for maturity. Often people take similar
actions without thinking through the consequences, simply because
they are insecure.

>>Third, you gave her an ultimatum ('all she can do is take
>>responsibility). There was no threat, but it was still an ultimatum.
>
>What else could I have told her?  Again, maybe I was unclear, but the entire
>message was 'You can't hide from our relationship - it's a part of reality.
>All you can do is decide what you're going to do about it.'
>
If your goals was to have her take responsibility, then you succeeded,
the ultimatum worked, and there is no need for a fallback.

Good Luck,
Michael.
Newsgroups: alt.romance