Don’t Let Your Partner’s Identity Influence Your Own
By: Jordin James
Tags: Advice, Relationships, Life Lessons, Love, Psychology

Photo by Pablo Merchán Montes

About a year ago, I listened to an episode of Adam Roa’s Deep Dives Podcast where he had his ex-girlfriend of 10 years come back on the show and discuss what they’ve learned in the few months since their breakup.

One of the questions they asked each other was,

“What is the biggest thing you learned about our relationship after our break up?”

What they said next blew my mind.

His ex-girlfriend told the story of how one of the hardest things she had to adjust to after their breakup was taking on the more practical side of life. She had to book her own travel, pay her own bills on time, and drive her own motorbike in Bali.

All of these changes were quite difficult at first, but in the end, she reported feeling empowered through taking care of herself in this way and actually became quite good at it.

Then, Adam spoke about his experience dating again. In his relationship with his ex, it was understood that he was always the practical, rational one and she was always the spontaneous, carefree, fun one.

So you can imagine his surprise when one of the girls he was dating looked up at him and said, “I love how fun you are. You’re so spontaneous and carefree.”

In this new relationship, he was considered the fun one. This made him reflect on all the time he spent letting this limiting belief that he was not the fun one keep him from embodying his natural sense of play and spontaneity.

This happens in relationships all the time

So often we mold our identities around the identities of our partner.

It’s natural to do this, but its also a huge bummer because when we hire out parts of ourselves we feel our partner does “better”, we cram ourselves into limiting boxes that keep us from developing our full talents.

I do this all the time in my relationships. I usually go for very high energy guys and as a result, I’ve retreated into the identity of the quiet one, the listener, the one with too-low energy and too-much going on in her head.

The reality is, I am actually quite a lively person. I mean, I’m a definitely introvert, don’t get me wrong, but I can definitely get out there and party, man. There are plenty of people I would be with in which I would be the funny one, the party animal, and the entertainer.

Imagining this helps me not shrink down to my comfortable role of the quiet one just because I’m not louder than my partner and instead embody this new characteristic of myself as much as it feels comfortable.

You could play all the roles you think you’re “not” in your next partnership

Whatever characteristic you feel like you are not, it is totally possible for you to be with someone in which you would be the one in the partnership that embodies that characteristic most.

I want you to really imagine that. Feel the expansiveness that creates in your chest and really feel into all the ways you would embody this fresh new characteristic of yourself that you’ve hired out to your partner.

Then, carry this limitless feeling with you in your relationship and commit to not playing small about it anymore. Challenge yourself to cultivate this part of you and strengthen these new skills. Push yourself to embody them just as you would if you were single and hadn’t morphed your identity around your partner.

And then post in the comments to let me know how it goes!