Nerfing Our Personalities

EANx

HildaCorners said:

For example, if a man has always ranked high in Impulsiveness — he loved downhill skiing, then street racing, even did a couple of skydives ... then got married and stopped doing anything more impulsive than climbing a ladder to wash the upstairs widows, because his wife forbid it.

He needs impulsiveness in his life. As he matured, he might have changed from street racing to bow hunting, go back to skiing ... but his wife wants a man with very little impulsiveness, so he nerfed that part of himself. If he doesn't know about MMSL, he's probably unhappy and doesn't know why.

That's the guy that will be jumping off the house roof as soon as his kids are old enough to appreciate it.

HildaCorners

EANx said:

That's the guy that will be jumping off the house roof as soon as his kids are old enough to appreciate it.

Unless he buys into his wife's view that being impulsive is bad and he should never do anything at all risky, ever.

I like tying this into Athol's brands of attraction and comfort. If you were strong in one brand when you were single, and dropped it to zero after marriage, you will suffer for doing that.

I'm remembering a very bad sitcom from the 1960s ... anyone else remember Green Acres? In it, a high fashion society gal marries a country bumpkin and he moves her to the back of beyond. She didn't change, which made the comedy ... but in real life, she would have tried to be a good farm wife and felt miserable because she felt she wasn't able to let her peacocking social butterfly out.

Cowboy

HildaCorners said:

Changing hobbies and interests is a normal part of maturity ... and not quite what I'm talking about.

What I'm talking about is trying to eliminate parts of your own temperament.

For example, if a man has always ranked high in Impulsiveness — he loved downhill skiing, then street racing, even did a couple of skydives ... then got married and stopped doing anything more impulsive than climbing a ladder to wash the upstairs widows, because his wife forbid it.

He needs impulsiveness in his life. As he matured, he might have changed from street racing to bow hunting, go back to skiing ... but his wife wants a man with very little impulsiveness, so he nerfed that part of himself. If he doesn't know about MMSL, he's probably unhappy and doesn't know why.

Or, in my life ... I've always been a Maker. I have to be making things. Over the years, I've changed what craft I do, what types of things I make ... but there's always something. If I felt that I had to stop making anything, that would be a nerf.

I can't speak for the first officers, but I sure know a lot of men -- including me, unfortunately -- who fall into this trap. The wife says she wants a house, then a minivan, then nice flowers out front, then wants hubby to not go play with the boys because it's junior's nap time and she needs to get her nails done, and we just keep saying yes because we think that's what will make her happy. Before you know it, you've turned into a slave to the "honey do" list, and you've gotten rid of everything that made you happy. What's worse, your wife isn't as attracted to you because you've smoothed out some rough edges that she liked (even though she was the one that tried to stamp them out), and you just do whatever she tells you to. It's lose-lose.