1715. Compatibility: Wifely Initiatives 01 through 17

Commenting at post 1713, Her Highness Princess inspired thoughts about a compatibility index. This and soon-to-follow ‘Incompatibility’ are the result.

Wives can smooth wavelets of incompatibility before they build into breakers and tsunamis. A wife needs to have and depend on something specific, because showing or expecting affection, proving her love repeatedly, or yielding her self-respect to please her husband isn’t always enough. The little negatives and persistent irritants of living together can easily compound and eventually outweigh positive and broader subjects such as love, companionship, togetherness, respect, affection, vows, et al.

Being the relationship experts, women are particularly endowed with abilities to determine the ‘health’ of their marriage. Unfortunately, much of what modern wives know about men and keeping their man is wrong. This post provides wives with initiatives that discourage thoughts that breed incompatibility.

Many specific wifely behaviors soothe angry spirits, smooth turbulent waters, and prevent marital breakup. We all do what makes us feel good about ourselves, aka WADWMUFGAO. Wives apply marital glue when they behave as described below and feel good about themselves for doing it.

1. She shows respect for who he is, what he has to do, and how he fulfills his need for self-admiration. She regularly reminds him of his admirable traits and effective habits and specifically admires those characteristics most needful of more self-confidence.
2. Her sense of self-importance comes primarily from supporting and encouraging husband to fulfill his duties and responsibilities. She understands that husband’s self-respect comes from liking his picture of who he is, what he does, and how successful he is at balancing the competing venues of family and employment.
3. Except for emergencies, when push comes to shove between the interests of husband and kids, husband comes first. She energetically promotes among their children the spirit of respect for their father and loyalty, gratitude, and admiration for her husband. In the process, she primarily leads by example. Husband mostly sees the fruit of her leadership, and it causes him to take her for granted as a mother.
4. She lets this top-to-bottom rank structure guide all her decision making: husband, wife, mother, father, children. She continually looks for ways to reinforce it rather than try to ‘beat the system’.
5. She finds joy in the ways husband displays his dependability, his sense of responsibility, his focus on duty as he determines that duty.
6. She avoids laying guilt upon husband. She understands that men respond arbitrarily against any attempt to lay guilt on them. Whatever guilt husband may impose upon himself, he will forget or relieve it with actions that require no change in him.
7. Trust being the ultimate sign of respect, she routinely confirms his trustworthiness by trusting him completely, respecting his decisions, and displaying publically her dependence on him.
8. Remembering the fun she and he initiated during courtship, she tries to re-embody it in their marriage without putting pressure on him.
9. As much as she dislikes having to live with it, she understands that most of husband’s expressions of frustration are caused by conditions, others, him, but not her. Rather than feeling hurt, she finds a reliable way to treat and make him feel good about himself. She finds it amazing that such silent and gentle ‘uplifts’ over time result in his changing such that he’s not so easily frustrated.
10. Never trying directly or overtly to change him, she plants seeds that promise happier times and indirectly influence his decisions without pressuring him to live up to her expectations.
11. She yields on all squabbles and fights, waits for a better time, and figures out how to win him to her side. He respects her ability to outwit him with feminine guile. He expects her to win some battles as long as it doesn’t look like he lost. It’s an example of masculine recognition of feminine dominance that men refuse to let show.
12. Tempted as she frequently is, she never stoops to manipulative tactics. She feels good about herself for having aborted manipulative thoughts in favor of respectable ones.
13. Recognizing that men prefer action-to-fix rather than discussing problems, wife surrounds the problem with hints and planted seeds until he brings on discussion. She recognizes that a man can’t stand for his wife to have an unresolved problem, but that he expects to resolve it himself—which normally involves some time but little or no discussion or help on how to do it.
14. She indirectly shows her gratitude for his highly valued assets, such as masculine character, dependability, integrity, sense of duty, personal responsibility, setting admirable examples, entertaining nature, pleasantness, sound decisions, financial expertise, warm heart, and the list goes on.
15. She takes husbandly complaints with a dose of feminine understanding. She knows that problem-solving men always have a simplified solution too complex for female implementation or understanding. She exploits her ability to outwit men with much better results than disagreeing or fighting back.
16. She recognizes and strictly adheres to the principle that his business is none of her business, except as it directly affects the home or unless he invites her thoughts.
17. Recognizing that men are present oriented in thought and action, she defers to settling present-day pressures according to his wishes. She takes her reward by more assertively but indirectly shaping future pressures to brighten both hers and the family’s future.

Actually, performing those initiatives regularly is not as important as never doing the opposite or never citing his shortcomings. By wife doing those things regularly, however, other benefits accrue.

Those initiatives program her mind to overlook or forget his shortcomings. By feeling good in the process, she reduces her desire to change him. By reducing that desire, she reduces the normal pressure that her female nature generates to improve her man whose nature resists change. Less pressure on her means less on him, which means compatibility is helped more than threatened.

Also, a natural phenomenon causes two benefits even when husband doesn’t deserve wifely efforts. First, she becomes convinced more easily that Mr. GoodEnough is growing into Mr. Right. She can’t long act as if he’s turning into Mr. Right but not come to think it true. Second, he slowly morphs into where he actually deserves the marital blessings she so diligently bestows. Both benefits result from the self-fulfilling prophecy working for rather than against their relationship.

For the husband, lifetime compatibility depends more on her likeability than his appreciation of her love. He takes for granted those numbered efforts cited above, and it converts her loving actions into her likeability. Treating her as likeable (his way) more than loveable (her way) makes him feel good about himself.

For the wife, lifetime compatibility depends more on her ability for shaping his heart into goodness than his willingness to please her. As she perceives him responding favorably to her initiatives, she feels good about herself and her ambitions grow beyond just having him please her.

So much for compatibility. The upcoming article, ‘Incompatibility’, describes husbandly behavior that should wave red flags before observant wives.

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