Is it possible to live and let live when you are committed to building a life together? In a culture that promotes being “one entity” as a couple, can one even allow oneself to follow a different growth path, which is not similar to your partner’s?
Post pandemic, Bengaluru-based lawyer Dina (37), a client of mine has been on a path to downsizing her life. Ved (37), her entrepreneur husband, has seen his venture flourish since then. He wants to flaunt his success by supersizing acquisitions, making grand social gestures and maximising their lifestyle.
For Dina and Ved, the minimalist and maximalist attitude is indeed a drastic juxtaposition. For any reasonably successful relationship, being aligned on the kind of lifestyle to lead together is among the most important vectors. Money management and parenting style being the other important ones.
The last couple of years have been particularly hard as Dina is getting more confident about the minimalistic path and Ved more grand in the lifestyle he is drawn to. Her arguments are heard and perhaps even understood by Ved but he is not in a place to follow Dina’s lead. Dina is well aware that Ved’s choice is one that they both subscribed to before her change of heart. Until we spoke, she had been trying to convince Ved to give up on all that and follow her lead.
In some ways this first-world problem highlights what I believe in – when it comes to couples – we do not have to be identical and no one person should be the leader of the other. There should be a space in a marriage where we are able to be or do what we want in our individual evolution and growth journey.
Two individuals who choose to spend their lives together should enjoy each other’s companionship, seek support from each other, and face the ups and downs of life together. There will be many compromises along the way; your own health issues, aging parents, issues with children etc. But when it comes to individual journeys, a couple can live and let live.
I have met many couples who have polar opposite political views and personalities: introverts and extroverts, or where one is an atheist and the other deeply religious, and of course, Dina and Ved, where one is a minimalist and the other a maximalist. They have all found a way to co-exist despite their extreme differences.
Is it difficult? Indeed it is. Trying to find balance in diverging preferences will not be easy. Yet, there are many encouraging examples all around us.
These couples have gracefully agreed to disagree. They don’t stop each other from following what seems to attract them as they evolve. They do not actively talk about things they disagree on. It is established that they are free to follow their path as long as they don’t try to – even covertly – convince the other person to follow their beliefs/ philosophy.
To me that’s a real partnership. One that is strong and fair. With a real sense of freedom and space which so many couples seek but don’t know what that means. It means that two people live with each other on absolute equal footing, they don’t possess each other and they are not the master of each other.
(Simran Mangharam is a dating and relationship coach and can be reached on simran@floh.in. The views expressed are personal)
