When it’s not good to get your way

I want to live in San Francisco. My boyfriend wants to live in Virginia. How do I talk him into living in San Francisco?

I want my husband to stay married to me. He wants a divorce. How do I talk him into staying?

I want to have a baby. My husband doesn’t. How do I talk him into it?

I get questions like this all the time. They all have the same theme: my spouse won’t do what I want. How do I get my spouse to do what I want?

The answer? You can’t.

You can’t control what other people believe, say or do-not even the ones who live in your house. The only person you can control is your self, and that’s debatable to some degree. Think of all the times you tried to tell yourself “no more ice cream” and think about how long that lasted.

As humans we often mistakenly believe that we can get our way all the time. So when someone-especially a spouse-dares to think differently, we get really ticked. After all, that means they must not really love us, right?

Not really. It just means that they are separate human beings, humans who do not share the same brain with us. You might have a lot in common with your spouse, but you don’t have everything in common. Some of your opinions, thoughts, beliefs, hobbies and desires just don’t match up.

Sometimes you and your spouse will disagree and no amount of talking will bring you to consensus. You can talk about the issue night after night after night. You can fight. You can badger. You can see 679 marital counselors. You can pray.

And you’ll still disagree.

You’ll be tempted to get really ef-ing mad when this happens because you’ll think that your spouse is 1) obviously wrong 2) knows he or she is obviously wrong 3) therefore must be disagreeing just to piss you off.

Thing is, neither one of you is wrong. Neither one of you is right. You just share different opinions on whatever it is you are fighting about.

In such cases, you can only do three things.

1. Agree that you disagree.

2. Accept that you are different.

3. Decide what YOU are going to do about the fact that you want something that your spouse doesn’t want (or vice versa). Will you find a way to love Virginia with your spouse or will you move to San Francisco without him and continue your relationship long distance? Will you leave your spouse and have a baby with someone else or will you stay with your spouse and remain childless? Will you spend the rest of your life wishing your spouse hadn’t left you or will you pull yourself together and get on with it?

Yeah, in such situations, it’s not about what you can talk your spouse into. Once you’ve spoken your mind and said your peace and are still at an impasse? It’s about what you can talk yourself into.

Oh, I know, you don’t like that answer. You want a magic formula that you can use to manipulate your spouse into seeing things your way. But if that formula really existed, are you sure you would want to use it? Would you really feel more loved and understood if you were able to bully your spouse into doing what you wanted even if he really didn’t want what you wanted?

Or would you feel more loved and understood if your spouse totally understood where you were coming from, but had the courage to disagree with you anyway?

I don’t know about you, but I’d choose the latter any day.

My husband and I don’t agree on a lot of things. I think Italy is a great place to go on vacation, for instance. He’s been there before and has no interest in going there again. Assuming I have the money, I’d like to go there when I turn 40. Will I take him? No, he doesn’t want to go. I could probably talk him into going, but how fun would that be? He’d spend the entire vacation making comments about how much our vacation sucks. Yeah, I’ll go with a friend instead.

This doesn’t make me think any less of my husband. I did not marry a child. I did not marry a subordinate. I did not marry a robot. I married a person, one who is not me. For that, I am thankful.