At last we come to this. Kimberly and I have needs that conflict–satisfying her need exacerbates mine and vice versa. I could fill a book with examples, literally. Promptness is a high value of mine and we are going to be late, so I am driving fast, but safety is a high value for Kimberly. Whose need gets trumped? She needs to talk and I need to think. She needs a clean car and I need a functional one. She needs us to be more tactful with folks and I need us to be more straightforward. She needs to spend more money and I need to spend less (in certain categories). She may need more together time and I may need more alone time. She’s freezing and I’m burning up.
I was raised to 1) evaluate if this is a true need or just a want 2) if it is just a want (and almost everything was), then sacrifice your desires for the other person 3) if this is not adequately reciprocated and I feel resentment for the “unfairness,” then I hint with my eyes, tone of voice, sighs, coolness, a “joke,” etc. 4) if this does not fix the injustice, then we “talk” about it (which means I tell you in so many words that you are wrong, you apologize and change). This was my understanding of fairness and compromise–in my family we manipulated each other to get the other to meet our needs–and it generally worked, at least for us younger siblings. We made demands of one another, taking responsibility for each others needs instead of taking responsibility for our own. In this environment, personal boundaries were significantly infringed, but the incursions were roughly equivalent, so it was workable. Of course, this only functions in a context where the expectations are set, determined by an authority (our parents). Someone has to settle what is fair if fairness is to be the default standard for behavior. Pushing or choosing for one’s own wants and needs was generally seen as selfish.
I quickly discovered this approach did not work with Kimberly. My system was reciprocation and her system was freely giving with no expectations. She insisted that my expectations did not determine her obligation. If I had a need, it did not mean she had to meet it, because she also had needs and she did not insist that I meet them. She explained the value of healthy boundaries in relationship. She would listen and empathize with my need if I cared to talk about it; she would offer suggestions for how my needs could be met; but if I then pushed her with an “ought,” it would stifle her free love, it would not only wound her, but hurt our relationship, setting it on legalistic grounds rather than on grace. I have needs, my needs are legitimate, she loves me and cares about my needs, but caring about my needs is quite different from caring for my needs. I cannot demand that she neglect herself to serve me (even if I neglected my needs to serve her). My resentment towards her “unfairness” suggested that I was not giving out of love and grace (which expects no reciprocity), but out of a fair-trade agreement.
She told me to only give to her (or compromise) freely, and if my gift had strings attached, I was not ready to give. In that case, she would look out for her own needs. If I say, “I don’t care where we eat,” “You choose where to dine,” “I’ll go where you want,” and this eventually leads to, “Why don’t we ever eat where I want to go?” then I am being dishonest with her and with myself. We should tell one another plainly what we want, and then look for some solution that provides for both our needs (or at least does not block either of us from meeting our own needs). I have learned to trust Kimberly to give me what she can in a healthy way, and whatever is still lacking I take responsibility for instead of placing on her. She trusts me in the same way.
This set things on a very different footing for me. I always assumed my expectations were justified, were self-evident and obvious. If so, then she should change to meet them. Why did Kimberly disagree? I began questioning whether my expectations were self-evident. I always assumed I “needed” to be on time… the what was given and I only had to resolve the how, how can I get her on my schedule. But suppose punctuality is not a necessity or even of high value. Instead of asking what should be done, I started asking why do I feel this way. Why did I have such a high level of anxiety about lateness? I thought I did this out of care for the other person’s time, but in fact I was operating from a fear of what others would think of me. My value depended on others seeing me as dependable, and punctuality was a big part of that evaluation. I tried to control others’ views of me (and thereby my true worth) by being prompt. My feelings cried out that I needed to be on time, but my true need was rather to feel worthy, and I could only satisfy this need by grounding it in something more firm than others’ opinions. I had to learn to be okay with being sometimes tardy, it is human, and part of finding this path into freedom was allowing myself to actually be late. Kimberly’s need for me to drive slower was an invitation to reconsider my own true need.
This was not a smooth, quick, or comfortable transition, and I still tend to drive with narrower safety margins than makes her comfortable. I am a work in progress (as is she), and what matters to her most is not slower driving, but acceptance and support of her feelings (instead of poking fun at her caution or otherwise suggesting there is something wrong with her view). Amazingly, once I was able to segregate my real needs from my false needs, I realized that my greatest need was what Kimberly was so great at giving–empathy and acceptance of my feelings rather than help avoiding my feelings by “fixing” the situation. If simple compromise works because neither of us feels very strongly about the matter, then we simply adjust for one another because we care. But if either of us feels an ongoing discomfort with this solution, we bring it up for discussion, not to figure out a better solution (and so avoid the true issue), but to uncover the real unmet need that is agitating our feelings.
BTW, Kimberly is a punctual person, she just is not driven to it as I am.
Janathan Grace Reflections 
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