Tania

When I first started my career, I learned a very valuable lesson about working with difficult youth. I was taught that I should think about youth like an ATM machine and I should never try to take out more than I put in. By far that has been the best lesson that I learned about my work and oddly about any relationship, especially those annoyingly intense intimate ones.

Always Against the Odds

First deficit, I am a woman who loves to take care of people. Second, I am independent and like to do things for myself. Third, I can spend years in the emotional deprivation zone and function just fine. Hell, I was married in one for 16 years. So interestingly enough it is quite easy for someone like me to become more like an emotional soup kitchen for people who can’t or won’t invest anything into what I need or want and that means disaster eventually.

The Royal Poorhouse

My ex was the king of “give me one more chance” and I was the queen of “maybe this time will be different.” Together we got nowhere fast except into one big emotional deficit. And the last time he ever told me that he deserved one more chance, I looked him in the eye and said, “What the fuck, dude, my heart ain’t no soup kitchen!” And suddenly a light bulb went on in my heart.

Make Sure You Know Your Worth It

The key to establishing any type of new relationship lies in knowing what you have to offer the other person and not just know it, but feel it too. Over time I have learned many things about who I am and what I can offer to people I let into my heart. It takes awhile to figure those things out but once you gain a little confidence in one area that confidence has a way of transferring to many more. So you have to know what you are offering and how much you’re willing to invest (never more than what you get) and draw that line in the sand. If I want someone in that space, I lay it down without a threat of walking away if I don’t get what I want, otherwise I wouldn’t actually want that person in the first place now would I?

The Brinks Line

And once the line in the sand is drawn and I won’t re-draw that line in hopes of stealing a little slurp of someone else soup. The key to feeling secure about where your at and who you are with is that you don’t risk more than you invested, you don’t take more than you receive, and finally you know that when that other person moves toward your line it is because that person WANTS to be there. And for God sake ditch the book that says make him popcorn for supper on your first date because that is so inherently wrong on so many levels.