“Put Your Pride To The Side and Watch Your Relationship Survive”
Pride — (N.) a feeling or deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one’s own achievements, the achievements of those with whom one is closely associated, or from qualities or possesions that are widely admired.
In this day in age, there are a million and one ways to ruin a relationship. From questionnable social media activity to non-verbal communication, there should literally be a book called, “How To Ruin A Relationship For Dummies”. One of the most common killers of relationships (just from my observations), pride (and lack of communication) is the prime suspect the murder of a non effective relationship. There’s nothing wrong with having pride for your positive attributes and what you bring to the table, but if you aren’t willing to put your pride to the side, your relationship will not survive.
Throughout my short 25 years and some change on this earth, I’ve seen a lot of relationships crumble due to pride. Whether it was a business relationship, friendship and even a bond between two people, I’ve seen both sides of “I’m not apologizing because I don’t see what I did wrong”. Then days, weeks, months, even years later, we look back and say, “damn. maybe I was wrong”. By then it’s too late.
Due to a previous conversation I had with a close friend and his acquired knowledge on building foundations on solid foundations, we both came to the conclusion that without a solid platform, no relationship will be successful. For example, the legs on a chair, support our heavy hind parts when we take a seat. If the leg is glued back together and let time run it’s course, the glue will hold the legs together. On the flip side of the coin though, if you put glue on the leg of the chair and instead of letting time dry it, youapply your own speedy methods, the glue will hold but not for long.
In case you didn’t catch where I was going with that anology, just because you have a broken relationship, doesn’t mean you have to rush and get it fixed. Because if the love is real, no matter how far you are from the other person, the emotions and feelings are still there. If you broke your relationship, your apology serves as the glue to the chair. Can’t apologize and jump back in neck first, have to gradually test the waters before you are engulfed by the current.
At times, we as men can be very prideful individuals. We like to pump our chest and quote Mohammed Ali quotes to signify how strong we really are. But the pride issues don’t always come from the men because women have pride issues as well. You can’t allow yourself to get caught in the cycle of, “oh he’s a man. He’s the one that should be apologizing”. At some point, you have to hold yourself accountable for your faults. All relationships work 50/50. Not 80/20, 70/30 or 49/51, but an equal balance of responsibilities and acknowledging the faults.
In all honesty, the life you used to live and the bond you once had can resume, ONLY if you put your pride to the side and take care of what needs to be taken care of. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with ending a relationship because the two parties are at a different space in life and in order to see things clearly, you have to separate. That’s not giving up, it’s understanding that you have to take care of you first, before you nurture someone else.When you put your pride to the side, you’re not only apologizing by words, you are apologizing by actions. You are making progressive steps to clean up your act to show the other person that you are sincere about their involvement in your life. If you have someone that is pursuing their dream and you want them to be Super Man/Woman, you must put your pride to the side and encourage them to reach their destination.
“A difficult thing for women to understand is that, when a man is pursuing his passion and his career, a lot of women think that they are putting that in front of them. When in essence what you have to understand is, men looking at it is, I’m doing that for you and them. It’s the only way a man validates himself as a man. 1. Who he is, 2. what we does and 3. how much he make. That’s the only way we validate it. We have no other validation amongst each other. Now we got something out with God, but when we talk to other men, it’s who we are, what we do and how much we make. It ain’t nothing else we go by. And so he gotta do that, to validate and justify you all living the lifestyle you all live. It’s not that he loves that more than he loves you, but he loves doing the things for you but he gotta do that to get it done…” — Steve Harvey
