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> emotional labor in their relationships This phrasing really rubs me the wrong way. If your relationship with me involves any kind of labor for you then it's

> emotional labor in their relationships This phrasing really rubs me the wrong way. If your relationship with me involves any kind of labor for you then it's not a good relationship and you should leave as soon as possible. Labor is for employer-employee relationships. I think people's Anglo-Saxon obsession with work taints the perception of what relationship should be and doing things solely for yourself (things that might also benefit others) is unimaginable. Whenever you do things that have a benefit it's somehow labor. With implied expectation of compensation or at least sacrifice appreciation.

nsingh2 2y ago
> If your relationship with me involves any kind of labor for you then it's not a good relationship Depends on your definition of labour, but this doesn't make sense to me. Relationships require conscious effort (labour) to maintain. I've been in a relationship where I was too passive, didn't end well. The hard part is finding a balance, where one person is not doing too much or too little.
- scotty79 2y ago
  Labor in my definition is something you do for someone, rather than [for yourself, because that's exactly what you want to do]. > Relationships require conscious effort (labour) to maintain. Absolutely not. You can just live in a relationship and labor no more than you would be living alone. I know because I've done both for extended period of time. The presence of the other person should make your life easier not harder (and vice versa). Good relationship is when you and your partner do only things each wants to do and do them for yourselves not for each other. You offer generously, you accept graciously, you thank profusely. Anything else is tainted by transactionality and becomes balancing act and harder and harder as relationship ages and/or life becomes harder. That's why so many relationships break down. Transactionality gets off balance in perception of one party or the other. Finding a person you could have a good relationship with is harder than finding a person you could have some relationship with obviously. But it's worth it. In 14 years a word chore didn't pop up once and neither any disagreement about money. Of course some of it is finding the right person but a lot can be done just by having proper framework of what life and relationships are (not labor) and leading by example.
  - brabel 2y ago
    Oh my... you really need to look around you. The world of relationships is a fucking mess. You speak as if it's super easy. How old are you? 18? If you haven't been in a bad relationship or brokenhearted, I can only assume you're in completely unexperienced or one of the luckiest people on Earth. You need to drink a huge amount of reality tea.
    - scotty79 2y ago
      > The world of relationships is a fucking mess. Yeah, I can see that. It's one of the reasons I'm currently abstaining from relationships of this kind. The other is simply because I can, due to having schizoid personality and no specific goals that would require having a relationship. > You speak as if it's super easy. I don't think I explicitly said that but I might have given that impression. While the target might not be realistically achievable for many people in their lifetimes due to something as simple as lack of luck I think it's still worth to point whomever I can in, what I believe is, the correct direction so at least they can adopt the right framework that could enable them to achieve the target if they are lucky enough. > How old are you? 18? I'll be 47 soon. > If you haven't been in a bad relationship or brokenhearted, I can only assume you're in completely unexperienced or one of the luckiest people on Earth. I'm prone to landing in situations that produce incels and as a young person I spent years in this kind of "relationships" (which constitute mostly of being constantly brokenhearted, betrayed and feeling inadequate and powerless) before I actually found (due to sheer luck in timing and match) someone that decided to spend the rest of their life with me and seen what a good relationship might look like and what nourishes it. One relationship I never been in so far was the transactional kind, the one where the labor is expected, the one where labor might give any illusion of contributing positively to the relationship. The ones that most Americans see as a default, desired mode despite of having divorce rate of more than 50% (and that's not counting the ones that fall apart before marriage). So all of your assumptions about me are false unfortunately. If I can recommend something, which I personally also struggle with... When talking to people try to ask more and guess less. Smart people like you and me naturally lean towards guessing because it worked for us in the past across many domains. What I noticed so far is that it's not a great strategy when interacting with people about their personal perceptions and experiences because variety and absurdity of this domain makes us guessing wrong way to often.
brabel 2y ago
> If your relationship with me involves any kind of labor for you then it's not a good relationship and you should leave as soon as possible. Good luck jumping from relationship to relationship trying to find a perfect partner who requires no emotional labor on your part. Oh , you have found one? First of all: so you think because you did it, everyone can do it? Do you realize a large percentage of people are desperate to be in a relationship, yet very few even manage to find one that lasts more than a few years? If you did find a perfect partner: how long have you been together? The first few years tend to feel perfect for most relationships, even those that turn really sour after that. I would wait at least 10 years to reach any conclusions.
- scotty79 2y ago
  > yet very few even manage to find one that lasts more than a few years? [...] > The first few years tend to feel perfect for most relationships, even those that turn really sour after that. I would wait at least 10 years to reach any conclusions. In my opinion that's mostly because labor gets in the way. Once you perceive relationship I'm terms of labor you no longer ask yourself "am I happy?". You ask yourself "am I getting screwed?" and since it's superhard to balance things that don't innately tend to equilibrium there's always some imbalance which brings resentment. In this framework lasting relationships are only the ones where both parties are feeling like they are getting at least 110% of what they are putting in. But since it's reevaluated constantly and economics and attraction evolves it still most often eventually lands on less than 100% for one or both parties which breeds resentment and makes the relationship fall apart through negative interactions. Labor actually harms relationships because while it might raise the evaluation of what the other person is getting from you it also rises the evaluation of how much you are putting in which might make your perceived return drop below 100%. When you abandon the concept of labor you do things for yourself and if those things happen to be benefitting the other person enough so that being with you is easier than being alone they will stay in that relationship. And the other way around. It still may fall apart of course at any point if you doing things for yourself starts making the life of the other person harder than it would be if they were apart from you. But at least you don't have this narrative layer of being responsible or indebted to each other which makes not only relationship more amicable but also severing it. That kind of hostility that you see in divorce is what happens to people brains when perceptions of unsettled debt are involved. This state of mind can turn perfectly ordinary people into vindictive monsters. > If you did find a perfect partner: how long have you been together? 14 years, she wasn't perfect but she instinctively had the right framework and taught me it through living it with me, I sort of investigated it, distilled and verbalized it since she was gone Since our relationship didn't involve labor it only got stronger with time. It was never off balance because no one was keeping score. And when you are living with other person having positive interactions with them your brain includes their benefit in your own reward circuits. This can also happen in transactional relationships but I believe labor narrative gets in the way. You don't like the smell of your nice car so much if you believe to be overpaying for it 25%. If you're interested about what I have to say about relationships or for more context please check my response to a sibling comment.

nsingh2 2y ago

> If your relationship with me involves any kind of labor for you then it's not a good relationship Depends on your definition of labour, but this doesn't make sense to me. Relationships require conscious effort (labour) to maintain. I've been in a relationship where I was too passive, didn't end well. The hard part is finding a balance, where one person is not doing too much or too little.

scotty79 2y ago
Labor in my definition is something you do for someone, rather than [for yourself, because that's exactly what you want to do]. > Relationships require conscious effort (labour) to maintain. Absolutely not. You can just live in a relationship and labor no more than you would be living alone. I know because I've done both for extended period of time. The presence of the other person should make your life easier not harder (and vice versa). Good relationship is when you and your partner do only things each wants to do and do them for yourselves not for each other. You offer generously, you accept graciously, you thank profusely. Anything else is tainted by transactionality and becomes balancing act and harder and harder as relationship ages and/or life becomes harder. That's why so many relationships break down. Transactionality gets off balance in perception of one party or the other. Finding a person you could have a good relationship with is harder than finding a person you could have some relationship with obviously. But it's worth it. In 14 years a word chore didn't pop up once and neither any disagreement about money. Of course some of it is finding the right person but a lot can be done just by having proper framework of what life and relationships are (not labor) and leading by example.
- brabel 2y ago
  Oh my... you really need to look around you. The world of relationships is a fucking mess. You speak as if it's super easy. How old are you? 18? If you haven't been in a bad relationship or brokenhearted, I can only assume you're in completely unexperienced or one of the luckiest people on Earth. You need to drink a huge amount of reality tea.
  - scotty79 2y ago
    > The world of relationships is a fucking mess. Yeah, I can see that. It's one of the reasons I'm currently abstaining from relationships of this kind. The other is simply because I can, due to having schizoid personality and no specific goals that would require having a relationship. > You speak as if it's super easy. I don't think I explicitly said that but I might have given that impression. While the target might not be realistically achievable for many people in their lifetimes due to something as simple as lack of luck I think it's still worth to point whomever I can in, what I believe is, the correct direction so at least they can adopt the right framework that could enable them to achieve the target if they are lucky enough. > How old are you? 18? I'll be 47 soon. > If you haven't been in a bad relationship or brokenhearted, I can only assume you're in completely unexperienced or one of the luckiest people on Earth. I'm prone to landing in situations that produce incels and as a young person I spent years in this kind of "relationships" (which constitute mostly of being constantly brokenhearted, betrayed and feeling inadequate and powerless) before I actually found (due to sheer luck in timing and match) someone that decided to spend the rest of their life with me and seen what a good relationship might look like and what nourishes it. One relationship I never been in so far was the transactional kind, the one where the labor is expected, the one where labor might give any illusion of contributing positively to the relationship. The ones that most Americans see as a default, desired mode despite of having divorce rate of more than 50% (and that's not counting the ones that fall apart before marriage). So all of your assumptions about me are false unfortunately. If I can recommend something, which I personally also struggle with... When talking to people try to ask more and guess less. Smart people like you and me naturally lean towards guessing because it worked for us in the past across many domains. What I noticed so far is that it's not a great strategy when interacting with people about their personal perceptions and experiences because variety and absurdity of this domain makes us guessing wrong way to often.

brabel 2y ago

> If your relationship with me involves any kind of labor for you then it's not a good relationship and you should leave as soon as possible. Good luck jumping from relationship to relationship trying to find a perfect partner who requires no emotional labor on your part. Oh , you have found one? First of all: so you think because you did it, everyone can do it? Do you realize a large percentage of people are desperate to be in a relationship, yet very few even manage to find one that lasts more than a few years? If you did find a perfect partner: how long have you been together? The first few years tend to feel perfect for most relationships, even those that turn really sour after that. I would wait at least 10 years to reach any conclusions.

scotty79 2y ago
> yet very few even manage to find one that lasts more than a few years? [...] > The first few years tend to feel perfect for most relationships, even those that turn really sour after that. I would wait at least 10 years to reach any conclusions. In my opinion that's mostly because labor gets in the way. Once you perceive relationship I'm terms of labor you no longer ask yourself "am I happy?". You ask yourself "am I getting screwed?" and since it's superhard to balance things that don't innately tend to equilibrium there's always some imbalance which brings resentment. In this framework lasting relationships are only the ones where both parties are feeling like they are getting at least 110% of what they are putting in. But since it's reevaluated constantly and economics and attraction evolves it still most often eventually lands on less than 100% for one or both parties which breeds resentment and makes the relationship fall apart through negative interactions. Labor actually harms relationships because while it might raise the evaluation of what the other person is getting from you it also rises the evaluation of how much you are putting in which might make your perceived return drop below 100%. When you abandon the concept of labor you do things for yourself and if those things happen to be benefitting the other person enough so that being with you is easier than being alone they will stay in that relationship. And the other way around. It still may fall apart of course at any point if you doing things for yourself starts making the life of the other person harder than it would be if they were apart from you. But at least you don't have this narrative layer of being responsible or indebted to each other which makes not only relationship more amicable but also severing it. That kind of hostility that you see in divorce is what happens to people brains when perceptions of unsettled debt are involved. This state of mind can turn perfectly ordinary people into vindictive monsters. > If you did find a perfect partner: how long have you been together? 14 years, she wasn't perfect but she instinctively had the right framework and taught me it through living it with me, I sort of investigated it, distilled and verbalized it since she was gone Since our relationship didn't involve labor it only got stronger with time. It was never off balance because no one was keeping score. And when you are living with other person having positive interactions with them your brain includes their benefit in your own reward circuits. This can also happen in transactional relationships but I believe labor narrative gets in the way. You don't like the smell of your nice car so much if you believe to be overpaying for it 25%. If you're interested about what I have to say about relationships or for more context please check my response to a sibling comment.