Making Compromises Without Overstepping Boundaries

Analysis by an Aspiring Therapist

Relationships take a lot of work, even at the best of times. Surviving and growing in a relationship requires looking for compromises, even for the littlest things.

Hopefully, you and your partner are able to find great scenarios to compromise on. However, if you’re feeling that a compromise, is in fact, not a compromise, perhaps they are subtle red flags into a potential power differential between you and your partner.

Partnerships aren’t supposed to be a massive game of tug-of-war. They’re supposed to be mutually reflected across both parties, through safety, security, respect, and consent. Without this safety blanket, it becomes a dictatorship.

If you find yourself in a situation where you think you are giving too much with little return on investment, you may want to consider thinking your relationship through and reflecting on how much you’re willing to let go.

Writing out or mapping out your ideas may help you conceive the same circumstance under a different lens as well.

If you're hurting yourself to give more for your partner, this might be the time to address your unresolved fears with your partner. A gentle and loving partner is not going to hurt you for having these kinds of thoughts. Instead, they may not even realize how you feel, until you tell them.

Remember, others cannot read our minds nor can they read your body language in the exact way that you can.

Compromises are usually a healthy sign of a relationship. It means that in order to achieve something, a shared goal is realized, even if both parties have different views on a topic. There is no winner or loser in this circumstance.

Here are some signs that you might be giving more than you handle:

1. Loss of Control and Identity

You are a person with many interests and beliefs. You have friends, family, and maybe even a loving pet. You’ve worked across many industries and are maybe pursuing scholarly interests. If you find yourself independent but gradually too dependent on your partner for everything, that’s a serious loss of your identity.

Losing one’s identity may cause you to feel out of control. You might feel off, worried, or even paranoid. You’ve sacrificed everything for your partner— and now you’re codependent on them.

2. Indecisive Decision Making

Being in a relationship or remaining in one was a very big decision on your end. Once you’re compromising to the point that you’ve started to people-please, you’re no longer having a greater say in how the relationship continues.

You had that agency before, but now you’re slipping away, into the deep recesses of doubt. Every decision you’re making is mulled over, and you’ve started to doubt whether or not you should up more of yourself for it.

If you’re feeling this way, you’re likely not comfortable with the arrangement and wish you could do something that is much more balanced.

3. Caught in an Endless Loop

Compromises are usually great. While we can’t always get what we want, if you’re always struggling with decisions, it’s possible that your partner is enabling the narrative. You’ve probably compromised on yourself well before you compromised yet again with the partner.

While it’s easy to get caught in such a cycle, it’s not your fault. Sometimes these things happen, in a subtle way, and by the time you and/or the partner realize it, it’s very hard to climb out of it.

If you find yourself in a situation where your fear of repercussions, then your partner is controlling the narrative. You’re going to have to get out of the scenario in slow increments and it’s going to be a long road ahead, but if you made decent decisions in the past, you can certainly do so again.

4. Resenting Others

When you’ve spent too much time giving more than you receive, you might find yourself angry and hurt at the others who are reaping the benefits. Resentment will seep into your system and carry into the inner recesses of your body until your own confidence and self-worth are diminished. By then, you’ll start to blame yourself for the sacrifices you made, early on.

Again, it’s not your fault. The decisions we made in the past were based on what we best knew at the time. The other person may not have realized that you were genuinely angry at them.

Others may think that you genuinely wanted this. They can’t read your mind, so they had no way of knowing. While it’s frustrating, you may need to verbalize your thoughts to them and let them know that the compromises are getting a bit too much.

5. Loss of Enjoyment

Over-compensating on your compromises can impact your overall levels of happiness, especially on the things you used to do. For example, if a partner has successfully talked you out of doing specific hobbies and activities, you’re left with little opportunity to maintain and further nurture your coping strategies.

Coping strategies are great as they are activities that give your mind and body some temporary rest. The best decision making comes from our mental breaks because your brain is making all sorts of subtle and subconscious decisions in the background. When you fail to have any coping mechanism, you’re more likely to be erratic, scared, and confused.

If you can, try to track how you are feeling and how your partner is reacting to you, to see if there any strange patterns, like a partner being angry whenever you want to listen to music.

While compromises can be great in some situations, we shouldn’t have to fundamentally change our livelihoods, dreams, and interests for other people. After all, we are people and not emotional doormats.

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