Don't you know I'm ALWAYS right??

One morning on my way to work I was enjoying a radio sermon that spoke about the debilitating effects of "being right." He talked about people wanting to have their way in a relationship without regard to the overall health of that relationship. He said that one can be "right" but there is a way to BE right that doesn't demean or embarrass another person in the exchange.

I recall once a friend asking her husband a question when they were out and among friends. His retort only served to make her seem stupid for asking as evidenced by his facial expression and condescending manner. Everyone who saw this could see how embarrassed she was as she was not seeking to be dismissed in such a way.

Were his intentions to denounce her or was it to make himself seem correct? Probably a lot of both as they were soon divorced and everyone they knew saw it coming.

But, is this the flavor of many of our interactions with each other? Do we want to be sooooooooooo right, and not only "right" but right "out loud" that no matter how you make the other person feel, you don't care because you "won."



I have written before about "fighting to win" and how no one actually wins when one sets out to denigrate their partner through their own haughty behavior. I sense that it is a form of narcissism that causes this but, I'm not a therapist or even Obi-wan Keno-be anymore (smile).

But, what I do know is that there is always a middle ground and in a solid relationship, both halves have to be given an avenue to be who they are to that relationship. It cannot be "my way or the highway" because if anything happens and you can't drive anymore, the new driver won't know where to go, eh?

Lots of attention has been paid to the acrid behavior of both sides on the health care debate. It is seeping into every other realm of the political arena as well and, as I have noted, both sides WILL lose if things don't take a different tack.

Are you so strident in your beliefs that you allow no quarter for the the other party/person to learn anything from you? Can they even hear you over your shrill attestations of your "correctness?" Are you not even listening to them to see where you could possibly be in error yourself?

Will your being so right mean more to you than having nearly every other dream come true? Is it a Faustian bargain? Do you even recognize it as such?

I can bet that nearly all of us can look back and see exactly where one of our relationships, or past jobs, etc., went bad and we can all point to a moment of selfishness (maybe you could not see it then but retrospective reasoning can reveal it now) that cost you something precious. So many of us are good at seeing it with others but not with ourselves and will deny it in a fit of self-righteous pique.

There is a way to love fairly, fight fairly, debate fairly, even lose fairly. If you want to live a healthy, well-rounded life full of abundance, you must recognize and respect those with whom you will live this life...or it can be VERY lonely otherwise.