Compromised.

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I love getting phone calls. I talk a lot. I love talking to people, I love hearing them talk, I love hearing the words they use, the invisible punctuations, the smile in their voices, their heartfelt guffaws.

I do better when I talk than when I write.

So I got a couple phone calls from really good friends today. One of them called from a country thousands of miles away. The other one from a district away. I haven't spoken to either of these guys in months, but we talked like we were continuing a conversation that was paused indefinitely.

And when that happens, that's when I know I'll continue to be friends with them.

Next time, I'll call.

***

After that long conversation with S today, I've come to the following conclusions on Compromise.

1) In our relationships, we often forget to stop and really think about what the other person values, what they truly consider as important. This is the first step to compromising.

Sure, we think compromising is about giving as much as we are expecting or receiving. But it's not only about that.

We need to find out first what's important to the other person, because that's what's worth giving them. It's not really about how much we give, it's what we give that signals the first step.

2) Of course this would only work if both parties are involved in it. Let's try a little math. (I suck at math, btw.)

Let's say A is important to me, but unimportant to you.

B is important to you, but unimportant to me.

If i give you A, that wouldn't mean crap to you. If you give me B, I won't notice anything, because it just has no value to me. All I want or need is A.

Therefore, Compromise = You give me some A, even if you think it's stupid, and I give you some B, even though I think you don't really need it.

So there it is, folks. My own brand of algebra. Good stuff.

3) You don't have to lose your true self or personality to compromise. To compromise, you only have to give A or B, sometimes maybe even C or D. Not the whole fucking alphabet. Dig?

No one should change themselves for another person. That's selling yourself short. It's not about changing, it's about adjusting.

4) It's when neither people in the relationship is willing to compromise that you know you're fucked. Or, when only one of them is doing the compromising.

The question is, is the relationship worth all that algebra I just mentioned in Point 2? If you answered "no", or "not really", or "mmmmmmmyeahno, i dunno", or any other variation of the negative form, then maybe it's just not working out.

***

So yeah. Sometimes, it just happens that you think it was nothing, but it was really kind of a big deal for me.

Are you really ready to compromise?


Comments

  1. BabyPinkNovember 1, 2009 at 3:33 AM

    Kiyababayaan ko aya a entry. Your realizations totally hit the mark! :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. nessreenNovember 1, 2009 at 8:13 AM

    Marugun a galbuk angka-i a kapaki-nggiginawa-i ka kinanglan dn a mag-adjust. Maka-pamtang ta saya. Haha. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousNovember 26, 2009 at 9:57 AM

    hahaha....these so-called ideas in economics is called comparative advantage...laws of trade or specialization....when countries specialize in producing goods that they could produce easy and cheap and exchange them to other countries who could not produce the goods in the same cheap and easy way. Country A will specialize in producing product A because its availability is abundant, meanwhile, Country B will produce Product B because they have the best technology at hand which Country A does not have...so to utilize the advantage for both countries...they trade or exchange products in a way that is both profitable and advantageous to them.

    In economics everything could be measured by using certain parameters and equations by giving values to each variable. Its a bit tedious and imprecise if you do that to relatonships though so its a little bit diffrent.

    ReplyDelete
  4. aiDecember 28, 2009 at 2:43 PM

    Haha! malo ako bithang sa gyanan a si anonymous.

    yes, i agree, compromise is the key when it comes to relationships. i think i heard that in a movie, or, read it in a book. :)

    ReplyDelete

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