Agreeableness and Romance: Finding the Balance for a Healthy Relationship

Oh my god, relationships. Let me tell you something about being “agreeable” – I spent approximately three decades of my life trying to be the good girl, the nice one, the person who never said no to anything unless she was literally on fire, and even then she’d probably apologize for the smoke damage.

The Exhausting Performance of Perpetual Niceness

Here’s what nobody tells you about being agreeable: it’s exhausting. It’s like being in a perpetual production of “Please Like Me: The Musical,” where you’re both the star and the understudy and also somehow responsible for making sure everyone in the audience gets their emotional needs met during intermission.

A Brief Interlude About My Ex (Because Of Course)

I had this boyfriend once – let’s call him Brad, though his real name was worse – who used to say things like “Whatever you want to do is fine with me,” which really meant “Please read my mind and then do exactly what I want while making it seem like it was your idea.” I spent so much time trying to decode his emotional hieroglyphics that I could have learned actual hieroglyphics and probably had a more satisfying conversation with King Tut.

The Part Where I Actually Tell You What Matters

But here’s the thing about relationships (and I know this because I’ve had enough of them to populate a medium-sized romantic comedy): They’re not actually about being agreeable. They’re about being real. And being real is messy and complicated and sometimes involves saying things like, “No, I don’t want to spend another Sunday watching you play fantasy football while I pretend to care about your quarterback’s emotional journey.”

A List Because Everyone Loves Lists (Including My Editor)

Listen, if you’re one of those agreeable people – and I know you are because you’re reading this – here’s what you need to know:

1. Your feelings aren’t inconvenient plot points in someone else’s story. They’re the whole damn movie.

2. Setting boundaries isn’t mean. It’s like putting on your own oxygen mask before helping others, except instead of oxygen, it’s your sanity.

3. When someone says “You’re too nice,” what they really mean is “I can’t believe I’m getting away with this.”

The Real Secret (Which Isn’t Actually a Secret)

The secret to relationships isn’t finding someone who thinks you’re agreeable. It’s finding someone who thinks you’re fascinating even when you’re being completely disagreeable. Someone who loves watching you say no to things you hate and yes to things you love. Someone who doesn’t need you to be smaller or quieter or more amenable to their every whim.

A Conclusion That’s Really Just an Excuse to Tell You About My Marriage

In my experience – which includes enough therapy bills to finance a small island nation – the best relationships are the ones where both people can say, “This is who I am,” and the other person says, “Great, let’s order takeout and talk about it,” instead of “Could you maybe be someone else?”

And if you’re worried about losing people by being less agreeable, remember this: The only people you’ll lose are the ones who were taking advantage of your agreeability in the first place. And honey, that’s not a loss – that’s a clearance sale of emotional baggage.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go tell my husband I don’t actually enjoy his political podcasts. It only took me eight years to work up to this moment.