The Third Option

I was recently coaching a young client about her relationship.  She has been dating someone for several years, waiting and waiting and waiting for him to propose.  He has his reasons for putting it off.  She doesn’t like the reasons.  And they constantly fight about it.  Every few months she gets more frustrated than she can handle and tells him they need space.  During those breaks she not-so-secretly hopes he’ll come riding up on a white horse with a ring in hand.  He does not come riding up on a white horse, or have a ring anywhere near her hand.   

Now, before I go on, let me mention that I’m not a big fan of all or nothing thinking.  It usually promotes seeing things in two categories such as ‘good’ or ‘bad’.  It loves living in extremes and most of the time those extremes are not viable or sustainable.  (You may be familiar with an example such as “I’m never eating sugar again and will only subsist on green vegetables” – or some such variation.)  

But sometimes, all or nothing thinking is very, very useful.  Sometimes we need to think in extremes. 

You’ll know when you need to get back to all or nothing when you find yourself wishing for the dreaded third option.  

We think the third option is the answer to our dreams.  

In reality, the third option causes the majority of our pain. 

In my client’s case, one option for her right now is to find someone to be engaged to and to marry.  It can happen for her.  There are a hundred guys out there she could marry if she really, really wanted to be married. 

The other option is for her to love her boyfriend.  Just as he is.  Right now.  

She thinks there is a third option – to get engaged and married to him.  

There isn’t.  

THAT thought is what is causing her pain.  Period. 

Yes, the third option may happen sometime down the road, but it is not on the table right now – so if she wants to come to peace about this, she can’t pick as if it is.  

Taking the third option theoretically off the table (….and out of the house ….and into a storage unit for good measure!) allowed her, in this case, to realize she’d rather continue to be with him than to marry someone else.  It also allowed her to go all in on her choice to be in the relationship and love him exactly as he is. He doesn’t have to be the bad guy who won’t marry her.  She’s choosing to stay.  You can imagine how that choice has allowed her the space to be the girlfriend she wants to be.

For you, taking the third option off the table might look like choosing to love the version of someone in your life exactly as they are – instead of the version of them you think they should be. It might even lead to you being a better version of you. 

I can’t wait to hear about it.