Comments on: My Boyfriend is Wonderful, but Not Ambitious or Successful

By: WhoWhatWhy

WhoWhatWhy — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 23:26:08 +0000

Wow… that was one heck of a great answer. I feel for CJ, and I see both sides. It’s a tough position to be in, and, I feel, a very modern position.

By: Andrea

Andrea — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 21:56:31 +0000

Fantastic response; with a face full of tears, I now know for certain MY kind and compatible guy is worth more to me than any intellectual.

By: Sarah

Sarah — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 17:26:18 +0000

Wow, I am so impressed by the answer to this question! I’ve been having a similar issue and this was exactly the advice I needed. Great post.

By: zuwaiyna_fs

zuwaiyna_fs — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 10:52:55 +0000

Hi. CJ, Sadly, u & ur bf are not made for each other; what u r doing is just passing ur time until u find someone who is more of ur type ! Plz don’t take undue advantage of a guy’s love for u! Tell him how u feel; and plz be honest with yourself as well as with him. Seriously, 10 yrs of relationship & u still feel dissatisfied ! Break up girl !

By: Caro Ferrero

Caro Ferrero — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 01:04:25 +0000

I have just ended my relationship. It had been 3 years and by boyfriend had not been able to keep a job for more than a month (because these are boring or not what he wants and expects for his ”professional career”), and in fact these jobs have not exceeded 4 or 5 jobs (hence 4 or 5 months). He is very good at what he does (if he wants to work), yet talking to him about things outside his “comfort zone” make him terribly depressed (making it harder for him to decide to find a new job).
In order for you to understand the full picture, I will describe a month of our relationship. I work all week, go to postgraduate classes twice a week, and run with my running team most “free” days; leaving me just Saturday and Sunday as the “relationship days” of the week.
Because of current economy, i was forced to move back to my mother’s house. Rent was around 70% of my paycheck, so I did some math and estimated 3 years of this would give me enough cash to get my own place. Because of this our couple-weekends would probably be me going to visit him at his house (he would never go to my house because I have a car and can move to his place, yet my place is too far away for him). At first I thought that the following series of events would just be a phase: getting there, seeing everything in a terrible mess, cleaning the floors, cleaning dishes, cooking dinner, buying groceries, taking dogs out for walk (while he played with a computer all weekend, since weekends are his resting time). Going out was crossed out after a while, since I got pissed off at paying for absolutely everything, and still doing what he wanted.
I slowly discovered (unfortunately this is slowly because he is, regarding everything I have said above, as a person, a kind and good hearted man) that I was turning into a sex-benefit mother figure after him. Even though things are not all black and white, and I have been using the “it is gray” excuse; there are clear boundaries which should not be crossed in my opinion. I tolerated not getting a single birthday or Valentine’s Day present because “he did not consider presents important”.
It took me too long to find the answer, but losing one’s own identity is not negotiable in a relationship, no matter how much one can divide the aspects of life. Even though you can talk about your sports with your running team buddies, or have the intellectual conversations with your university class mates, I got to a point where the monotonous (and in this case leeching-off-me) relationship was not worth it, I found myself preferring to be at work rather than with my couple, signing up for overtime and a stronger work load. Conversations with him would be plainly boring and repetitive, we had no activities in common, all we had in common was sex (and it got to a point where even that drifted apart).
Why did I put up with it for so long? I thought that finding a good and kind (even wonderful in some aspects) person, who would put up with my tight schedule was hard enough to find. But this made me miserable.
There are gray areas. But one’s own happiness comes first, if you pospone your goals and things you like to keep hold of a man that is not making the best out of most of the time together; the relationship is not worth your while, as plain as black and white.

By: AGreenheart

AGreenheart — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 02:42:47 +0000

Evan,
Thank you for this thoughtful and insightful post. You have helped me TREMENDOUSLY. My mother is convinced that me and my serious boyfriend are not compatible because we have different levels of ambition (I am very ambitious, he is not). I have felt that somehow it can’t be so black and white, and you have helped put words to what I know is true. He doesn’t have to be ambitious for our relationship to work. I would love for him to be a stay at home Dad, for example. I can talk about work “stuff” and my professional life with my [large enough!] network and professional friends. I absolutely don’t need him to fulfill every waking need and whim that courses through my body! Thank you, a million times thank you, for helping me to put my mother’s worries to rest. The case is closed, from where I stand!
AG

By: Min

Min — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 23:03:07 +0000

CJ’s problem, the orginal post concern, is EXACTLY the same as what I am going through. The replies at the start, and Evan’s answer, have made for amazing reading. Every post said something significant and valid, something for me to think about. However, I got a big confused as I read further on and felt that we began to stray a little off topic…
But the advice, observations and theories offered have been very, very useful. It’s made me look at my relationship from all angles, I’m very glad I found this site, thank you.

By: Don't want to say

Don't want to say — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 02:50:37 +0000

Wow. It was like I wrote this. Thank you so much for your answer. I have been crying over this for a long time. I now feel like I know how to think through this. God bless you!

By: Phil

Phil — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 06:43:26 +0000

Michele (#16) said:
“Your attraction to the 6 PM loose tie guy may/not alter over time, but I can assure you that a man in his early 30′s who is into the status quo is NOT going to change.”

This is an unfair assumption to make, especially with the current generation in that age bracket. As you mentioned, you are a baby boomer, so you can be forgiven for not realizing that, for better or worse, many of our generation, male and female alike, have extended the period of adolescence.
I dropped out of college at 23, and I am only now, at 32, getting my act together, after a decade-long decline in my fortunes. I’ve gone back to school, and I’m doing rather well. My success in the classes I am taking has boosted my confidence in other areas, so I’m also getting back into shape and reading more broadly.
I’ve always been a literate, cultured, adventurous guy, but for too many years I was satisfied with a bare-bones bohemian existence. My last relationship (she was an engineer!) was disastrous, precisely because my own dissatisfaction with my life was eating away at my self-esteem, and frankly, turning me into a bitter, boring slob.

But hey, like I said, things are looking up. It’s never to late to make something of yourself. I know one guy who became a successful computer programmer without ever having used a computer before the age of 40, and another who got his architect’s license at 50!

I’ve been so busy that I haven’t dated much in this first year of the rest of my life, but those women I have dated have been pleasant, succesful, and apparently more interested in my current road to success (as well as my many interesting experiences) than the often crooked paths and dead-ends of my not-too-distant past, which I haven’t felt the need to hide.

By: vino

vino — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 06:06:23 +0000

Ummm JG,

I didn’t say men were better communicators. Nor did I ‘write off’ women’s manner of communicating. That is your assumption, the words you seek to put into my mouth. I said:

“I also think that directness actually makes men in general far better communicators than given credit for.”

Don’t wish to argue, but it does appear as though you haven’t actually LISTENED to what I said.

Part of the problem, no?