If we can’t be ourselves in our relationships, we’re not really compatible.
KEY POINTS
- Personal authenticity starts with accepting oneself, including one’s sexuality and needs, as they are.
- Giving up a core part of oneself to save a relationship essentially destroys what one is trying to save.
- Acting in any way other than one’s authentic self in a relationship is unsustainable.
Virtually 100 percent of people—at some time in their attempts to make love work—will compromise their best thinking and some core values to avoid getting dumped, to try to make their marriage work, or to keep the good stuff (ahem) available. This sounds like a good plan, right? But I’m here to tell you this doesn’t work, at least not in the sense of making sure love has a chance to endure.
Hold on to Who You Are
Yes, you may stay married or together longer if you stop doing something your mate abhors, and that might be a good idea for them, and you, if it’s something like smoking or drinking too much. But that’s not what I’m addressing when I suggest staying true to yourself. Instead, I’m talking about giving up your preferred career, your friends, or some essential part of what makes you who you are.
Be Your Authentic Self
Personal authenticity starts with accepting ourselves, our sexuality, and our needs as they are. And that is a part of being true to ourselves. If you give up a core part of who you are to save the relationship, you have essentially destroyed what you were trying to save because your real self is not even there.
Related: Why Most Relationships Fail
The Truth About Relationships
A relationship is only real, only sustainable, when the two adults in it are authentically themselves. Imagine if we are pretending to be someone we’re not: How is that supposed to work out over a lifetime? Acting any way other than yourself is simply an unsustainable band-aid to a compatibility problem. If we can’t be ourselves in the relationship, we’re not really compatible, and we’re simply not capable of loving one another as we are.
Don’t Please Someone Into Liking You
Resolve to ignore the foolish tendency to please someone into liking you. There is no way you can make someone like you because there is no way we can control the feelings of another. Some of you might be thinking, Maybe…but you can at least influence them, can’t you? No, you can’t, and I can prove it to you.
Consider a Thought Experiment
Remember the last time you hated someone; now imagine being guilt-tripped into forgiving that someone. Can you make yourself stop hating them and love them? For the majority of us, the answer is, “No, of course not, that’s not how feelings work.” Think about it: If you can’t control your own feelings, how can you ever hope to control the feelings of another? That’s right, you can’t, so stop trying.
The Right People Will Show Up
Instead of convincing your partner to like you, stay true to yourself. Believe it or not, there is someone out there who will like you for you. Imagine, for a moment, this someone is a bus, and you’re waiting at the bus stop. You keep seeing Bus #2 and Bus #5, but you’re looking for Bus #1. It’s frustrating and time-consuming, but you must wait because all those other buses are headed for a destination other than the one you want. So it’s best to wait for Bus #1 because it (rather, your future partner) will be worth the wait. After all, you are.
Jeff Thomas
Publisher • Opinion Columnist • Licensed General Contractor • Real Estate Appraiser • New Orleans
Jeff Thomas is the publisher of Black Source Media and one of New Orleans’ most direct voices on civic affairs, economic justice, and Louisiana politics. He writes from the intersection of experience and accountability — as a licensed general contractor,a tech company founder and executive with over 30 years experience, and a businessman who has worked across the city’s civic, media, and construction ecosystems for decades.
His Sunday column covers Louisiana legislative politics, insurance discrimination, housing policy, and the forces shaping Black community life in New Orleans and across the state. Thomas writes in the tradition of Black journalists who hold power accountable without apology — building arguments from data, delivering verdicts from evidence, and speaking to Black New Orleans with the directness the moment demands.
He is also the principal of EA Inspection Services, LLC, a government inspection services company. Black Source Media is his platform for the civic conversation New Orleans has needed and too rarely had.
Selected Articles by Jeff Thomas
Black Neighborhoods Pay the Highest Insurance Rates in Louisiana. Here’s What They Don’t Want You to Know.
They Didn’t Yell the N-Word. They Went to Law School, Bided Their Time, and Rewrote the Constitution Instead.
Vappie vs. Morrell: Why Does Justice Look Different in New Orleans?
The State Has the Money. New Orleans East Just Needs Them to Use It.
The Failure of Mitch Landrieu
Publisher — Black Source Media
Jeff Thomas
Publisher • Opinion Columnist • Licensed General Contractor • Real Estate Appraiser • New Orleans
Jeff Thomas is the publisher of Black Source Media and one of New Orleans’ most direct voices on civic affairs, economic justice, and Louisiana politics. He writes from the intersection of experience and accountability — as a licensed general contractor,a tech company founder and executive with over 30 years experience, and a businessman who has worked across the city’s civic, media, and construction ecosystems for decades.
His Sunday column covers Louisiana legislative politics, insurance discrimination, housing policy, and the forces shaping Black community life in New Orleans and across the state. Thomas writes in the tradition of Black journalists who hold power accountable without apology — building arguments from data, delivering verdicts from evidence, and speaking to Black New Orleans with the directness the moment demands.
He is also the principal of EA Inspection Services, LLC, a government inspection services company. Black Source Media is his platform for the civic conversation New Orleans has needed and too rarely had.
Selected Articles by Jeff Thomas
Black Neighborhoods Pay the Highest Insurance Rates in Louisiana. Here’s What They Don’t Want You to Know.
They Didn’t Yell the N-Word. They Went to Law School, Bided Their Time, and Rewrote the Constitution Instead.
Vappie vs. Morrell: Why Does Justice Look Different in New Orleans?
The State Has the Money. New Orleans East Just Needs Them to Use It.
The Failure of Mitch Landrieu