Do you ever worry that you could be “let go” from your job as husband at any moment?
What would you do if that happened? What would you THINK?
Do you sometimes have an “employee” mindset in your relationship?
This is the main source of discomfort and insecurity for way too many men.
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If you look at the “position” of husband from the mindset of an employee you will adopt the bad behaviors of a man who feels like a second class citizen in his own home.
And THAT will destroy a marriage faster than anything else I can think of.
Let me give you an example of two men. Bill and Bob are electricians working in the same company.
Bill views himself as an employee – a man who is a common commodity. He feels like a man with very limited options.
These are the daily thoughts in Bill’s mind:
- My work will only be as good as how I feel I’m being treated…and no better.
- I’ll try only as hard as I feel my employer is trying.
- I feel insecure about my employment because I fear what my boss thinks about me.
- I get angry and unhappy every time I think they disrespect me or criticize me or my work.
- I hate Mondays. I LOVE Fridays. And I live for payday!
On the other hand, Bob views himself as an entrepreneur – a man of unequaled value. He feels like a man with many options.
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These are the daily thoughts in Bob’s mind:
- I will be the best electrician I can be.
- I make my growth and security a priority by becoming more valuable every day…no matter what my employer is doing.
- I’m secure in my value and employability because I know my value and I don’t worry about what others think about me. I can work anywhere.
- I’m a happy electrician because I choose to be…regardless of the opinion or actions of others.
- I’m grateful every day I wake up. Payday is something that results from me staying in my lane and being the best electrician possible.
Watch this video for a deeper look into this mindset and how it applies to you as a husband. Translation: “Payday = Sex” in this video.
I like using examples and metaphors and analogies like horses and mountain lions and hummingbirds.
Well, today’s metaphor is about looking at your marriage as a place of employment. This is a mistake a lot of guys make.
The title of the video above is “What if your wife fires you tomorrow?”
A lot of guys going through their entire life in relationship tend to look at the marriage as a place of employment, and your title is husband and with a place of employment called marriage. Then there has to be a boss, right? And you see her as your employer.
What happens when you go into this mode of trying to be the good employee and trying to keep everyone happy?
What problems do you encounter when you only give as much as you get back?
What if you’re the kind of employee who’s is always just waiting for Friday, always waiting for payday.
Sometimes I kid around with guys and say that “pay day” is Sunday morning from 9 to 9:15am – it’s that window of sexual opportunity – know what I mean??
You know what happens when you have that employee mindset for yourself when you’re thinking about your marriage, and this is kind of drudgery?
You hate Mondays, you look forward to Fridays, you live for payday, you give only as much as you get, you’re waiting to see how they’re treating you. And if they don’t treat you well, you’re not going to be a good employee. In fact, you’ll get away with anything you can get away with.
That’s how the employee mindset is sometimes and I’m asking you guys to think differently.
Think of your marriage, not as a place of employment, but it’s a place of business and you’re an entrepreneur. You’re an entrepreneur and you can be happy even if the owner isn’t happy.
Even if the owner isn’t in a good mood, or the owner of the business isn’t treating you the way you think you should be treated. Having an entrepreneurial spirit in your marriage means you’re going to be the best husband you can be anyway, to her or somebody else.
You can’t look at this as a prison where it’s your only place of employment and you have one employer you’re stuck with for the rest of your life. That puts you on the defensive. That puts you in an employee mindset where you only give as much as you get.
So an entrepreneurial mindset is not tied to the opinion of others. It’s not tied to the criticism of others, you don’t give a crap what they think about you and your value as an entrepreneur, or what they think about your mission.
You’re on this earth to be a good man, a good husband, a good father, and you’re going to do that according to the terms that you have defined for yourself as the entrepreneur called husband, called man.
So what I want you to get out from this article is the idea that, if you have been playing small in your relationship and in your life with an employee mindset – where you’re waiting for something to happen for somebody to treat you right, something to motivate you, or give you meaning. You’re taking the wrong approach.
You’re on your heels, waiting for something else to come into your life so that you can be happier.
Even if you’re in a job as an employee, taking the entrepreneurial mindset is a place of empowerment.
When you have an entrepreneurial mindset about your role as husband, It’s a place of encouragement where you have the agency to do things that you want to do on your terms.
That’s what I want you to take away with you today.
If you have been feeling small, feeling disrespected, feeling criticized.
If you feel like you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop in your relationship or that you just might get fired…
I want you to have an abundance mindset like a good entrepreneur.
Be the best man you can possibly be independently from the criticism, judgment and opinions of others.
Do it for you, because you know that job security which is for the rest of your life – your own security and happiness as a man – is directly tied to what you think of you, your value and your mission in this world.
Go forward from this moment with an entrepreneurial mindset.
You don’t need anybody to respect or like or be nice to you for you to be an effective entrepreneur of a man, of a father and a husband.
Bottom line: You have the choice of two frames of mind to live in.
1. The frame YOU create for yourself from your values, terms and boundaries.
2. Someone else’s frame.
If you are not operating in your chosen frame or don’t know what that frame is you will, by default, be operating in someone else’s frame.
I want to invite you to FIND YOUR OWN VALUES, TERMS AND BOUNDARIES with me.
It will be one of the most important and most defining moments in your life. This is the way one man in the community put it recently. Read it with his Scottish accent for fun.
“I have felt like a weight has been released off my shoulders….not lifted just released. It’s amasing really… gone are the stomach cramps, the anxiety feelings, hardly sleeping the anger and resentment towards my wife is reducing because of [this work]. I know there is plenty of work to do and I am up for the challenge. Even confidence at work has returned this past few days.”
A really simple way to get started immediately is to join me and my colleague Dan Dore, in the Goodguys2Greatmen Live Coaching Roundtable – it’s a powerful collection of men from around the world working together to transform themselves and their relationships.
Dan and I lead this community with 5 other professional coaches. We have live coaching video calls twice per month and the camaraderie in this group is something missing from the lives of too many men in the world.
Our online course How to Defuse the Divorce Bomb is a deep and intense dive into handling yourself when you hear, “I love you but I’m not in love with you anymore.” Tim Wade and I host monthly live Q&A calls with all the students in this course which includes many other bonuses as well. Find out more here.
We love teaching men these tools – how to be better, how to know who you are, what you stand for, what you want and how to CREATE it in your life through our Masculine Confidence coaching programs.
What if this next year everything changed for you?
That’s what we want for you brother.
My new book Straight Talk Tools for the Desperate Husband will help you to lead yourself and your relationship back to good health. Understand why your partner acts the way she does toward you and learn how to lead your life in the direction you want it to go. You CAN have the relationship you want, fulfilling all your desires while maintaining love and respect.
I wrote a free e-book to help men learn how to lose their fear and be more bold in their marriage to create the love and connection they want. Get The Hard to Swallow Truth About Saving Your Marriage.
