“I’d Rather Pay My Own Bills Than Be With a Man Who Can’t”
I saw this quote and it resonated.
Some people say social media has made men and women more divided, and that it’s a problem. I’d say something different: it’s helped women raise their standards. And for the men that discomfort brings up, that discomfort is usually doing exactly what it should — shedding light on weaknesses and flaws they’d rather not look at.
Men who feel threatened by personal growth, rather than valuing it, often become controlling instead of levelling up. It’s easier to control a partner than to face what her growth is asking of you.
We’re still not far from the 1960s, and there’s a long transitional period ahead before men, as a whole, become the awakened partners healthy relationships actually require. In the meantime, social media has made women more informed about the common issues they face in relationships. It’s raised awareness, created a sense of not being alone, and invited women to raise their standards and protect themselves from the emotional turbulence that comes with low-quality relationships.
My Values Aren’t 50/50
Some of you want a 50/50 relationship, and that’s valid. My values are different.
I believe financial independence matters. It protects women from relationships built on power and control.
Some of you want a 50/50 relationship, and that’s valid. My values are different.
I believe financial independence matters. It protects women from relationships built on power and control. A man’s financial independence matters too — but I’d take the whole idea of 50/50 further than that. Relationships themselves were never meant to run on an even split.
Relationships aren’t 50/50. Hormones aren’t 50/50. Feeling safe isn’t 50/50. Childbirth isn’t 50/50. PMS isn’t 50/50. Experiencing harassment isn’t 50/50. Walking home alone at night isn’t 50/50. Getting back into work after having children, or after leaving domestic abuse, isn’t 50/50 either.
Social media has empowered women to hold higher standards, so they stop staying in relationships that don’t meet them. I’ve always sought a partner who is emotionally intelligent, available, and genuinely invested in growing a healthy relationship, one built on effort, commitment, investment, and respect for my autonomy and my personal growth.
Social media has empowered women to hold higher standards, so they stop staying in relationships that don’t meet them.
If He Can’t Do the Small Things, He Can’t Do the Big Things
When a man isn’t financially stable, it often points to something underneath: a lack of emotional readiness for a relationship. He can’t take you out to dinner to make you feel valued. And if he can’t manage the small things, like making a dinner reservation, he very often can’t manage the big things either, like picking you up and driving you home when you’re having health issues.
A Relationship Is a Responsibility
A man needs to be emotionally responsible for a woman. A man has a responsibility when he is in a relationship, and a man who doesn’t want that responsibility lacks relational readiness, emotional maturity and has unaddressed issues he needs to work through in therapy. It’s a man who still wants his mother’s help.
His biggest focus is protecting the emotional health of his partner, which involves consistent communication, effort such as making reservations, and having the financial stability to do that.
How to Stop Attracting Partners Who Make You Feel Anxious or Unsupported
The key is developing relational discernment about someone’s capacity, chemistry, compatibility and character. Are they someone who is financially stable? Do they take responsibility? Are there risks? Do they have unaddressed mental health challenges?
Hurt people hurt people, and if they have unaddressed issues, this increases the risk of this not being a compatible partner you can build a life with. The question isn’t whether he has struggles. Everyone does. The question is whether he’s doing the work on them. You can be honest with yourself and ask: Am I attracted to the potential of someone?
What is the evidence this is a partner who can take on the responsibility of a partner and build a family?
What is the evidence that this person can meet my emotional needs?
If you resonate with these values in relationship, where you want your own financial independence and a partner who is also financially independent and can take responsibility for a mature relationship, then you may be a good fit for working with me in my coaching container.
What Happens With Inner Child Healing
In inner child healing we heal the part that feels anxious or abandoned, so you can create internal resolution and stop seeking partners for this resolution.
We don’t meet these parts by judgment, blame or analysing. Instead we meet them with love, openness and compassion, and create mental clarity for you to find your inner power and space to integrate capacities that create the relationships you want in your life, such as relational discernment, self trust, assertiveness, secure independence, self-prioritisation.
The nervous system doesn’t know the difference between the anxiety of a triggered inner child and the anxiety of genuine incompatibility, so until this part is healed you will keep mistaking chaos for chemistry.
Healing this part isn’t about becoming hard or guarded. It’s about no longer needing a man to complete a sense of safety you can give yourself. When the inner child is healed, you stop chasing potential, stop over explaining your worth, stop shrinking to keep the peace.
Capacities to Raise the Quality of Your Relationships
Inner child healing helps you to come back to the present.
When you heal your inner child, you stop looking to relationships to resolve what happened in your past. You take your power back and create that resolution from within, instead of seeking resolution with unhealthy partners. This is what keeps you grounded in the present instead of reacting from old wounds.
It creates the space and mental clarity you need to integrate the capacities that actually build good relationships, ones with high effort, emotional readiness, confidence and stability, without ever having to sacrifice chemistry.
These are the capacities, we can integrate emotionally, so you can rise into the woman who is supported, valued and cherished in relationship.
Self-prioritisation. Putting your needs, your peace and your standards at the centre of your own life, not as an afterthought to his. Put yourself first physically, emotionally and spiritually.
Taking it slow. Taking it slow and giving yourself in very small doses to observe patterns, boundary intelligence, relational literacy and assess evidence of consistency, high-effort, responsibility, communication, emotional regulation and relational repair etc., Taking physical intimacy slowly to prevent premature attachment and only escalate the relationship with intimacy once compatibility is established.
Relational discernment. Reading someone’s capacity, chemistry, compatibility and character clearly, before you hand over your time, your trust and escalate the relationship with more time, energy and commitment.
Receiving. Letting effort, love and care land instead of deflecting it, earning it, or immediately looking for a way to repay it. Many women are only fluent in giving. Receiving is its own capacity, and it’s often the one that needs the most rebuilding. Do less and receive more to attract better quality men.
Being the diva in the relationship, not him. You are the one who gets pursued, chosen and prioritised. The relationship centres your needs and your comfort, not his routines or readiness. Selective energy is attractive because it’s rare, and because it comes from a woman who already knows her own worth.
Patterns to Let Go Of
Growth here is about doing less, not more, and give a man the space to meet you, rather than shrinking or overextending to meet him. That means releasing:
- Accepting low effort
- Validating men and being their unpaid emotional support coach or therapist
- Over-loyalty to people who haven’t earned your trust
- Social isolation for the sake of a relationship
- Fawning
- Over-giving
- Settling
- Fixing him
You’re not here to manage a man’s growth for him. You’re here to build a life, and a relationship, that meets you where you already are and makes you feel more confident.
If he can’t rise to your standards and values, then we work on detachment, we let go of over-loyalty and we redirect your energy and focus to yourself or something else.
Start working with me
If you saw yourself in this and you’re ready to build real standards, boundaries, and discernment, I work with women 1:1 on exactly this. Comment RISE below and I’ll reach out with next steps.