The Powerless Principle

Posted by fxckfeelings on July 7, 2011

Obviously, emotions are a powerful motivator, but they aren’t responsible for bad decisions—they just provide the fuel that your stupid idea needs to take flight. Ultimately, love can only make you a fool, and fear can only stymie you, if you allow them to. Don’t try to figure out why you’ve lost control, just admit you can and need to get it back. Stay dedicated to the idea that control is possible, if you’re prepared to take a position and stick with it before you crash and burn.
–Dr. Lastname

I struggle not to fall for any man who isn’t already involved with a woman. Dating, engaged, married, I don’t care, so long as they’ve got someone who’s done the groundwork and has given them the tick of approval. I’m refusing to buy into the fact that there are no eligible men left in my city, but I need to know why it is I’m so sadistically falling for men I just can’t have.

The idea that we are all powerless to control love isn’t so much a romantic notion as it is an excuse. Obviously, we’re not all powerless to control hate, because the body count would be unreal (although it would make the competition on most reality shows more interesting).

In other words, just because you fall for someone doesn’t mean you should select them, or that falling needs to precede the selection process. You have control over your emotions, not vice versa.

The average guy tends to fall for girls for such crucial characteristics as big tits and/or advanced flattery skills, but it usually doesn’t take too many mistakes before the big-busted, complimentary façade fades and he learns to stop touching the proverbial hot stove.

Some guys, like Clinton, Kennedy, or even Weiner, have the power to touch the stove as often as they like and avoid getting burned (or so they think). In reality, their risks are high, and while they have the political intelligence to calculate those risks to the fifth decimal place, the intoxication of sexual adventure turns them into idiots.

As such, asking why you’re attracted to pre-attached guys is about as dangerous as asking why you love Martinis; it allows you to study and indulge your predilection until you find an answer that will make it easy to stop, which won’t happen, and in the meantime, all your research is just fodder for rehab.

Accept the fact that the answer will never come or, if it does, it will change nothing, and it will never be easy to stop. The question then isn’t why you do it, but if you want to stop doing it, period.

Put aside your feelings and consider the pros and cons of getting involved with pre-involved guys. If they’re strongly attached and you pull them away, you’ve proven they’re weak and can’t be trusted, which means you’ve won the heart of a loser, a sad prize as prizes go. I assume, when you use the word “sadistic,” you mean you’re being mean to yourself, and I agree.

The alternative is to accept the fact that a good man, and a good match, are had to find, regardless of how easily you attract or are attracted to people. If you accept that fact, you’ll become much more skilled at avoiding relationships that go nowhere while you remain available for that rare, eligible candidate. Remember, catching the fish you want takes patience, and the main reason for failure is being distracted by the wrong fish.

Accept that finding a real partner requires patience and discipline; it’s better to find someone truly worthy than give in to the powerful pull of someone who makes you fall both for them and flat on your face.

STATEMENT:
“It’s discouragingly hard to find a possible partner who is available, reliable, and interesting, but that’s what I’m after because the alternative simply doesn’t work. Wasting time with the wrong person is the best way to ensure I won’t be available when a genuine opportunity comes along.”

I wish I could be more assertive about my design fees when clients realize that they can’t afford all the landscaping ideas they were dreaming of and decide to cut their plans in half. That’s the point when they expect me to down-size my design without its costing them more money. Unfortunately, that’s never easy to do, and it takes lots of time that wasn’t budgeted into my original estimate. There are always major elements I have to re-design from scratch and, by the time I’m finished, I’ve lost my potential profit unless I get clients to pay for the additional time. I wish I could get myself to be more aggressive and ask for the money, but then I’m also worried they’d just say no to the added costs and stop the project. My goal is to be a better salesman.

There are several professions, from taxi driving to psychiatry, where the rules are best laid out up front, e.g., the flat rate to the airport or the requirement that appointments must be cancelled with at least 24 hours notice (which the ADHD patients never seem to fully grasp). Your profession is no different.

Don’t persuade yourself that you need to be a better persuader; sadly, you’ll probably never become a great salesman and explaining the cost of a project will never be easy. On the other hand, if you develop a system of charging for your services that you believe is fair and ethical, you can probably shape your clients’ expectations from the beginning, and salesmanship becomes unnecessary. After all, reasonable requests are rarely a hard sell.

Ask yourself why you think it’s right to charge more for a project at a time when your clients are feeling frustrated by the realization that they don’t have enough money. The answer, of course, is that you’re not responsible for their unrealistic expectations and you deserve to be paid for your time.

Now, instead of apologizing, gently assert, before beginning a project, that your clients are responsible for their choices while emphasizing your ability to create a cost-efficient design. Remind them that, to use you most cost-effectively, they must be realistic about what they can afford before you commit their dreams to paper.

That’s because, if they are not realistic before you do your first design, and the cost of the final project is either much more or much less than what was initially proposed, your design time doubles and so do your costs and their fees.

Take courage from stating what you think is fair. Then incorporate your standards into your procedures. If anyone should apologize in this scenario, it shouldn’t be you for wanting to get paid to do your job.

STATEMENT:
“I’d like to persuade my clients that I can satisfy their dreams, but it makes more sense to let them know that I can give them more dream for their buck if and only if we squeeze those dreams into an affordable budget before we go to the drawing board.”