Relationships #3: The Downside of 150%

Time to read: 1 minute and a few seconds

Today might be a little uncomfortable. Stay with me because it's territory I know well.

Overperformance!

My favorite.

Here's the uncomfortable flip side of the 100/100 rule: sometimes the imbalance isn't about someone else giving too little. It's about you giving too much.

Just because you over-perform doesn't mean other people have to step up and give 150% too.

You tell yourself lots of stories about your over-performance. It's care, or responsibility, or just "how I am." You're the one who remembers the details, smooths things over, makes sure nothing falls through the cracks. It's easy to wear that as an identity without noticing you've quietly set the bar at 150% and started measuring yourself and everyone else against it.

The problem is, 150% is exhausting you and isn't a standard other people agreed to. So when someone shows up at an honest 100%, it can feel like they're falling short, even though, by the actual rule, they're doing exactly their part. Or you're doing all the things and falling in bed cross-eyed at night.

Over-performing has many reasons: discomfort with asking for what you need, wrapping your worth in your work (that's me), or maybe it's just habit, built up over years of doing it all.

If you're constantly the one organizing, inviting, initiating — before asking why won't they meet me here,"" it's worth asking a more uncomfortable question first: am I operating at 100%, or have I quietly made 150% my baseline, and now I'm tired and resentful that no one else is matching a number I set for myself?

Maybe it's time to pull yourself back to 100%. For your sake and for your relationships.

If you have friends and colleagues who would like to spend a few weeks learning about how to create healthy, functional relationships, they can sign up for this newsletter here.

Enjoy the food for thought!

Relationships #2: 100% Is a Moving

Time to read: 1.3 minutes

Last time we talked about the 100/100 rule — you give your 100%, and so does the other person. Simple in theory. But there's a catch: 100% isn't a constant number.

100% effort fluctuates depending on how you feel and what's happening in life. When you are sick, 100% looks different. If you're super tired, your 100% will be less than when you are rested.

Think about it in practice. The friend who's usually the first to text back might go quiet for a week because they're drowning at work. The partner who normally initiates plans might not have it in them the month after a parent's diagnosis. Their 100% just shrank. It didn't disappear, and it isn't a downgrade of how much they care.

That's not you slacking, and it's not the other person slacking either when their 100% dips. The rule was never"always perform at your peak." The rule is: "show up honestly with what you actually have."

The tricky part is telling the difference between someone's 100% shrinking for a real reason and someone quietly settling into a smaller, permanent version of it. One is a season. The other is a pattern. It's worth paying attention to which one you're actually looking at before you decide whether to extend patience or ask for more.

Next week we'll talk about over-performing in relationships. I don't know anything about that. :-)

If you have friends and colleagues who would like to spend a few weeks learning about how to create healthy, functional relationships, they can sign up for this newsletter here.

Relationships #1: How Much Effort Should You Put In?

Time to read: 25 seconds

More vintage jewelry cuz, why not?!

See if any of these scenarios feel familiar:

• You are organizing all the plans for the holidays and resent that it's all on you.
• You are always the one inviting people to do things.
• You feel like you always push for the important conversation, the deep topics.

Maybe it's something else entirely. You're the one who remembers birthdays, who checks in after a hard week, who keeps the group chat alive. Whatever the specifics, the shape is the same.

All of these situations feel unbalanced. You feel like you are putting in all the effort. It's no fun when a relationship feels out of balance — and over time, that imbalance curdles into something quiet and toxic: resentment. Not the loud kind. The kind that shows up as a sigh when you're texting to make plans, again. This isn't a recipe for the connection you want.

So, how much effort should you put in?

Here's the simple answer: 100%.

You put in 100% of yourself and your effort. No more. No less. 100% is not 150% for all you over-performers out there. (Just making sure you got it!)

The expectation is that your friends, partners, and colleagues also put in their 100%. Not carrying you. Not being carried. Just two people, each bringing their full, honest share to the table.

That's the standard. It sounds obvious once you say it out loud — and yet most of the relationships that feel unbalanced are ones where nobody ever actually agreed to that standard. They just drifted into a pattern, and one person kept absorbing the gap.

This week, notice one place where you're filling a gap that isn't yours to fill. We'll keep talking about what to do!

If you have friends and colleagues who would like to spend a few weeks learning about how to create healthy, functional relationships, they can sign up for this newsletter here.

Week 8: Be The Antidote To Cynicism

Time to read: 1 minute!

Uranium Glass!

Somewhere along the way, being kind got branded as soft, like you have your head in the sand or aren't being "realistic."

I think it's the opposite. Choosing kindness in a hard world isn't naive; it's a deliberate act, made with full knowledge of how people can behave. Being kind is harder than cynicism, not easier.

Cynicism is the low-effort choice. You get to point at what's wrong and stop. Kindness requires you to show up decently even when you have evidence that decency isn't guaranteed back. That takes more strength, not less. It requires thought, intention, and self-management not to shoot back with the mean but witty thing in your head.

When you're decent, you're not being a doormat or pretending bad behavior doesn't have consequences. You can hold boundaries and still choose to be the person who doesn't add cruelty to a day that already has enough of it.

The world doesn't need more people who can point out the problem. It needs more people willing to be the counterexample. And that's YOU. (and me)