Who is the boss or boss of a couple relationship?

Traditionally, the Couple relationships they have tended to reproduce a class of affective ties in which there are two well-differentiated roles: the person who commands and the one who obeys. This phenomenon has been questioned recently with the rise of egalitarianism, but its effects continue to be felt in the small details of our love and intimate lives: Even today, it is common for there to be bosses and bosses within relationships.

There are several factors that explain why, if we carefully observe our relationship as a couple, we will most likely see that we are prone to adopting the leader role or from an obedient party without attending to reasonable criteria.

More than just different personalities

That in couples there are bosses and bosses can be seen relatively easily when realizing that it is very frequent that one of the members of the relationship cares more about pleasing the other, apologizes more often and with more emphasis, and always accepts the decisions that the other makes other.

It may seem that this is simply a sign that In couples there are always certain personality differences, but the truth is that there are more factors that influence this and that make, to a greater or lesser extent, many people embrace the roles of bosses and vassals.

Who wears the pants in the relationship?

The dynamic of domination in which a person makes the decisions, assumes great risks and rules over her partner in something that has been closely related to the role of the man as leader of the family. Not surprisingly, in various Spanish-speaking areas, it is common to ask who wears the pants in your relationship?, serving this resource based on metonymy to snoop on who is the person who plays "man" in the couple.

At least within the domestic sphere, there are still good reasons to believe that women tend to be subject to obligations that men do not accept. they don't understand: you only have to review the studies carried out on practically any country and that explore the weekly hours that both sexes dedicate to carrying out tasks domestic. The female sex gains overwhelmingly in the time dedicated to household chores, on many occasions complementing these with what men had been doing: work outside the home and higher education.

Therefore, heterosexual couple relationships in which both people live together continue to being leaning towards masculine leadership in regards to maintaining the conditions of life. Women continue to do most of the work at home and, on many occasions, also develop professional careers outside of it. However, the boss or boss of a relationship is in several aspects that go beyond the housework and the collective influence of culture. We must also take into account what each and every one of us has been learning individually.

The comfort of the role of boss and obedient party

If we start to think about the concepts "boss" and "obedient party" as something abstract, it is very likely that we will conclude that being the first is preferable to being the second. After all leadership is related to the ideas of freedom, autonomy and power, while obedience transmits the opposite sensations.

However, in practice it is not difficult to put yourself in the shoes of people who prefer to assume the role of those who obey. Giving up the boss role means not having to worry as much about the future, living in less unpredictable situations and not making complicated decisions. This is, in part, what explains why there are so many relationships in which there is a clear boss or leader: the other party has come to internalize the idea that adopting a passive and obedient role is in their interest or is "normal". You have learned it from previous experiences.

In this way, if the fact of taking the initiative and leading teams (formal or informal) of people has left us with good feelings on most occasions, this will also have an effect on our relationships couple. The same happens in those cases in which, even unconsciously, we have learned that it is best to do what is asked of us. Courtships and marriages are not a world apart from those in which we learn to relate to all people in general.

A lace in real time

Of course, in the appearance of the role of the boss in relationships, it is not only the culture that matters and whether we live more or less anchored in our past experiences. Also the way in which we share time and space with the other person is decisive, the way in which our personalities fit together in real time depending on the situations we usually experience together and the context we share.

Thus, a proactive person with a good level of self-esteem You could be displaced towards the role of the obedient party if your partner is a person who is not especially determined but with a much higher socioeconomic level.

Various leaderships for various situations

In addition, it is also frequent that one of the members of the couple is the boss or the boss in very specific contexts, but not in others. Sometimes this is so for well-established and to some extent rational reasons; For example, the man can be the boss when it comes to maintaining the garden of the house because he knows more about that subject. However, it is the rest of the leaders, who cannot be justified based on values ​​such as equality, who put the balance in the relationship at risk.

Some of these cases of unwarranted bosses may be reinforced by tradition and culture; such as the old custom that a man should pay a woman for dinner. But the other cases of leadership that is not reasoned or based on community customs may simply be a symptom that the relationship is based on a false symmetry: in it, there is someone who unjustifiably believes that they have a greater value than the other person, with whom they adopt an authoritative and paternalistic attitude.

Avoiding extra leads

Although the boss or boss believes that this role corresponds to him by default and that this is part of normality, the truth is that this relationship dynamic daily and affective relationships is not based on anything that is not simply the idea that oneself deserves to be the one in charge and the one who decides for the other person.

Avoiding the appearance of these leaderships based on small-scale authoritarianism is essential. to ensure that the two people involved in the couple's project can give and receive equally.