I got my hair cut last night at my favorite hair salon, the one where all the stylists are quirky over-30s with piercings and a vast knowledge of the latest celeb and local gossip. As the stylist blowdried my hair with practiced flips of the brush, she told me about a woman who had come in earlier to accompany her teenage daughter for a haircut. The stylist had asked the daughter, "What sort of style would you like?" The daughter wouldn't even look up. Her shoulders were hunched. She mumbled, "Dunno." The stylist was surprised; usually, teenagers have a very clear idea of what they want. There was an awkward silence, which the mother quickly filled. "She'll have her hair like this and like this."
The stylist shook her head as she was telling the story. "The mother was a control freak," she said. "She kept telling me how to cut the girl's hair as I was cutting it. 'I'm a professional,' I told her. 'I've been doing this for 20 years. I wouldn't presume to tell you how to do your job, so please trust me.'
"She's not the only one like that. Another woman came in with her husband. They were both getting haircuts. She told the stylist exactly how she wanted his hair cut. She wanted it like Hugh Grant. Then her husband went off with one stylist, and I started doing her hair. Once her husband was out of earshot, he told the stylist, 'I really don't want it like that.' So they compromised with a softer cut. When the wife saw it, she was furious. She raised a huge fit. 'I didn't ask for it to be like that!' 'No,' the stylist said, 'but he did.'"
I shook my head. "So sad. But it's so common, partners needing to be in control."
The stylist continued. "I was just thinking, 'So what if he wants a different haircut? You married him for better or worse, right? How is his haircut going to harm you, especially if it makes him feel good?' Women like that end up trying to control everything. Someday he's going to have enough of it. Five, ten, fifteen years down the road he's going to say, 'Hold on a minute. What's happened to my life? You're trying to turn me into you. I'm out of here.'"
I added, "It's that need to change a man. The fixer-upper attitude."
"Exactly. And when she can't turn him into the man she wants, she acts like he has let her down. He gets sick of her nagging and goes off to find someone who appreciates him for who he is."
It was a fantastic conversation for the price of a haircut. In a hair salon, stylists see a cross-section of the world come and go every day. They listen to the woes and tribulations of their clients. Much like bartenders, they get an inside peek at people's lives that few professions have access to. They see patterns that we can't see, because we're so immersed in the particular details of our own lives.
The stylist had hit on a very important concept. Women who are used to being in control of their lives often feel as if they're helping their partners by "guiding" or "directing" them. It can be quite scary to let go and allow their partners to make choices without offering any input or advice.
Beneath a person's need for control is the fear that everything will turn into a mess unless he or she is directly involved. It is a simple equation.
Fear = Need to control = Lack of trust
And, as we all know, lack of trust in one's partner is poison for a relationship.
Men, in particular, find their wives' direct or indirect attempts to shape them stifling. To marry, most men have to overcome a natural distaste for giving up independence and being accountable to someone. When a wife begins to mother him and tell him what he needs to do for his own good, he begins to feel that she's questioning him. He was good enough for her when they were courting; why isn't he good enough for her now?
One lesson that we can all learn is to let go of our need to control every aspect of our lives. Let go and allow life to happen. Don't give in to your fear of not knowing what's going to happen. Enjoy the unpredictable nature of life and laugh when things don't turn out as you expect. Learn to accept and love your partner as he is, even when his preferences and opinions are nothing like your own.
Best of all, when you let your partner be himself, make his own decisions without "helpful" suggestions from you, and choose options that you would never have considered, you get the wonderful benefit of a relationship that is surprising, spontaneous, and much more interesting than one controlled down to the dot on every 'i.' You discover that you're not in a relationship with yourself; you're in a relationship with another human being whose internal world is vastly different from your own, and equally valid. Because you no longer fear that he'll make the wrong decision, you will be able to relax and trust him in a way that you may have never been able to before.
Love and let go.