The conversation is actually about something completely different: whether you’re willing and able to emphasize the positive over the negative aspects of something for her sake, which is an essential skill in any relationship.
That is something the people do have actual conversations about, something that is, indeed, important to consider and a good reason to adopt the practice of emphasising positive things. However, it is not the kind of conversation that SaidAchmiz was talking about unless you read it extremely uncharitably.
There is a rather distinct and obvious difference between emphasizing the positive aspects of something and emphasizing something that does not exist. In fact, choosing to emphasize something to exists entails outright failing to emphasize a positive aspect of the the thing in question. Sometimes that is necessary to do, but doing so does not constitute a converstation of the type you describe.
You’re right, I made some assumptions that probably don’t apply to SaidAchmiz, and I realize my comment comes off poorly. I apologize. I was trying to refer to the situation from the OP, but found it difficult to write about without using a hypothetical “you” and I’m not entirely satisfied with the result.
What I was trying to get across is that this kind of situation can be complex and that the girlfriend in the scenario can have legitimate emotional justification for behaving this way. I agree that wishing you’d lied is a bad situation to be in. I agree that the OP’s story is not a very good mode of interaction even if handled the way Sam Harris would. I agree that people should be able to have explicit conversations about emphasizing positives rather than veiled ones (which I was trying to get at when I said the conversation was “actually” about that).
I don’t mean to imply that SaidAchmiz wants to feel completely free to say anything regardless of consequences. I’m trying to say that I have felt that tendency myself and have unintentionally taken advantage of a “we should be able to say anything to each other” policy as an excuse not to think about the effects of my speech.
Hopefully this is clearer. I’m only trying to relay what I’ve learned from my experiences, but maybe I’ve failed at that.
That is something the people do have actual conversations about, something that is, indeed, important to consider and a good reason to adopt the practice of emphasising positive things. However, it is not the kind of conversation that SaidAchmiz was talking about unless you read it extremely uncharitably.
There is a rather distinct and obvious difference between emphasizing the positive aspects of something and emphasizing something that does not exist. In fact, choosing to emphasize something to exists entails outright failing to emphasize a positive aspect of the the thing in question. Sometimes that is necessary to do, but doing so does not constitute a converstation of the type you describe.
Your reply has distinct “straw man” tendencies.
You’re right, I made some assumptions that probably don’t apply to SaidAchmiz, and I realize my comment comes off poorly. I apologize. I was trying to refer to the situation from the OP, but found it difficult to write about without using a hypothetical “you” and I’m not entirely satisfied with the result.
What I was trying to get across is that this kind of situation can be complex and that the girlfriend in the scenario can have legitimate emotional justification for behaving this way. I agree that wishing you’d lied is a bad situation to be in. I agree that the OP’s story is not a very good mode of interaction even if handled the way Sam Harris would. I agree that people should be able to have explicit conversations about emphasizing positives rather than veiled ones (which I was trying to get at when I said the conversation was “actually” about that).
I don’t mean to imply that SaidAchmiz wants to feel completely free to say anything regardless of consequences. I’m trying to say that I have felt that tendency myself and have unintentionally taken advantage of a “we should be able to say anything to each other” policy as an excuse not to think about the effects of my speech.
Hopefully this is clearer. I’m only trying to relay what I’ve learned from my experiences, but maybe I’ve failed at that.