The Debt of Being Understanding

Being understanding is usually a good thing. Someone disappoints you, and you start thinking about why they did it. You explain it away: they’re under pressure, they had a difficult childhood, or they struggle to communicate. Those explanations may be valid, but they still don’t answer whether you want to keep living with the consequences of their behaviour. You can understand why someone behaves the way they do and still decide that the effect on you has become too costly. Their history may explain the behaviour without making it something you have to keep accepting. The difficulty begins when you start to understand their behaviour and determine what you allow from them. You become so focused on explaining why they behave that way that you stop asking whether the relationship still works for you. Eventually, the explanation becomes a reason to keep tolerating the behaviour. Psychological flexibility offers a useful way to think about this. It involves acting according to what matters rather than letting difficult feelings dictate your choices. In this case, that means letting your understanding inform the decision without allowing it to make the decision for you. Understanding can help you make a better decision. It can also give you a reason to postpone one. You keep finding another reason to wait because every explanation makes the situation feel more manageable. Understanding someone can explain why you stay after you’ve decided you should leave. What to do instead when you catch yourself explaining someone’s behaviour, ask: “If I understood this behaviour perfectly, would I still choose this relationship?” Your answer tells you whether your understanding is helping you decide or helping you delay.