A few days ago, Madison came home from work, finding me munching on a delicious burger.

She was hungry, she’d just worked a long day, and her first question was, “What’d you get for me?”

A great assumption: that I would have considered my partner before I bought dinner.

Sadly, also a wrong assumption.

Because I was only looking out for myself.

So when Madison sat down next to me and said, “I think we can be more of a team when it comes to food and meals,” it hit home. I realized that she was on the receiving end of me pretending I’m a solo act.

In fact, I get this reminder pretty often.

Do you ever hear:

“You take care of your needs so well it’s hard to find a way in.” “You seem really self-reliant.” “You don’t ask for help very often.”

If you said yes, maybe one of your strategies for life is self-reliance.

Likely at one time you needed to not rely on others, for good reason.

Self-reliance seems positive, yet being a ‘lone-wolf’ actively keeps us invulnerable, bubbled off from our partner.

If you’ve learned to be self-reliant, to try this recipe:

1. Find a partner who is worthy of relying on. With a relationship that’s a safe zone for meeting each other’s needs, they’ll naturally begin to call out your self-reliance.

2. Give it a try: lean into relying on your partner. Be vulnerable, and ask for help.

3. And when resistance comes up (oh boy it will), get curious … there’s an important memory, a root cause, that can help the pattern heal. (Therapy is good here.)

4. Feeling the resistance, practice through it. Practice relying on your partner even if instincts are saying no. Ask for help.

Receiving the support and closeness we deserve is a vulnerable practice! Yet it cultivates deeper care for the needs of our partner. We pop the ‘lone-wolf bubble’.

Madison called me out for being a lone wolf, and when I admitted I was keeping myself in a bubble, only caring for myself, it got easier to bring my care to the relationship.

Are there areas in your relationship where you pretend you’re a solo act? Where you could rely on your partner or show your care but feel walled off?