Helpful Partner or Nag?

Here is something I have been giving a lot of thought to recently. Is it good or helpful to remind your partner about goals they have made or things they want to accomplish when they seem to have fallen off track? Is it good to be 100% supportive 100% of the time when that means allowing them to get side tracked with life instead of attending to their goals?

Further...

What is a "good" wife's/husband's/partner's responsibility in holding the other accountable?

Let's run through a couple of past situations first while considering the possibilities.

Partner is depressed and sleeps on the couch all day long...indulging his own self created hell of a life.

My response?

Give him space. Give him lots of time alone. No nagging about what I would like to do or what I would like him to do. No rules imposed on his behavior or what I will/will not tolerate. No expectations....surely he'll just find his way out on his own.

Outcome of this particular situation?

I went crazy. I lost hope. Partnership dissolved.

I think I played my cards wrong. I'm not sure that a good partner permits that sort of behavior over an extended period of time (everyone has their blue days...but years??) Not nagging and leaving him to do his own thing, and permitting him to wallow long term in his own despair was probably far more damaging to us both.

Maybe love involves getting in the face of the people we love once in a while and confronting them.

Ahhhh....hindsight is killer eh?

Scenario number two.

Partner NEEDS to go to graduate school to further his career. He knows this and has accepted it as an inevitable and necessary headache. Partner has been putting this off for YEARS. I am now married to said partner.

I have been struggling with how to be supportive of the current situation and also gently remind him that he has goals and great thoughts that he has either forgotten about or has decided are not important. Verbal nudges feel uncomfortable to me. I am not sure where the line is between helpful partner and annoying nag.

I'm not even sure if he feels good or not when I bring things like this up. On the one hand he seems flattered that I seek great things for him. He smiles and laughs and says, "I know." This makes me wonder if this is one of those wifely responsibilities I was supposed to figure out ages ago. On the other hand I wonder if my pushes are seen as "typical wife behavior."

I have never worked toward "typical" before. Maybe it's okay to be typical as long as I'm respectful?

Perhaps as a partner it is important to have our faith about the other's ability come first. Maybe there are times when we can still connect with the potential in the other while they are busy just operating in daily maintenance mode. Maybe some people need cheerleaders and coaches.

Is that the role a good husband/wife takes?

Do I like it when he does it for me?

Yes. I do.

He frequently has more faith in me than I have in myself...and he has none of the hang ups I do about sharing his opinions. In fact, he corrects my behavior quite a lot. Just yesterday he reminded me if I was going to borrow his car I needed to park it BETWEEN the two yellow lines.... I asked him if he noticed the snow was cleared off of it and that it had been re-parked in a clear section of the parking lot.

...and besides...I reminded him... I was ON the yellow line...it's not like I took up two spaces or anything!

He also lets me know that I am an impressive person. He does this in conjunction with offering suggestions about how I can perform better at my job or create a more satisfying life. Do I see this as nagging?

Some of his "suggestions" about day to day life are nagging. I know he loads the dishwasher better than me. To his credit, he has just given up and decided to do this himself. I don't park or drive the way he would prefer, and although his method of organization is mystifying to me he would prefer me to be more like him in the way I care for "stuff."

I don't mind if he teases me for too much coffee consumption though...because it is out of concern for me...it's not about any pet peeve he happens to have.

Maybe that's it. If we are correcting behavior or "reminding" partners to do this or that out of self interest it quickly becomes nagging. If on the other hand we have the other person's highest self in mind and we can honestly say that it is not about us at all..it becomes supportive.

hummmmm

Perhaps I should remind him again where I placed those graduate school applications.