Any truth to this? Examples, anecdotes?
Well, I have dated many guys that I knew weren’t good enough for me, long-term or suitable for marriage. I don’t mean to disparage them or brag about my own wonderful self, they obviously had something going for them. I’m talking hanging out with dim bulbs, bad boys, high school dropouts, and cheaters. As we all have. None of them said they weren’t good enough for me, though my mom most certainly did! Myself, I was dumped by a guy I had really fallen for hard, because I didn’t have a college degree and HIS mother said he could do better… I was outraged, he made me feel like a dummy, like Shirley McLaine vs. Frank Sinatra in “Some Came Running.” Douchebag.
It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Self-doubt is as addictive as crystal meth, and ruins far more lives.
I don’t have any personal ancedotes, but I recall reading about this on Baggage Reclaim, a great site on relationships. I think she refers to women who want to “fix” men who aren’t good enough for them as Florence Nightingales.
Yeah, I think if someone says they’re not good enough for you, they’re probably right, starting with low self esteem.
Of course, there is the old joke: “Men marry their fantasies while women marry projects.”
If someone says that they are not good enough for you, they are giving you a way out of a relationship that they already know won’t work.
Whether the reason that it won’t work is because a) they are not good enough for you and will perhaps cheat on you or something equally bad, or b) they just don’t feel it is working and are looking for a painless way out, doesn’t really matter. It won’t work out.
Yeah. I told you I was slumming when I met you!
A few weeks before our wedding, my fiancee’s brother announced he was getting divorced. My fiancee went hysterical and kept saying that we shouldn’t get married, that no one in her family had a good marriage, we were doomed, etc. Of course I calmed her down. Three years later our marriage collapsed in a heap of her lies, infidelity and stealing and I started to think maybe she had been right.
If someone has doubts, maybe you should, too.
Interesting split in the poll…nobody who voted ‘Hooey’ has commented, so it would be nice to hear from someone with that perspective.
That saying is something I decided to take to heart a while ago, and I’ve never had to actually apply it. Maybe this time, though…
The only reason somebody would say this is because they are trying to break up with you, scale back the relationship, or mentally prime you for one of these two actions.
So yeah, if they are saying it, they probably really aren’t good for you at all.
I didn’t vote–but my first instinct is that I’ve seen that sentiment all the time in romances and it’s no big deal.
And then I thought about why it isn’t a big deal in romance novels–because if there’s nothing to discourage a relationship, there’s no story. And if someone really is not good enough for someone else, there’s no happy ending.
So romance novels are bad sources of life advice (I knew that already).
Still, I’m a little ambivalent about agreeing with the idea that someone who claims to be not good enough should always be believed–I think it overrates the importance of someone’s past and underrates the importance of the future.
Of course, if someone told me she was in love with someone else based on future potential, I’d think it was a bad sign.
Which puts me back at maybe it’s true.
It’s not you. It’s me.
I think everyone has heard this one.
What he said.
I think self-doubt is rarely, if ever, an issue.* Rather, it is self-concern: the other person has decided to end your association because it no longer suits him/her.
He or she is, in my opinion, sorely lacking in both imagination and tact if he or she invokes the old “I’m not good enough for you” chestnut. I also find it hard to believe that he or she would be deficient in ego by trying to use such a lame line.** “This isn’t working out,” or “We’re just not right for each other” would be more honest answers.
Whatever the case, parting ways (and never having contact again) is the absolute best thing you can do.
*Why would you hook up with someone wracked by self-doubt anyway?
**My response would be “You actually think I’m stupid enough to believe that? Push off!”
The one time I had a girlfriend who did the whole “not good enough for you” thing, four months later she broke down and confessed to a stack of lies a mile high. None of which involved cheating or any of the typical relationship lies, just lies about what she wanted for the future and stuff that revealed her not to be the person she’d presented herself as at all. Since then, I’ve been convinced that even if someone honestly believes they aren’t good enough for you for some silly reason that doesn’t matter to you (your social or economic standing, attractiveness, supposed strength of character etc), chances are they believe that out of misplaced guilt from the strain of keeping up a big fat lie or two.
I was young and stupid. I had wagered it was because she’d been verbally torn down and trampled too often. She did have a couple of abusive exes, no father, a younger sister into petty crime, a stepdad who drank too much, etc. I had asked her if treating her gently and considerately might restore her confidence in the long term, and she said yes, so that’s exactly what I did. For a long time the “I’m not good enough for you” speeches stopped, and she did improve, and then suddenly I got sick and- bam! “I actually think all people, including girlfriends, are a waste of time. I really want to go hiking all day every day. Now that you’re all frail, I’m dumping you so I can still do that. Have a good life!”
That was years ago now, and my attitude toward the “I’m not good enough for you” crowd is still the same: Never. Again. Ever. Partly this is because, in my experience, it applies as much to friendships as to relationships. I’ve had plenty of people act like their normal selves until they get close to me, start up the whole “Aaaaaaah I don’t deserve you’re friendship!” spiel, get told how great they are, and then promptly start doing douchey things behind my back. Now when anyone says that shit, I believe it the first time.
I’m a gay woman, if that makes any difference to the poll.
Well those exact words haven’t been said, but it was a comment to that effect.
I suspect that this is more likely to be the case:
And this is less likely:
Still, some thinking to do.
I have said exactly this to a fellow. “I am not good enough for you”, by which I meant “I am smart enough to make passable conversation and amuse you, but I am severely under-educated and I am certain you will be acutely aware of this ten years from now when I am the only person in your world who does not hold a PhD”.
…what I really meant was “I have low self-esteem and I’m way too impressed by you to ever feel like your equal”.
My current fella has said exactly this to me. “I’m not good enough for you” he says, but I also feel a bit of the same way about him. If the feeling is mutual, I think what you have are two people who each see something amazing in the other.
My experience of this has been that when guys say it what they are really saying is: “I’m going to put you way up on this pedestal, and I’ll call you smart and strong and beautiful and feed you lots of compliments; but I will never ever be there to support you in any way because you are supposed to be the strong one who takes care of everything while I’m over here playing video games.”
“It’s not you, it’s me.”
“You’re right, it’s you.”