The 50/50 attitude shows up quite a bit in askMRP. This post is an adaptation of a couple of my comments there. This is perhaps one of the single greatest discoveries I had made in my marriage prior to finding RP, which has helped me hone the craft.


50/50 is Wrong

Life is not fair. Stop training your wife to believe otherwise. We don't get ahead in life by playing fair with others, otherwise we'd all be communist peons - but even then we'd exist only to support the true alpha dictator.

"You cook, I'll clean" is garbage thinking. It's your house, your food, your dishes, your sink, your time. If you're planning divorce, yeah, don't think that way. But it's a crap life worrying about divorce all the time. If you're high enough value, why would she leave? And if you're leaving her, you have the forethought and context to prepare. Bottom line: treat everything as if it's yours.


OYS as a Mindset

When I see OYS get mentioned, it's usually in the context of what you're doing to take care of the house and improve your lifestyle. Sure, an OYS mentality leads to this as a conclusion. But you can't sustain that lifestyle without actually believing everything in your kingdom is actually yours. A citizen may own land just as your wife and kids may technically own stuff, but that land is still subject to the governing authorities, hence taxes, eminent domain, etc.

To be clearer: don't think about OYS as "I need to be responsible and diligent with OUR stuff." Think about it as you literally owning everything in your domain. It's not "some things are hers, others are mine." It's not even co-ownership. Unless she contributed separate value to get it, it's yours. And even then, if you already paid her for that value, don't let her double-dip on the reward.

EXAMPLE 1

My wife did a great job during last busy season at work and earned herself an extra $500 bonus. I rewarded her by buying her a new oven, which cost well over $500. When her bonus check came in she handed it over to me, understanding that the family finances are mine - even what she earns. She contributed an extra $500 in value to the family with her hard work.

I could have let her keep her $500 bonus as her reward and done nothing else for her, in which case she allocates her appreciation for the reward to her company.

Instead, I took the credit for rewarding her, channeled how I wanted her to be rewarded for that value rather than how she would have spent that check, and now she's overjoyed with appreciation to me at the new oven I BOUGHT HER (as opposed to her company) and I still get the $500 check to spend however else I see fit. Plus, since I do most of our cooking, extra benefit to me (hence spending more than $500 on it).

If I wanted to, I could have also just taken her bonus check and given her nothing, and I've done that before too. But most of the time I like to reward good behavior so she keeps up the good behavior. This will remain true for the $3,500 bonus she's about to get in her next paycheck. I'm not going to go out and buy her $3,500 worth of crap. I'll find other ways to reward her for adding value.

But if I reward her with my love, affection, gifts, appreciation, etc. and then still let her spend her own bonus money - she's double-dipping, getting twice the reward for the same work, and at my expense.


Contributing Value

In a 50/50 mentality, you both expect each other to do half the chores, half the cooking, half the cleaning, etc. But odds are you don't value those things equally, so no true 50/50 arrangement ever works. If you see everything in your domain as your stuff, you'll realize it's 100% responsibility on you. If she wants to use your stuff she has to contribute value. You're not a benefactor for free-loaders.

How does that value work? Maybe you do 100% of the work around the house and contribute 100% of the income and she just lays around all day waiting to give you the best sex of your life every single day multiple times a day.

Maybe sex alone isn't enough value for you, so if she wants to keep living in your house, eating your food, and watching your TV, while scrolling social media on your phone that you let her keep in her purse all day - she needs to start contributing other value. So, she cooks you breakfast. She vacuums the floors. She cleans up after the kids. She works a job. Is this enough value to you?


Sex as Value

What if she thinks she can add enough value that she can ignore sex? If she has a 50/50 mindset, sex ends up not fitting into the equation at all. It's not the same as the other household chores, and you should rightly be reinforcing that she not treat it like a chore (unless you like duty sex, then be my guest). In her mind, she's already contributing her 50% (most likely she perceives it more as 80%), so she thinks of herself as a high-value contributor and if you're only doing 50% you're just doing your fair share and she owes you nothing. Why should she care about sexually gratifying you, or even herself? That's not a variable in the 50/50 equation.

If you deviate from the 50/50 mentality to an OYS mentality, you're the one who dictates where you find value. In 50/50, there's a pseudo-objective standard. "You do this, I do that." In her mind, this has the same objective value as that. But what if this has more value to you than that? In OYS, your subjective impressions become the standard that she must meet.

EXAMPLE 2

My wife constantly tries to get affection and appreciation for doing things that she values and I don't. I've had to communicate to my wife repeatedly (sometimes even verbally), "That's great that you vacuumed the house three times this week. I'm glad you find value in that. I don't. I'm fine if it's only vacuumed once a week. You did the work, you're reaping your own reward from it. But don't expect me to pamper and reward you for something I don't value. You want pampering and rewards? You know what I value in the marriage. Go do those things instead."

She usually gets all huffy at me and says, "Well, you should value it!" I ignore her. Sometimes she'll add, "It's not fair, though, that if I do that extra work you still get the benefit of it even if it's not something you would have cared to do yourself." Sometimes I'll ignore her and go about my business. Other times I'll note quickly: "I honestly can't tell the difference between vacuuming the carpets 1 or 3 times a week. You're the only one who experiences that value."

In the past, she still harbored bitterness over this against me because I was still flawed in my execution. After refining things since discovering RP, she hasn't brought this stuff up once. Instead, she's focusing more on the things that she knows I value, including sex. That's a huge win.


Effort v. Value

It's also worth noting that effort =/= value. If something takes 8/10 effort for her to complete, but I only get 3/10 enjoyment out of it, that's only a value of 3/10. She feels like it should be an 8/10 because of all of her effort, but over time is now realizing that value is based on the result, not the work put in.

Decent sex might have a value of 7/10 for me, but only has an effort level of 4/10 for her. Great sex might be an 8/10 in effort, but gives 10/10 in value. When she's contributing less effort than the value her effort produces, she's in her "sweet spot" - especially when she becomes cognizant of the fact that I reward good behavior based on value, not effort.

The problem is that most women don't understand this effort-value dynamic. Why? Because they're living in a 50/50 dynamic, not an OYS/value-based relationship.

  • In a 50/50 system, effort dictates what you should objectively value.

  • In an OYS system, you dictate what you actually subjectively value.

If you succumb to the 50/50 mentality, you'll never be able to pull her out of it. Learn to OYS - not just by taking responsibility, but by actually assuming ownership. If she continues in a 50/50 mentality, that's on you. Lead her out of it. But don't be an idiot in how you make that transition or expect it to happen all at once.