1 You don’t want to wash the dishes.. well break a few and see how quickly your other half soon says “get out of the way and let me do them”.

2 Don’t like weeding the garden … dig a few of your partner’s favorite plants up by mistake.

3 Fed up with cooking for him all the time… opps how did all that pepper you do not like get into there?

4 Hate doing the cloths washing … how did that bright red woolly get in with your white (now pink) shirts?

5. Don't really want to become a moderator for a site when asked ... opps where did all those messages suddenly disappear to

Becoming a problem is something that we do when we try to get out of doing something we did not want to do in the first place, but we just are not repaired to say so. It is a way that we look as if we are doing as is asked of us, and yet we do things in such a way as to manipulate the person who asked us into never asking us again.

Why is it such a self-defeating game to play? Well it is self defeating in so far as we are not been open and honest with the person who asked something of us. It is self-defeating in so far as it tends to make us look hopeless when in fact we are not. It is self-defeating in so far as it is very manipulative, and sooner or later our partner will start to see how manipulative it is.

If there is something that we are not repaired to do, then would it not be much easier and honest to say so. Relationships with others depend on honesty and openness. Playing “becoming a problem” is not only manipulative; it is one way of destroying the relationships that mean most to us.

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