By William Chabot

I’m no writer, but I have some thoughts to vent that could stand to benefit others. I’m struggling with my first love, and I am having trouble finding the adequate vocabulary to convey the abstractness of it. In many discussions I was told she was my “cheerleader” and that is why I loved her. The person I loved viewed this as “co-dependent” and saw it as a largely negative trait. I took conflict with that, and this was my unvoiced rant in rebuttal.
“You are my teammate, not my cheerleader.”

In my search for love I am confronted with a big vaguely defined term: co-dependence. The term carries heavy negative connotations. Being co-dependent implies that one is unable to sustain oneself without the help of another. This puts one at risk, for in the absence of the other party one is doomed to fail. The responsibility of the success of both parties, therefore, falls onto the party who is depended on. This tips the scale of the relationship heavily to one side, weighing it down with the accountability for future success, akin to putting all of your eggs in one basket.

Under the right circumstances these relationships can thrive — with one clear-cut set of interests: Whatever benefits the party who is depended on, the energy of the relationship can be focused on furthering those interests at the expense of both parties rather than just one. The dependent party then benefits indirectly, being provided with an enhanced situation to depend on. This gives the party being depended upon a high worth to the dependent party. The danger is in the realization of the party who is depended upon that the dependee is not unique, and that the encouragement and support provided comes at an equal cost from any alternative party. Thus, the dependent party loses all worth, and lacks the security of commitment.

It is clear that the most successful relationships are balanced, where both parties are equally independent of each other. In this new relationship there does not have to be no co-dependence, only a balanced amount. If the eggs are equally divided into both parties’ baskets, then both parties hold equal responsibility for the relationship’s success. In this situation the energy of the relationship is focused on furthering each party’s own best interests, rather than the other’s. Each party stands to benefit equally from the advance of another, and is dependent on the success of the other party. Thus, each party has equal worth to one another.

I argue now that there is a third, even more successful relationship where both parties are entirely independent. Untied to anyone else’s best interests, each party is free to further their own best interest without reservation or fear of failure. You may ask, how can a relationship form without a necessity for another party? Only if both parties share the same best interests can this form of relationship be successful. Working as a team, playing one’s strengths and filling in for another’s weakness, both parties stand to benefit immensely from another.

While it is possible to achieve independently, a much higher state of achievement can be obtained as a team. Each player knows that the other is just as valuable. When one teammate falls, although they can pick themselves up, another teammate can quickly get them back on the field. In contrast, a cheerleader, while encouraging and supportive, without a team would have no purpose. Each teammate offers a different perspective, a different set of strengths and weaknesses, each benefiting the team as a whole in their own way. It is then clear to me that in the game of life I am not looking for a cheerleader to support me, I am looking for a teammate to play by my side.