March 4, 2025 • 60 mins
Welcome back to Generational Tea! Your hosts, Ronnie & Kaina, are diving into a topic that is as frustrating as it is common—weaponized incompetence. Ever had someone pretend they just can't do something so that you have to do it for them? Yeah, we’re talking about that. Tune in to learn exactly what this behavior is, how to identify it in relationships and the workplace, as well as how to confront, prevent, and stop enabling it.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:14):
I am fed up with lots of things,but one of them would be
menopause.
I am fed up with hormones.
I'm fed up with TMS, even thoughI haven't had a period in how
long?
And I still PMS.
The only reason why I know it'sPMS, there's two reasons.
(00:35):
One is, the fact that we'reusually together on it.
We're both kind of irritable atthe same time.
We both want to leave ourhusbands at the same time.
So we talk each other out of it.
Like, do you hate Jim?
Do you hate Weston?
And we're PMS ing! Yes, and justhormones in general.
(00:56):
but, on a lighter note, we justgot back from Miami a couple
weeks ago, and there's one thingthat really burns me up.
In Miami, other than the sun andthe heat.
It is that people down theredon't wear clothing.
(01:16):
And I'm about fed up with it.
I'm like, what the heck?
I know it's hot, but don't youguys have jobs?
And who's working right now iswhat I want to know.
Cause I, everywhere I go, it'scrowded during the day.
Yeah.
Hey, back when I was growing up,if you went to the DMV, like,
during the middle of the day,wasn't nobody there.
(01:37):
Everybody's working.
You could take 10 minutes offlittle route to wherever you're
going, because everybody's atwork.
No one's on the road.
Now, I wonder who works.
Everybody's on the road.
They work, but they don't havethe traditional schedule.
Yeah, which is actually awesomeBut it does make running errands
more troublesome Different areyou do you have anything you're
(02:01):
fed up with I'm fed up with theweather because one week It'll
be like 65, but I'm like here wego.
It's spring and then the nextweek It'll be like 20 degrees
and I'm like, okay Can we justmake a decision?
Exactly.
But I don't know why I'msurprised because I feel like
it's like this every year.
It is.
So.
It is.
literally every year I'm like,gosh, this weather is bipolar.
(02:23):
And then it just, every year,I'm like, okay.
Stop being fed up.
It's just how it is.
It is how it is.
And the final thing that I'mreally fed up with.
Is when you let someone walk infront of you in a car, you know,
like you stop at the crosswalkor you stop in the middle of
your route because somebody'salready stepped out in front of
you and you wait and then theytake their time getting across
(02:48):
the road.
That burns me up to the pointthat I think about it all the
time.
And so this morning we went toCostco and there were lots of
cars everywhere.
People were stopping to let us,and literally Jim and I are
running through the parking lotof Costco because I'm like, I
can't make these people wait.
I know that's how I am.
(03:09):
I do like an awkward littlescurry because I'm like, Oh my
God, they're waiting for me.
Exactly.
What is wrong?
So, public service announcement.
If somebody lets you go acrossthe road, you don't have to run,
but just pick it up just alittle bit.
Just pick up the pace just atiny bit.
Well, I think a lot of peoplehave main character syndrome,
(03:30):
which like, in a way you are themain character in your own
story, but The world's notrevolving around you.
Yeah.
So be considerate.
Yes.
Are you talking about me?
Huh?
Or them?
Huh?
Well, I think we all do.
But I think we at least areconsiderate to a degree.
Yeah.
Yeah, we're still maincharacters in our own story.
Yes.
(03:50):
Well, we're doing this episodeon one of the many things we are
fed up with, which is why weopened with that, and it is
weaponized incompetence.
So when did you first hear thisterm?
From you.
Maybe a couple of months.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean now that I know the term,I definitely know what the
disease process is.
Once you know what it is, you'relike, oh my, it's everywhere.
(04:13):
It is everywhere.
I probably heard it first a yearor so ago, and I've never been
able to get that out of my head.
And it's pretty crazy.
So that's why we decided to doan episode on it today.
Especially because it'ssomething that we think women
should be aware of.
And We'll get into why that is,but anyways, welcome to another
(04:34):
episode of the Generational TeaPodcast.
I'm Kena.
And I'm Ronnie.
And we are in double digits ofepisodes, I think.
I think so.
We're somewhere in the 10 or 11or so.
So that's really exciting.
And we just had our one monthanniversary a couple days ago.
Yeah.
Happy Anniversary.
What's happening?
I know.
Happy Anniversary.
(04:55):
So, while you're here, we wouldlove it, after you finish this
episode, go ahead and leave us areview.
We would love to hear yourfeedback, and it helps us build
our little podcast business tohelp us reach more people, which
is the goal, because we wantmore women to know how to speak
up for themselves, how to feelfree, how to make their lives
better, so how you can supportus is leaving us a review,
(05:15):
checking out our social media atgenerational teapot, and yeah.
Message us if you want to talkto us about anything.
Let us know how your weeklychallenges go.
We love to hear from you guys.
So, all righty then.
Well, we're going to open withsome research.
before we get into what isweaponized incompetence and all
the little fun sections we haveabout that, according to recent
(05:37):
research, 71 percent of motherstypically carry the mental load
in a household, meaning they'reresponsible for the majority of
planning, organizing,remembering, household
management tasks like Gettinggroceries, scheduling
everything, taking care of thekids.
Do you feel like you took moreof the mental load?
I think I did in some respects.
(05:57):
I think especially early on inyour marriage, because you don't
really know.
Who's best at something?
I think, honestly, like onceyou've probably been married,
maybe five years, but we don'thave to wait five years.
we're bringing this to y'all.
So if you're dating or newlymarried, wherever you are in
your season of life, Takes awhile to really find out what
(06:24):
your spouse is good at.
like Jim and I never livedtogether before we got married
and we met and married in eightmonths.
So basically, we had a baby, wehad a baby two years later and
then another baby.
so yeah.
I think for sure, especiallyduring the beginning.
Well, I feel like there's somany stereotypes where like men
(06:46):
aren't good at multitasking orlike women are just better at
doing some things or like,that's just how men are, which I
feel like.
Perpetuates this problem morethan it should be because at the
end of the day, we're all humanbeings and men and women can do
all the same things that they'recapable of and obviously it's
going to be dependent on yourrelationship and like you said,
(07:06):
like what you're good at, likedividing the labor, but I think
a recurring theme in a lot ofrelationships and it's reflected
in a lot of media is that womenare taking on all the mental
load and then there's like thebumbling dad who's just like,
Bringing home the paycheck andall that stuff.
Disney World dad.
Exactly.
Takes the kids to Chuck E.
Cheese on Saturday and he's ahero.
(07:28):
Yeah.
So, like I said, a lot of thingswill play into this and a lot of
it's, you know, going to bedependent on your relationship
and your personalities, but itis really important to
understand when weaponizing thecompetence is happening and you
have to understand that it's notjust men that are doing this, it
can be women, it's justtypically men, I think, that are
doing this in relationships.
(07:49):
They may not be conscious ofthem doing it, so.
You being conscious of it andbringing it into the
conversation and being aware ofit can help you Change your
relationship for the better andmaybe divide the mental load.
So it's not predominantly onyou.
Yeah, What is weaponizedincompetence?
(08:09):
The definition is the act ofpretending To be bad at a task
or exaggerating your difficulty,to avoid doing it, often forcing
someone else to take over.
And that I have seen in mychildren.
They're getting better,especially my youngest, my
(08:34):
husband.
I'm trying not to point him out,but listen, I be getting on him.
Okay.
Yes, yes, yes.
But well, you did do a great jobof raising a son that whenever I
raise issues with him, or I wanthim to change his behavior, he
doesn't get defensive.
And he's not like, I don't dothat or whatever.
He's always receptive.
And he's apologetic.
(08:55):
You know, he takesaccountability for the things
he's done wrong.
And we're still working on, youknow, changing the behavior.
But hey, that's a massiveaccomplishment.
That's a massive accomplishment,for sure.
Yes.
We're talking more aboutrelationships, side by side
relationships, but also, youknow, I have people in my family
(09:16):
who have done this, and I'mrecognizing it, and I think for
me, it's just been eye openingto really, not so much point it
out to them because there'sreally nothing I can do to make
them change that, you know, butjust being aware of it and not,
not to get defensive about it,but more to just.
(09:38):
Kind of know where it's comingfrom.
Yeah.
Well, awareness on your partwill help you.
And we're going to talk aboutthe tools you can use.
It'll help you stop enabling itbecause we do that.
We're enablers.
Okay.
They might be incompetent, butwe are enablers of their
incompetence.
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
We're incompetent.
In handling their incompetence.
Oh lord, yes.
(09:59):
So we're going to give you somecommon examples that might help
you recognize this instead ofjust hearing a definition and
trying to think, okay, does mypartner do this?
Does my family do this?
So one example.
Or do I do this?
True.
I think a lot of times, whenwe're evaluating, Okay.
Our partners, our family, otherpeople in our circle, I would
(10:20):
just strongly advise, you know,turn that on yourself first, get
along, think through it, takesome notes, that way When you're
approaching somebody, you cansay, you know, this is the thing
that I struggle with that.
I think I know what we weaponizeincompetence for.
Well, we just said it earlier.
We're like, I don't knowanything about cars.
(10:42):
I caught it too.
I was like, shoot, we got tolearn more about cars.
No, no, no, no, no.
I'll find another way.
I carry a lot of mental load.
So I think he can handle that.
Exactly.
So one example is.
I can't cook like you do.
So the partner never tries.
So, and an example from this outof my own marriage is that well,
(11:07):
I love doing cooking.
It's like a self care for me.
But sometimes, golly, I don'twant to do it.
And one morning Weston and Iwere just lazing about, and I
wasn't hungry, so I didn'treally feel like cooking
breakfast.
I was reading my book that I wasreally into, and Weston wanted
me to make pancakes.
And I was like, you can do it,and he was like, I don't know
how.
And I was like, well, by God,the recipe's on the box, so I'm
(11:29):
sure you can figure it out.
Ding ding! We have a winner! Andyou know what?
He made himself pancakes.
Yeah.
Yeah, there you go.
That's great.
Another one is, I don't knowwhere the kids clothes are, so
the mom has to do all thepacking.
And I definitely can say thatthat was a common thread.
(11:50):
And our home was, yeah.
Mm hmm, yep.
Another one is, Oh, you handleall the social plans.
I'm really bad at rememberingbirthdays or events or whatever
it is.
I feel like women are definitelythe social planners of the
family.
I guess it depends on therelationship, but I know like
for you and me, we're the moresocial people of our husbands.
So we kind of take control ofthat.
(12:10):
But I also think that that couldbe divided more evenly.
Just in being raised and seeingother my aunts my uncles my
parents and all that itdefinitely the Tendency that I
saw a lot was that they tookcare of all the birthdays They
reminded their spouses of theirparents birthdays their parents
(12:32):
anniversaries and then it justbecame taking on that and I've
really That's one thing thatI've tried to back out of with
Jim and just like let himhandle.
Well, I think you have to.
I think when you take a lot oftraditions or you like watch
your family, your older familythat's from a totally different
(12:53):
generation where not as manywomen worked as they did today.
Right.
And so you have to be carefulwith what things you're bringing
into your relationship that maynot work because you had a
career.
I mean, I, I work as well and alot of women and.
And marriages and relationshipswork today, so it's, you know,
not that when you're notworking, or if you're raising
(13:15):
kids, that's absolutely a fulltime job, you can take more of
the mental load, because again,it just depends on your
relationship and how you guyscommunicate, but Yeah, and the
season that your kids are in.
Mm hmm.
Because, you know.
A lot of stuff, time opens uponce you get them in school., If
you decide to send them toschool.
Oh sure., Oh, this was a goodone.
(13:37):
I don't know how to talk aboutmy feelings., This is one
partner avoiding conflictresolution while the other is
having to take an extra mentalload to help their partner work
through their own feelings.
So you've come to the tablewith.
Your own stuff, you know, maybeit's a pattern that you've seen.
It's something that you feellike you need to talk, with your
(13:59):
partner or parent, child.
this can happen because you comeinto it.
With not necessarily an agenda,but you've got a thought process
already going and you could beexhausted About what you're
getting ready to have todiscuss, but when you meet a
roadblock like this When it'slike, you know, I'm not good at
(14:21):
talking about my feelings.
Well, guess what?
Today's your first lesson Thisis feelings 101.
Yeah, and So, that can be veryfrustrating.
And that is a therapy.
Yes, because you don't want totake all that on I had a past
relationship where we would haveyou having a difficult
(14:43):
conversation and I'd be likeasking him how he feels or
whatever, whatever he would justsay, like, I don't know, like, I
don't know.
And I'm like, okay, well, how doI get you to figure out what
you're feeling so that we canresolve this?
Yeah.
And that's a whole nother thinginstead of just like tackling
the issue together.
Right.
Right.
Okay.
Another one is I can't change adiaper.
(15:04):
It's really bad.
And I feel like I've seen thisso many times in like sitcoms or
whatever.
Like again, like the bumblingdad trope who doesn't know how
to do anything other than bringhome a paycheck.
Yeah.
It's like, I don't know how tochange a diaper.
I can't do that.
Go to therapy.
Well, poor Jim.
When we had the kids, I workedpart time, like every other
(15:26):
weekend, 12 hour shifts istypically what I did, even back
then, and things were not nearlyas expensive, I was a registered
nurse, and I still could notjustify Putting my kids in
daycare because basically what Iwas doing was working to pay for
daycare So I did the every otherweekend thing and it was 12 hour
shifts So Jim was a hundredpercent full dad on those
(15:50):
weekends, and he was very goodI'm sure we had a discussion.
I don't remember itspecifically, but I'm sure we
had the discussion that said noYou're not gonna spend the
weekend at your mom's With ourchildren.
They're your children And you'regoing to learn how to take And
you know what?
Trial by fire.
(16:10):
I just left and he did great.
a little funny thing especiallywhen we had the two littles in
Weston, never cared what he hadon to wear, you know, just as
long as it was comfortable.
He didn't care, you know,Garrett came out Organized in a
closet, but Weston was so easyand because we were dealing with
(16:30):
Another child that was it wasvery important to him Yeah, how
he looked and all that not tosay one was better than the
other but my friends at churchwould talk about that they
always knew that The weekends Iwas working, based on what
Weston had on.
Because most of the time, he hadon what his dad put on Saturday
(16:53):
morning, he slept in that, andthen, okay, it looks great,
because he's trying to deal withthe other one that only wants to
wear certain things, and soWeston would just turn up in the
same clothes.
And they would be like, oh, hehad his pajama top on, but he
had a pair of shorts on.
Dude, he still wears the same,work pants for like a week
straight.
(17:14):
Things should be hung up.
So anyways, when we get to this,I can't change a diaper.
Okay.
Maybe that's true right now, butlater we're going to talk about
like.
The effort part, because you mayhave to take time to show that,
but understand when they'redoing household chores or tasks
(17:39):
or taking care of children, thelast thing you want to do is be
critical.
You have to let them do it.
You have to let them fail.
And it has to be okay if it'snot your way.
Yeah, we're gonna talk aboutthat later when we talk about
not enabling that behavior.
And part of that is not redoingtheir work or saying, oh, you
(17:59):
don't do it right, let me do it.
Oh, yeah.
Let them fail.
Let them get better.
Let them learn.
Yes, yes.
For your own benefit, long term.
Yeah.
like I said earlier, intent ispart of this.
And it's not always a maliciousbehavior pattern.
But it can be.
So sometimes this behaviorpattern can be learned and it
can be subconscious.
But whether the person that'sdoing it knows it or not, that
(18:22):
doesn't mitigate the impact onthe other partner.
So one person bears the burdenwhile the other gets off easy,
whether they know they're doingit or not.
There's also some long termconsequences that happen, if you
continue in this pattern, itleads to resentment, exhaustion,
lack of trust, and an imbalancein relationships.
(18:43):
This lack of trust is big timefor me because If we ask for
something that needs to be doneand it continually gets pushed
back, That part is reallyfrustrating and I feel like
that's where the lack of trustis.
Yeah, it's lack of being able tosay to your partner or to
(19:07):
someone I really need this.
I can't do this by myself, butcan you do it because what
happens again while it continuesto be pushed off and put behind
and put behind what ends uphappening is you stop asking.
Cause you have no trust thatthey're going to do it.
You have no trust that they'regoing to do it.
And a hundred percent of thetime for me,, I won't say
(19:31):
anything until one other thingtips me off and I blow up and
that is definitely not wiseeither.
It's not the healthiest, butunderstandable at the same time.
Exactly.
So the trusting part is so key.
And I think, I'll just tell youwith mine, Jim's relationship,
(19:52):
because this is kind ofsomething that we still deal
with.
and he's got more time on hishands now, but it is still
something.
And so I've had to, at somepoints he's, he said, I'm going
to take care of it.
I told you I was going to do it.
And I'm like, well, how do Iknow you're really going to do
it?
And he said, I told you, and Isaid, I will say based on what
(20:15):
evidence Give me some evidenceNow what i've done he shouldn't
be offended by that, but heshould say That's a point and
when we have had discussionslike that and I am, able to keep
my emotions in check.
and I say, you know, I hear thatyou're, you're saying you're
(20:36):
gonna do it again, but I can'tbelieve that.
Yeah.
Because I don't have a trust inyou.
Right.
Right.
And a lot of women, I mean.
We've never had the resources,but definitely a lot of women
will just say, okay, I'm justgoing to start making a list and
I'm going to call a contractoror handyman and get them out
(20:57):
here and do it.
But again, that's not, that'sjust an enabling, enabling.
Right, right.
Okay.
Definitely.
I mean, and I think I've evenexperienced, like, me and Weston
have been together five years.
And he has been in collegeathletics, which is a very toxic
(21:18):
non work life balance thing.
So he's working 78 hours a weeksometimes.
And so I'm carrying a lot of themental load, which I knew that
going in, and that's okay.
But even when he's not atworking, we've had issues with
weaponized incompetence.
And I He's not conscious of it,he has ADHD as well, and he's
really tired from working somany hours, and I'll ask him to
(21:39):
do things, because I'm at mylimit, and I know I need help,
and then he'll forget to dothem.
And then, I have definitelyexperienced the same thing as
you, the lack of trust, whereI'm like, I don't even want to
ask him to do things anymore.
Like, it's not like that rightnow, but at a point it was,
where I was like, I don't evenwant to ask you to do things
anymore, because you're gonnaforget.
And I'm going to have to followup with you, which is another
(22:00):
thing on my mental load, and I'mgoing to have to remind you.
And he used to get annoyed whenI would nag him or remind him.
And I'm like, dude, well, youdon't do it.
So what do you expect me to do?
And he was like, you're right.
I'm like, maybe I am, and that'sjust like in little periods of
time and my relationship.
And when you're married, like.
Decades and you're just dealingwith this like long long term.
(22:24):
I can't imagine to think of howthese Long term consequences
just build up and then it'scyclical.
no one's perfect.
So it's always gonna be there,but it's how you handle it, how
quickly we can recognize it.
Not that somebody else is doingit.
How quickly can I recognize whenI'm doing it?
(22:45):
And, you know, typically if it'ssomething you recognize that
you're doing and you say, youknow what?
That was wrong.
I shouldn't have asked you to dothat.
I'm going to try to do itmyself.
That will help your partner tokind of like, Oh, that's how you
handle it when you blow it.
Because that's what we need themost knowledge on is how do we
(23:07):
respond when we blow it?
Yeah, definitely.
Awareness is what we'redefinitely we want to talk about
for sure.
Well our ultimate goal here Imean unless it's a very
unhealthy relationship.
We want marriages andrelationships to thrive and The
reason we're talking aboutthings like these is so that we
(23:28):
can raise awareness foryourself, for your partner, for
everything, because we want tosee success.
And this is actually an issue,an uneven division of labor has
caused a significant percent offailed relationships.
So, a statistic according toHarvard 25 percent of failed
(23:48):
relationships are due to Thingslike uneven division of labor,
and that could be related toweaponized incompetence.
Yeah.
So.
There's an interesting statisticfor you, why things like these
are important to know andimportant to work through and
get on the other side of.
Yes, work through it soonerrather than later.
And then you'll have to workthrough it again and again as
(24:10):
stages of life happen, but alsoyour partner is going to have to
work with your own.
Yeah.
So.
Yeah, definitely.
Well, we want to give you someexamples, not just in
relationships, but in theworkplace as well.
Because like we just said, a lotmore women are in the workplace
nowadays.
weaponizing incompetence issomething that is not just in
relationships, it can beanywhere else, but especially
(24:30):
the workplace as well.
So we're going to give you someexamples.
One is, can you take the meetingnotes?
You're better at that.
Hmm.
Hmm.
Hmm.
and what about, I'm not good atorganizing things, can you plan
the event?
Hmm.
So while there is value in aworkplace of identifying and
(24:53):
assigning tasks based onstrength.
I think sometimes this can getabused, especially with women.
There's a lot of research thatsupports that women tend to take
on like the office housework,which is like note taking,
scheduling, mentoring,organizing, stuff like that.
While men are able to focus ontasks that are more promotable
(25:14):
in nature, like financial thingsand project management.
Over time, and this isn'thappening everywhere, but it,
can be prone to happen, and sobeing able to recognize it is
important because eventually ifyou're doing all the office
housework and you're strugglingto get a promotion, you're going
to have burnout in your career,you just might be stagnant for a
time, and that can be sofrustrating, especially when you
(25:34):
want to climb the ladder.
Yeah, A psychological impact wewanna talk about.
And something I have noticedmyself doing is gaslighting and
self doubt.
So the person that is left doingall the work starts questioning
their own expectations.
They start thinking, Maybe I'mexpecting too much.
He does work really hard atwork.
Ding, ding, ding.
(25:55):
He does make more money than me.
Ding, ding, ding.
I'm saying ding, ding, dingbecause these are things that I
have thought in my brain.
I get frustrated with him, andthen I start gaslighting myself,
or I start doubting, like, thethings I'm asking him to do.
And, you have been instrumentalin helping me realize that I
can't be doing that.
I don't remember when you toldme this, about having a
(26:19):
marriage.
It's like, your husband cannotcome home and just check out.
Which is what Weston used to alot more than he does now.
But I am still justified inasking him for things because I
know when I'm at my limitmentally and physically and
emotionally, and I need help todo all these things that a
relationship and adulting andliving demands.
(26:41):
I'm still struggling with this,I'm still like, oh I'm asking
him too much or I always work sohard.
And then I also don't attributethat to myself.
I also work really hard.
Like I expect a lot of myselfand I know when I, I know where
my limits are.
So I need to stop gaslightingmyself.
Yeah.
Yeah.
there's not a free pass when youcome home to check out.
(27:04):
and I think we might havealready talked about this, but I
think it's, it bodes mentioningis, If your husband does have a
very stressful job, just ingeneral, they've been gone for
eight hours a day, especially ifthey don't get their energy from
people.
They get their energy fromquiet, solitude, nature, and
we're both married to those kindof men.
(27:26):
And I had to finally figure outif I gave him 30 minutes after
he walked through the door, thenI could pretty much ask him
anything.
Yeah.
If I was able to just give himbut see what happens is you get
in a pattern Of as soon as theywalk through the door, you're
exhausted.
You're at your limit You've gottwo in diapers and one that
(27:48):
needs help with homework orwhatever When you start
establishing a pattern of whenthey come home, you just unload
on them What happens is one theytake the long way home sometimes
But the other is they arealready we whoever it is.
We're already Ramped up andalready offended before we ever
(28:10):
get out of the car because wealready know what's coming Yeah
But you want to shock the pantsoff of somebody break that
pattern and then it it may takea while but you retrain neural
pathways that you know Hedoesn't have to be triggered or
frustrated on the way home fromwork because he knows when he
(28:31):
gets home I'm gonna unload andjust like expectations again.
Definitely.
Well yeah, utilizing that withWeston since he did have a very
demanding job.
He's getting ready to have amore balanced one soon.
Yay! So maybe I won't gaslightmyself as much.
Yeah.
But yeah, I would let him have anap or have like an hour or two
just unwind.
(28:52):
Cause he would be socializingand he'd be after like a 12, 13
hour shift.
So I'd let him have his time.
And I think.
Letting him have that time andthen still being able to like
ask him things to do I would notdoubt Myself asking him those as
much right?
So it definitely helps when youcreate little life hacks.
(29:14):
Yeah.
Yeah.
The other thing is if you needsomething done now, you need to
specify that.
Yeah.
But it needs to be an emergency.
everything cannot be the fire.
and so I have tried and I stillfail a lot, but I've tried to,
when I've asked Jim something, alot of times I'll say, I'll
(29:35):
preface it with, you know, inthe next few days, can you do
this,, and then just let it goand see the other thing is, if I
need something done right then Ineed to specify, I mean,
obviously, if he comes home inthe toilet and the house is
flooded, but if I need him toreally do something right then
specify that and don't leteverything be a fire or an
(29:58):
emergency because then you'vejust conditioned them to not
take you seriously.
Yeah.
And you're catastrophizing everyrequest.
And you're catastrophizing everyrequest.
The other thing that I would,suggest doing is when we ask, if
there are specific things,details that we want them to pay
(30:19):
attention to, first of all, Iwould say, can we?
Do this together.
If it's something that youreally are hung up on, it needs
to be done in this order withthis equipment or whatever.
I would suggest that you jointhem in that task, because if
you say, can you do this and,can you wash the car and I need
(30:42):
it inside vacuum and, becareful, Pay close attention to
underneath the mats in the back,because there's a bunch of
goldfish down there or whateverit is, it can grate on people's
nerves.
So I would just say you have aright to be specific, but just
use that when it's reallynecessary as you grow in your
(31:06):
marriage and in yourrelationships and partnerships
that can begin.
To have a little more presence,but when you're trying to, like,
establish a communication,tactic, I don't mean it that way
method, maybe a method more, butyeah, I'd say for sure, and
there is a, as far as like thegaslighting and self doubt, and
(31:27):
there can be a manipulativeaspect to this as well.
So if someone is more.
intentional with theirweaponizing competence and they
insist, like, they just can't,then that will make you feel bad
for pushing them.
And that's not acceptable.
So definitely, when they'reinsisting that they can't do
something or they won't, andthen you start feeling bad for
even asking them, hmm, hmm,maybe it's time for a
(31:51):
conversation.
Yeah.
Encourage learning.
That's the difference.
And we'll get to that in aminute, but that's the
difference when somebody says, Ican't or I don't know how, but
are they willing to learn?
Yeah, that's the whole thing.
The person that's carrying theload of experiences and
exhaustion and frustration, ifit stays there, it's going to
(32:14):
get really nasty.
Like I was saying, you know,it's something completely,
Irrelevant to what is actuallygoing on at the current time.
It's all this resentment thatwe've held back on.
It just explodes.
I'm guilty of that as well.
I'll be holding resentment overmy brain.
(32:35):
I'll be like, I asked him to dothis three weeks ago and he
didn't do it.
And then I asked him for thatlast week and he didn't do it.
And then he'll do like one veryminor thing that grates on my
nerves.
And I'm just like.
Yeah.
and you really understand,what's the best communication
mode.
I feel like that Jim does prettygood with list I don't do it as
(32:56):
much as I should because he justretired and I didn't want him to
go back to work.
So I've been really good and notasking for much, but lists
sometimes work for folks.
Uh, put it in priority.
You know, one means.
This is the first thing I needfor you to take off the list.
Weston I know does good withlists.
In the past.
(33:16):
That's about what we had to do.
and.
I do good with lists.
If somebody's expectingsomething from me, I love that.
I want the list.
I want to, for you to rank inorder of importance, you know,
that kind of thing.
Oh yeah.
I agree.
Same.
Yeah.
Cause, cause this is, oh, it canreally still kill and destroy
(33:41):
not only your relationship withyour partner, but your
relationships with other folksin your Family friends when
you're hurt because hurt peoplehurt people.
It's true.
So that's a big thing to kind oftake inventory and when you have
these thoughts just say okayWhere's this coming from and it
(34:04):
it doesn't have to be like anDialogue that you're having out
loud.
Yeah, but definitely try yourbest not to get in that
resentment mode.
Yeah, don't let it build up.
I, my family has not been greatat like communicating issues as
they come up, which is somethingI inherited.
Weston's been great at likeencouraging me to bring up
(34:25):
issues as they arise.
So that's something I'm workingon for myself and it definitely
helps our relationship when I'mlike noting things like.
Okay.
Hey, I asked you to do somethingand you forgot and that's
frustrating for me because Ifeel like I have to like follow
up with you about everything andhe's like, yeah, you're right.
Okay.
I'll do it right when you ask meto and I'm like, okay, that's a
lot better than me one monthafter the offense, keeping track
(34:49):
of everything he's doing andthen blowing up on him and then
he doesn't go on the defense,but it can just seem like so
much worse of an emotionalreaction from me onto him and
that's just not good for eitherof us.
Right.
Right.
So while we're talking aboutpsychological impact and we've
kind of already mentioned thisas well We're talking about like
(35:10):
older generations So there is alot of cultural and gender norms
that shape who's expected tonaturally handle certain tasks
So for example, I think everyoneknows this women are most
expected to manage Householdtasks and child rearing
especially if their husband isthe breadwinner But we just
wanted to encourage you guysthat just because these are
(35:32):
Quote unquote norms.
You can challenge these in yourown household.
communicate.
Just because your husband worksand brings in the income, that
does not mean he can check outand use weaponized incompetence
to keep doing so.
So, challenge the norms in yourhousehold.
Find what works best for you.
In some cases, maybe Fittinginto those norms is what works
best for you and your husband.
(35:53):
Like, you never know.
Every relationship is different.
There's no relationship that'sgonna be the same.
But make sure you're actuallyhaving the conversations.
I remember Weston and I did thislittle marriage workbook pretty
early on in our marriage and Weeach had to check off, whether
it was me or him, like, each ofthese random adult household
(36:14):
marriage tasks, like, what didwe think, who should we think
should be doing this?
And actually our answers werepretty much the same, but it was
interesting for us to, gothrough that, and then discuss
it together, like, I said heshould be doing all the car
maintenance, and he agreed.
And then I said I should also doall the cooking.
Well, most of the cooking.
He does help cook as well.
(36:34):
Yeah, he does.
He can.
But I just think having thisconversation was so important
for us to set up the rest of ourrelationship and obviously it's
an ongoing dialogue and lifehappens, things change, stuff
like that.
So it's important to keeptalking about these things, but
I think it's most importantfirst that you're challenging
the norms and finding out whereyour expectations lie, the both
(36:55):
of you.
Yeah, yeah.
Find out to What's reallymeaningful to your spouse,
especially if you have more timein the home, whether that's
taking care of kids or even justworking from home, a big thing
for me is, and it's you too, isif my.
Countertops are clean in mykitchen.
(37:16):
The whole world could fallapart.
I would be perfectly happy.
Yeah, I'm crazy about cleancountertops.
Yes, yes.
If you find something and youknow something that's really,
really important to them that,maybe at the end of the day,
Jim, you still love coffee.
I'd throw in a pot of coffee.
While I was making dinnerbecause I knew that he likes
(37:38):
coffee in the evening or justdifferent things like that
because the goal is to out serveeach other the Imbalance comes
when one person's doing it andthe others not yeah So.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
So the next section we're goingto get into is basically, you
know, how did we stop enabling?
How do we confront and preventthis behavior?
(37:59):
First we're going to tackle inrelationships, what can we do to
prevent this and confront it inour relationship?
So kind of like I was just goingon about set expectations early,
have conversations about sharingresponsibilities, expectations
you have and ensure that youguys reach what you both think
is a fair division of labor.
And it may take time and you mayhave to revise that constantly,
(38:22):
but you're probably going toavoid a lot of frustration and
all kinds of bad stuff if youcan communicate earlier rather
than later.
Right.
And, and all this, study yourpartner's family.
I think in this day and time, alot of folks don't move back
after college.
(38:42):
They're not living in the sametown that their parents did are
or where they grew up.
So you might have to, yourdetective work half might have
to be more about just askingthem, but kind of get a
temperature of how.
The household that he lived in,he or she lived in, how it was
run, who did what, because thatmore than likely is shaping
(39:05):
their expectations for what'scoming up and That's just smart.
So study, ask questions.
doesn't have to be like, we'regonna sit down and talk about
this.
But just as you guys are doingthings, hey, when you were at
home, you know, who, who washedthe cars or different things
like that.
(39:25):
You know, did you have to foldyour own laundry or, you know,
different things like that.
And I think that will really,one, it may, you may find out
after studying the family, thismight not be a good fit.
I would strongly discourage,marrying someone or moving in
with someone and making a moreof a long lasting commitment.
(39:48):
I would discourage it unless youcan really study the family.
And like I said, It doesn't meanthat you can be there every
Sunday for lunch.
and that's the other thing, notjust household chores and such,
who managed the social calendarin your home?
Maybe your, your father had anassistant that did everything
(40:08):
and it wasn't mom.
and I think that that will.
Always bid you and when indoubt, ask a question, you know,
just keep them talking becausepeople love to talk.
Why do you think we're on apodcast?
We love to talk, but, but yeah,just study the family dynamics.
(40:30):
Look at, your partner'ssiblings.
And how those dynamics betweennot just them as the siblings,
but how their marriages look andI think you can really find out
a whole lot.
Yeah, for sure.
I agree.
So another tip for.
(40:50):
Preventing and ConfrontingWeaponized Incompetence is using
the Fair Play Method.
So this is a system where eachpartner owns a task completely.
And I think there's a lot ofvalue in this, and I think me
and Weston do this in some ways,where like, this specific thing,
like the car maintenance, that'sWeston's job.
Yeah.
Again, I weaponized myincompetence and told him I know
(41:12):
nothing about cars.
No, I'm just kidding.
I think we both agreed on thatpretty early in our marriage
that and that's something he'sfine with doing.
And I am completely responsiblefor paying our bills, which is
fine with me, and that'ssomething we discussed before.
And I think there's value inthis, where you're completely
responsible for a task.
Because then I don't have toremind him to do things all the
(41:33):
time.
Like, he knows he owns this taskcompletely, and he does it.
And it's not like, You all youcan never ask for help if you're
using this method because youcan you just probably won't as
often as if you were Sharing atask.
That's great.
okay, I'm just guessing.
I would say in our relationship,probably 75 percent of what each
(41:57):
of us do is fair play.
Mm hmm.
At least 75, it may be more, butthat's after 30 something years
of being married.
but it doesn't mean that youcan't have it now, you know,
cause you learned from us, but Iwould say at least 75, if not
more, and they're just littlethings.
but it's just somebody got inthe habit of doing it.
(42:18):
And the other one does somethingelse to complement that.
if you're easily overwhelmed, oryour partner is easily
overwhelmed, this really canlower the temperature in the
room.
Yeah, which is great.
Yeah.
and then that, starts withencourage the learning.
(42:38):
Mm hmm.
and that's one thing When I wasdoing the research on this
weaponized incompetence, becausethat's kind of how Kena and I
have it set up.
We each do our own research andthen make our outlines.
So when you're hearing ustalking about it, it's off the
cuff.
I mean, we've got notes, butyeah, it's really just bullet
points.
And then we just go from there.
But, a person's willingness tolearn, is directly related.
(43:03):
To their weaponizedincompetence.
Yeah, and I would say even like,correlated with relationship
success.
Oh, a hundred percent.
Cause I mean, it's just not,it's not even just willingness
to learn tasks to support like,the household.
It's willingness to learn yourpartner, and I think willingness
to learn is like, willingness togrow.
Yes, and I just had a thought.
(43:25):
Think about emotional support.
It is difficult for most, men inparticular, to communicate their
emotions or to really, careabout what's going on with you
and your, your girlfriends, orwho hurt your feelings at work
or whatever.
It may be a Southern thing.
I don't know.
(43:46):
It seems like the way that hasbeen handled, in places that I
know of is more of, Well, I'mjust going to call my friend for
that.
Yeah.
And I'm just going to, you know,well guess what?
One day your friend's not goingto be available and you're going
to have to talk to that personthat you're married to and that
you've been in a relationshipwith for 20 years.
(44:07):
Yeah.
So that is not a pass.
I almost think that's like howyou get to the best friend
level.
Marriage is you treat them likeyou would a girlfriend because
honestly Weston loves the tea.
Oh GMT and a lot of times justbecause he's reactions are as
like it's Excitable or like justnot the same as like a
(44:28):
girlfriend would be I don't feelas inclined to like give him the
full report sometimes but thenI'm like He would love to hear
about this.
Right, right.
And we've talked about thatbefore and I'm not even sure
maybe on one of these podcasts,but you know as far as emotional
just to circle back on what thatoriginal comment was about was
(44:50):
you know, You can run to yourgirlfriends.
Jim, I'm gonna tell you, if Ihave something amazing that
happens, he is not my firstcall.
It's Kena.
If I can't get her, I'm callingClaire or Lisa or somebody, only
because his personality is notas animated.
(45:12):
And at that point, when I'm soexcited, I want to talk to
somebody that's going tocelebrate with me and he's, he's
going to celebrate, but it justmight be in silence.
So, uh, it doesn't, it doesn'tmean that he, he's not happy for
whatever happens and that Idon't tell him.
It's just again, managing thoseexpectations.
(45:32):
I know his personality.
And also history of running tohim with great news and not
getting the reaction that Iwanted.
Yeah.
So, so I'm just like, okay,I'll, but still you can't just
have your friends that arehelping you emotionally.
You, we have to lean into eachother as partners, to handle.
(45:59):
And discover how to handleemotional things that come up,
not just things within your ownrelationship, but, you know,
somebody hurts your feelings atwork or whatever, being open and
helping.
Sometimes we have to help ourspouse learn this, especially
(46:20):
like Jim grew up with all boys.
Yeah.
And Weston too.
I mean, they have, Weston hasfour male cousins, no girls on
that side.
So, a lot of times this stuffhasn't really been talked about
in a way that.
They can process it and learnfrom it and begin to implement
(46:40):
it.
Well, men and women are justraised so differently and I
mean, I disagree with that, butit's just kind of how it is.
It's how our culture and ournorms and gender roles society
have shaped parenting and thatmakes a lot of sense.
Yeah.
But I, I was telling you theother day too.
I saw a reel somewhere and itsays There's kind of a pattern,
(47:02):
and I think it was a therapisthad said, like, she finds it
interesting that a lot of womencome in to learn how to be firm,
speak up for themselves, like,things like that, and then men
are often learning, like, theopposite.
They're learning how to slowdown, how to listen, how to be
tender, yeah, like all thatstuff, and I'm like, well, a lot
(47:22):
of that is just how we treatdifferent genders when we're
raising them, and all thesethings that they're ingesting
from society that are saying,like, men are one thing and
women are one thing, which, Idon't like that, but it is the
way it is.
It is what it is, for sure.
Yes, it is.
I think, and we've mentionedthis before, like, this is the
biggest enabler to weaponizingcompetence, is do not reward the
(47:42):
behavior, resist the rea Theurge to redo their work or say,
it's easier if I just do it oryou don't do it.
Right.
Let me do it.
Don't honey.
It's going to be easier if you,if you do it, but in the long
run, it's not going to befulfilling.
It might be easier in theminutes.
give space and grace.
(48:03):
to not do it the same way.
It's fine.
Mm hmm.
Absolutely.
let's talk about work, since wedid kind of Tell you guys how
you can identify it at work.
Make sure that you're delegatingand holding boundaries.
So don't accept tasks justbecause you're better at it than
someone else.
Especially, I think, someoneelse that you're on the same
level with.
Yeah.
For sure.
Yeah.
(48:23):
And also speak up.
And this can be hard for women,like we just said.
a lot of women have to learn,like, later on in life how to
speak up for themselves and tobe firm and to, you know,
address things as they come up.
So Be comfortable and practiceaddressing imbalances and ask
for a fair task distribution,for example, saying things like,
I think we should rotate, whotakes notes?
(48:45):
Or, I'm happy to help this time,but let's make sure
responsibilities are sharedequally.
there's a lot of differentphrases and things you can use
to make sure that you're notgetting taken advantage of in
that, in the workplace.
Yeah, and, and, Be willing tosay, Oh, I didn't realize that
you don't know how to make aPowerPoint here.
Let's do it together.
So next time you'll know how todo it.
(49:06):
That to me, that can be one ofthe most productive ways if you
can get them to engage.
With doing it.
Yes, absolutely.
Well, yeah, that's the nextthing on the outline It's
encouraged training andaccountability because people
need to take responsibility forlearning tasks instead of
relying on others who know howto do it Or are better than them
or whatever.
(49:27):
Yeah last thing we wanted totouch on, not just relationships
and at work, confronting thisbehavior pattern, because I
think it is so prevalent insociety today, I think it's
important, the phrase, seesomething, say something.
So, challenge the idea thatcertain people should naturally
handle certain roles, call outthese harmful norms, because
when we're just saying that,everything is black and white,
(49:49):
Men should do this.
Women should do this.
This partner should do this.
That partner should do this.
Relationships are not all thesame.
People are not all the same.
Culture, society has changed somuch than it was two generations
ago.
So I think reinforcing gendernorms and stuff like that it's
doing more harm than it is doinggood nowadays.
And we instead should bereinforcing things like really
(50:13):
early communication, Managingyour expectations, setting your
expectations, like, so manyother things I feel like are so
important, but I feel like whenyou do see something, say
something.
And try to have like in depthconversations, not while you're
in the middle.
of somebody weaponizing, youknow, like go back and say,
remember when this happened?
(50:34):
I mean, there's certain things,obviously I'm like deal with it
immediately, but there are timesthat you might need to back off,
cool, cool, cool down and makesure that you're you're my
emotions.
Jim will say, stop yelling atme.
I'm not yelling, but I go up somany, just my tone gets
elevated.
Maybe it is a little yelling.
(50:56):
Okay.
I definitely yell.
I am so sorry, Jim.
I will do better at that.
I really will.
Cause my children hopefully aregoing to listen to this and
they'll call me out, um, Yeah,and then on the societal model,
healthy responsibility, sharing,teach kids that all genders
(51:19):
should contribute equally, andchildren need to be socialized
to take responsibility versusexpecting others to do it for
you.
So what that might look like is,it's a play date and we're
having a picnic.
Making sure like give the taskof handing out the food to both
girls and boys.
I think something that Simplecan really get the little things
(51:44):
that all add up to the bigpicture and what you also have
to understand Okay, we've nottold you about this, but I'm
just having a little light bulbmoment They're not they're not
as often as they used to be soshould probably hang on to this
light bulb moment is It'll beeasier for you to do whatever
(52:04):
your kids you're asking yourkids to do too Okay, it'll be
just easier for you to do it.
It takes more time to teachPatience, we're not doing our
children any favors Doingeverything for them.
Absolutely.
I have messed up on that in insome really key parts like
(52:28):
laundry and stuff like that.
I never really made, them do it.
Well, Garrett started doing hislaundry.
I think he was like six or sevenGarrett.
I hope you're listening to this.
He was probably six or seven.
And like I said, he liked hisclothes just so much.
So he decided.
I'm going to do my own laundry.
(52:49):
I don't want Weston's dirtyclothes touching my dirty
clothes.
He is a true unicorn of a child.
I don't think I've ever heard ofanyone else doing that.
So literally, six or seven.
And Jim would say, that'sridiculous.
He don't even have enough for afull load.
I'm like, that's what he wantsto do.
I'll choose my battles.
Well, overall, I think you did agood job.
(53:10):
I don't think you can be perfectin all the areas because, I
mean, I wouldn't know anythingabout raising kids, but I'm sure
it's a lot.
It is, but what you're raisingis little adults.
so, just as moms, as dads, asaunts.
As grandparents, make sure thatyou're, we need to make sure
(53:32):
we're not contributing to thatweaponized incompetence.
We're not laying the foundation.
For another brick, and anotherbrick, and another brick.
Yeah.
I think entitlement andweaponizing competence are
distant, maybe not even distantrelatives.
Oh.
They can definitely go hand inhand, I think, especially when
we're talking about parenting.
(53:54):
Mm hmm.
For sure.
So the last thing on a societallevel, and I think this can
apply to relationships as wellfor sure, is don't keep score.
So if you do notice a pattern,pay attention to it, and bring
attention to it if necessary.
But don't keep score becausewhat did you tell me earlier
today?
it's really funny.
I'm a little sidebar.
(54:14):
I was looking at the outline andwas putting something in.
And so I put something inearlier in the outline about not
keeping score.
And then I saw it on downfurther and I was like, Oh, she
already did it.
Um, you.
First of all don't keep scorebecause you will always win.
It's so subjective.
It is so subjective that Youwill win.
(54:36):
Yeah, the person that's keepingthat scorecard is always gonna
score better Especially when youhave, feelings of resentment.
Yes.
Because you're using thatresentment to, like, bolster
your score to make yourself feelbetter.
Or your resentment is just,like, clouding your perception
to where you're only noticingthings that your partner does
(54:57):
that will add a point to yourscore or whatever it is.
Yeah, This is probably one ofthe key, I think, contributors
to failed relationships is thewhole keeping score.
Well, I did it last time, heneeds to do it this time.
Or, I'm doing this while he'sdoing that.
Or, you know, even with friendsand stuff like that.
(55:18):
keeping score, first of all,against somebody that you're
committed to is basically likesaying, I win and if I'm
winning, they're losing and noneof us want these folks that we
love so much.
No one.
We're not looking to make themlose, but when we insist on
(55:40):
winning Individually, then wehave set up for them to be able
to lose Yeah So instead ofkeeping score between each
other, I would suggest Takeinventory and score Together,
like maybe you have and itdoesn't have to be a set amount
of time, but you know, you cansit down and talk, you know, we
(56:03):
need to grade our relationshiptogether.
I agree.
Definitely.
I think the perspective shiftyou need to have, if you ever
find yourself slipping intolike, I'm winning, he's losing,
or whatever, winning, losing.
Not good.
We need to shift perspective toit's us versus the problem, me
versus you.
Yes.
(56:23):
That's the perspective shift.
Yes.
And I have to like, check myselfon that sometimes when I'm
feeling very frustrated withWeston.
I'm like, okay, he's a greatpartner in the terms that he
listens to me and he takesaccountability for his actions
and he works to change thethings I need him to change.
And so I have to remind myselfof that and say, I need to go to
him.
I need to express how I'mfeeling and then we'll figure
(56:45):
out how we're going to tacklethis issue together versus I'm
frustrated and I'm keepingscore, whatever, whatever.
It's y'all versus the problem.
Oh, I love that.
I love that.
Well, guys, I didn't think ofit.
I've heard it many times over.
So what she said, Oh, this is agood one.
Go ahead.
You talk.
(57:06):
Yeah, this is, probably one ofmy favorite wishy seds that
we've had.
I just feel like it's very, verymeaningful.
So the quote is, Once you carryyour own water, you will learn
the value of every drop.
Oh.
It's an African proverb, too,which is interesting.
So good.
That is so good.
So this really ties in the ideathat when people take
(57:28):
responsibility, they realize theeffort involved.
And how this relates toweaponizing competence is, I
think, If you're noticing thatthis is a pattern or something
that's happening and you're ableto confront whoever it is you're
dealing with and work towards asolution and start to shift
things and they start to realizethat the mental load you're
(57:50):
carrying, once they start tomaybe help out a little bit more
and the division of labor is alittle bit better, they realize
the effort that you're spendingmentally and physically and
emotionally into each one ofthese tasks.
And so, I just think that's soimportant.
It's so important.
And again, I just want to pointout parents and grandparents get
(58:12):
your kids.
On board in sharing loads indoing things that they're not
great at, but they could learn.
That's why self people happenbecause they're never expected
to do anything that they're notgood at or that they want to do.
Yeah.
So, our challenge this weekendis think of the way you can set
(58:34):
a boundary or push back againstweaponized incompetence in your
life.
Um, yeah.
I already have some ideas.
You do?
Tell me one.
Well, I mentioned earlier thatWes is going to have more work
life balance, so he's got a newjob.
Oh, she's moving, y'all.
I am moving.
Sad.
We're going to film a bunch ofepisodes this week, but it's
(58:55):
actually going to be betterbecause we're going to have more
things to talk about in ourintros, because we would sit
down and be like, well.
What are we, what are we talkingabout now?
Other than the episode content.
Yeah.
But Weston's gonna have morework life balance and I do want
him to learn to do some of thethings that I do and like try to
(59:16):
do them even if I'm going to endup doing them long term.
I want him to realize the effortit takes me to get those things
done.
Cause I just feel like that willMake me feel like he's more of
an equal partner and I feel likeit'll make him have a better
appreciation for me if he knowshow to do things.
So if I need to ask him to payall the bills, he'll know how to
(59:36):
do it and he'll realize this ishow much effort goes into making
sure you pay every single billand tracking the whole budget.
And this is where the chat goes.
Boom, boom, boom.
Well, guys, we are so glad youjoined us today.
if you're listening to us onYouTube, we ask that you like
(59:56):
and subscribe to our channel.
You can also find us on Spotifyand Apple Podcasts.
Apple's podcast.
Apple's podcast at generationalteapod.
Yep, that's us.
like us.
Give us some information, and tocircle back, what are you fed up
with?
Yeah, let us know.
(01:00:17):
Leave us a comment.
What are you fed up with?
It could be anything.
Yeah, it might be the personyou're sitting beside.
Not, I'm definitely not fed upwith her, but you know what I'm
saying.
And that's the tea.
Thank you guys.
I am fed up with lots of things,but one of them would be
menopause.
I am fed up with hormones.
I'm fed up with TMS, even thoughI haven't had a period in how
long?
And I still PMS.
The only reason why I know it'sPMS, there's two reasons.
(00:35):
One is, the fact that we'reusually together on it.
We're both kind of irritable atthe same time.
We both want to leave ourhusbands at the same time.
So we talk each other out of it.
Like, do you hate Jim?
Do you hate Weston?
And we're PMS ing! Yes, and justhormones in general.
(00:56):
but, on a lighter note, we justgot back from Miami a couple
weeks ago, and there's one thingthat really burns me up.
In Miami, other than the sun andthe heat.
It is that people down theredon't wear clothing.
(01:16):
And I'm about fed up with it.
I'm like, what the heck?
I know it's hot, but don't youguys have jobs?
And who's working right now iswhat I want to know.
Cause I, everywhere I go, it'scrowded during the day.
Yeah.
Hey, back when I was growing up,if you went to the DMV, like,
during the middle of the day,wasn't nobody there.
(01:37):
Everybody's working.
You could take 10 minutes offlittle route to wherever you're
going, because everybody's atwork.
No one's on the road.
Now, I wonder who works.
Everybody's on the road.
They work, but they don't havethe traditional schedule.
Yeah, which is actually awesomeBut it does make running errands
more troublesome Different areyou do you have anything you're
(02:01):
fed up with I'm fed up with theweather because one week It'll
be like 65, but I'm like here wego.
It's spring and then the nextweek It'll be like 20 degrees
and I'm like, okay Can we justmake a decision?
Exactly.
But I don't know why I'msurprised because I feel like
it's like this every year.
It is.
So.
It is.
literally every year I'm like,gosh, this weather is bipolar.
(02:23):
And then it just, every year,I'm like, okay.
Stop being fed up.
It's just how it is.
It is how it is.
And the final thing that I'mreally fed up with.
Is when you let someone walk infront of you in a car, you know,
like you stop at the crosswalkor you stop in the middle of
your route because somebody'salready stepped out in front of
you and you wait and then theytake their time getting across
(02:48):
the road.
That burns me up to the pointthat I think about it all the
time.
And so this morning we went toCostco and there were lots of
cars everywhere.
People were stopping to let us,and literally Jim and I are
running through the parking lotof Costco because I'm like, I
can't make these people wait.
I know that's how I am.
(03:09):
I do like an awkward littlescurry because I'm like, Oh my
God, they're waiting for me.
Exactly.
What is wrong?
So, public service announcement.
If somebody lets you go acrossthe road, you don't have to run,
but just pick it up just alittle bit.
Just pick up the pace just atiny bit.
Well, I think a lot of peoplehave main character syndrome,
(03:30):
which like, in a way you are themain character in your own
story, but The world's notrevolving around you.
Yeah.
So be considerate.
Yes.
Are you talking about me?
Huh?
Or them?
Huh?
Well, I think we all do.
But I think we at least areconsiderate to a degree.
Yeah.
Yeah, we're still maincharacters in our own story.
Yes.
(03:50):
Well, we're doing this episodeon one of the many things we are
fed up with, which is why weopened with that, and it is
weaponized incompetence.
So when did you first hear thisterm?
From you.
Maybe a couple of months.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean now that I know the term,I definitely know what the
disease process is.
Once you know what it is, you'relike, oh my, it's everywhere.
(04:13):
It is everywhere.
I probably heard it first a yearor so ago, and I've never been
able to get that out of my head.
And it's pretty crazy.
So that's why we decided to doan episode on it today.
Especially because it'ssomething that we think women
should be aware of.
And We'll get into why that is,but anyways, welcome to another
(04:34):
episode of the Generational TeaPodcast.
I'm Kena.
And I'm Ronnie.
And we are in double digits ofepisodes, I think.
I think so.
We're somewhere in the 10 or 11or so.
So that's really exciting.
And we just had our one monthanniversary a couple days ago.
Yeah.
Happy Anniversary.
What's happening?
I know.
Happy Anniversary.
(04:55):
So, while you're here, we wouldlove it, after you finish this
episode, go ahead and leave us areview.
We would love to hear yourfeedback, and it helps us build
our little podcast business tohelp us reach more people, which
is the goal, because we wantmore women to know how to speak
up for themselves, how to feelfree, how to make their lives
better, so how you can supportus is leaving us a review,
(05:15):
checking out our social media atgenerational teapot, and yeah.
Message us if you want to talkto us about anything.
Let us know how your weeklychallenges go.
We love to hear from you guys.
So, all righty then.
Well, we're going to open withsome research.
before we get into what isweaponized incompetence and all
the little fun sections we haveabout that, according to recent
(05:37):
research, 71 percent of motherstypically carry the mental load
in a household, meaning they'reresponsible for the majority of
planning, organizing,remembering, household
management tasks like Gettinggroceries, scheduling
everything, taking care of thekids.
Do you feel like you took moreof the mental load?
I think I did in some respects.
(05:57):
I think especially early on inyour marriage, because you don't
really know.
Who's best at something?
I think, honestly, like onceyou've probably been married,
maybe five years, but we don'thave to wait five years.
we're bringing this to y'all.
So if you're dating or newlymarried, wherever you are in
your season of life, Takes awhile to really find out what
(06:24):
your spouse is good at.
like Jim and I never livedtogether before we got married
and we met and married in eightmonths.
So basically, we had a baby, wehad a baby two years later and
then another baby.
so yeah.
I think for sure, especiallyduring the beginning.
Well, I feel like there's somany stereotypes where like men
(06:46):
aren't good at multitasking orlike women are just better at
doing some things or like,that's just how men are, which I
feel like.
Perpetuates this problem morethan it should be because at the
end of the day, we're all humanbeings and men and women can do
all the same things that they'recapable of and obviously it's
going to be dependent on yourrelationship and like you said,
(07:06):
like what you're good at, likedividing the labor, but I think
a recurring theme in a lot ofrelationships and it's reflected
in a lot of media is that womenare taking on all the mental
load and then there's like thebumbling dad who's just like,
Bringing home the paycheck andall that stuff.
Disney World dad.
Exactly.
Takes the kids to Chuck E.
Cheese on Saturday and he's ahero.
(07:28):
Yeah.
So, like I said, a lot of thingswill play into this and a lot of
it's, you know, going to bedependent on your relationship
and your personalities, but itis really important to
understand when weaponizing thecompetence is happening and you
have to understand that it's notjust men that are doing this, it
can be women, it's justtypically men, I think, that are
doing this in relationships.
(07:49):
They may not be conscious ofthem doing it, so.
You being conscious of it andbringing it into the
conversation and being aware ofit can help you Change your
relationship for the better andmaybe divide the mental load.
So it's not predominantly onyou.
Yeah, What is weaponizedincompetence?
(08:09):
The definition is the act ofpretending To be bad at a task
or exaggerating your difficulty,to avoid doing it, often forcing
someone else to take over.
And that I have seen in mychildren.
They're getting better,especially my youngest, my
(08:34):
husband.
I'm trying not to point him out,but listen, I be getting on him.
Okay.
Yes, yes, yes.
But well, you did do a great jobof raising a son that whenever I
raise issues with him, or I wanthim to change his behavior, he
doesn't get defensive.
And he's not like, I don't dothat or whatever.
He's always receptive.
And he's apologetic.
(08:55):
You know, he takesaccountability for the things
he's done wrong.
And we're still working on, youknow, changing the behavior.
But hey, that's a massiveaccomplishment.
That's a massive accomplishment,for sure.
Yes.
We're talking more aboutrelationships, side by side
relationships, but also, youknow, I have people in my family
(09:16):
who have done this, and I'mrecognizing it, and I think for
me, it's just been eye openingto really, not so much point it
out to them because there'sreally nothing I can do to make
them change that, you know, butjust being aware of it and not,
not to get defensive about it,but more to just.
(09:38):
Kind of know where it's comingfrom.
Yeah.
Well, awareness on your partwill help you.
And we're going to talk aboutthe tools you can use.
It'll help you stop enabling itbecause we do that.
We're enablers.
Okay.
They might be incompetent, butwe are enablers of their
incompetence.
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
We're incompetent.
In handling their incompetence.
Oh lord, yes.
(09:59):
So we're going to give you somecommon examples that might help
you recognize this instead ofjust hearing a definition and
trying to think, okay, does mypartner do this?
Does my family do this?
So one example.
Or do I do this?
True.
I think a lot of times, whenwe're evaluating, Okay.
Our partners, our family, otherpeople in our circle, I would
(10:20):
just strongly advise, you know,turn that on yourself first, get
along, think through it, takesome notes, that way When you're
approaching somebody, you cansay, you know, this is the thing
that I struggle with that.
I think I know what we weaponizeincompetence for.
Well, we just said it earlier.
We're like, I don't knowanything about cars.
(10:42):
I caught it too.
I was like, shoot, we got tolearn more about cars.
No, no, no, no, no.
I'll find another way.
I carry a lot of mental load.
So I think he can handle that.
Exactly.
So one example is.
I can't cook like you do.
So the partner never tries.
So, and an example from this outof my own marriage is that well,
(11:07):
I love doing cooking.
It's like a self care for me.
But sometimes, golly, I don'twant to do it.
And one morning Weston and Iwere just lazing about, and I
wasn't hungry, so I didn'treally feel like cooking
breakfast.
I was reading my book that I wasreally into, and Weston wanted
me to make pancakes.
And I was like, you can do it,and he was like, I don't know
how.
And I was like, well, by God,the recipe's on the box, so I'm
(11:29):
sure you can figure it out.
Ding ding! We have a winner! Andyou know what?
He made himself pancakes.
Yeah.
Yeah, there you go.
That's great.
Another one is, I don't knowwhere the kids clothes are, so
the mom has to do all thepacking.
And I definitely can say thatthat was a common thread.
(11:50):
And our home was, yeah.
Mm hmm, yep.
Another one is, Oh, you handleall the social plans.
I'm really bad at rememberingbirthdays or events or whatever
it is.
I feel like women are definitelythe social planners of the
family.
I guess it depends on therelationship, but I know like
for you and me, we're the moresocial people of our husbands.
So we kind of take control ofthat.
(12:10):
But I also think that that couldbe divided more evenly.
Just in being raised and seeingother my aunts my uncles my
parents and all that itdefinitely the Tendency that I
saw a lot was that they tookcare of all the birthdays They
reminded their spouses of theirparents birthdays their parents
(12:32):
anniversaries and then it justbecame taking on that and I've
really That's one thing thatI've tried to back out of with
Jim and just like let himhandle.
Well, I think you have to.
I think when you take a lot oftraditions or you like watch
your family, your older familythat's from a totally different
(12:53):
generation where not as manywomen worked as they did today.
Right.
And so you have to be carefulwith what things you're bringing
into your relationship that maynot work because you had a
career.
I mean, I, I work as well and alot of women and.
And marriages and relationshipswork today, so it's, you know,
not that when you're notworking, or if you're raising
(13:15):
kids, that's absolutely a fulltime job, you can take more of
the mental load, because again,it just depends on your
relationship and how you guyscommunicate, but Yeah, and the
season that your kids are in.
Mm hmm.
Because, you know.
A lot of stuff, time opens uponce you get them in school., If
you decide to send them toschool.
Oh sure., Oh, this was a goodone.
(13:37):
I don't know how to talk aboutmy feelings., This is one
partner avoiding conflictresolution while the other is
having to take an extra mentalload to help their partner work
through their own feelings.
So you've come to the tablewith.
Your own stuff, you know, maybeit's a pattern that you've seen.
It's something that you feellike you need to talk, with your
(13:59):
partner or parent, child.
this can happen because you comeinto it.
With not necessarily an agenda,but you've got a thought process
already going and you could beexhausted About what you're
getting ready to have todiscuss, but when you meet a
roadblock like this When it'slike, you know, I'm not good at
(14:21):
talking about my feelings.
Well, guess what?
Today's your first lesson Thisis feelings 101.
Yeah, and So, that can be veryfrustrating.
And that is a therapy.
Yes, because you don't want totake all that on I had a past
relationship where we would haveyou having a difficult
(14:43):
conversation and I'd be likeasking him how he feels or
whatever, whatever he would justsay, like, I don't know, like, I
don't know.
And I'm like, okay, well, how doI get you to figure out what
you're feeling so that we canresolve this?
Yeah.
And that's a whole nother thinginstead of just like tackling
the issue together.
Right.
Right.
Okay.
Another one is I can't change adiaper.
(15:04):
It's really bad.
And I feel like I've seen thisso many times in like sitcoms or
whatever.
Like again, like the bumblingdad trope who doesn't know how
to do anything other than bringhome a paycheck.
Yeah.
It's like, I don't know how tochange a diaper.
I can't do that.
Go to therapy.
Well, poor Jim.
When we had the kids, I workedpart time, like every other
(15:26):
weekend, 12 hour shifts istypically what I did, even back
then, and things were not nearlyas expensive, I was a registered
nurse, and I still could notjustify Putting my kids in
daycare because basically what Iwas doing was working to pay for
daycare So I did the every otherweekend thing and it was 12 hour
shifts So Jim was a hundredpercent full dad on those
(15:50):
weekends, and he was very goodI'm sure we had a discussion.
I don't remember itspecifically, but I'm sure we
had the discussion that said noYou're not gonna spend the
weekend at your mom's With ourchildren.
They're your children And you'regoing to learn how to take And
you know what?
Trial by fire.
(16:10):
I just left and he did great.
a little funny thing especiallywhen we had the two littles in
Weston, never cared what he hadon to wear, you know, just as
long as it was comfortable.
He didn't care, you know,Garrett came out Organized in a
closet, but Weston was so easyand because we were dealing with
(16:30):
Another child that was it wasvery important to him Yeah, how
he looked and all that not tosay one was better than the
other but my friends at churchwould talk about that they
always knew that The weekends Iwas working, based on what
Weston had on.
Because most of the time, he hadon what his dad put on Saturday
(16:53):
morning, he slept in that, andthen, okay, it looks great,
because he's trying to deal withthe other one that only wants to
wear certain things, and soWeston would just turn up in the
same clothes.
And they would be like, oh, hehad his pajama top on, but he
had a pair of shorts on.
Dude, he still wears the same,work pants for like a week
straight.
(17:14):
Things should be hung up.
So anyways, when we get to this,I can't change a diaper.
Okay.
Maybe that's true right now, butlater we're going to talk about
like.
The effort part, because you mayhave to take time to show that,
but understand when they'redoing household chores or tasks
(17:39):
or taking care of children, thelast thing you want to do is be
critical.
You have to let them do it.
You have to let them fail.
And it has to be okay if it'snot your way.
Yeah, we're gonna talk aboutthat later when we talk about
not enabling that behavior.
And part of that is not redoingtheir work or saying, oh, you
(17:59):
don't do it right, let me do it.
Oh, yeah.
Let them fail.
Let them get better.
Let them learn.
Yes, yes.
For your own benefit, long term.
Yeah.
like I said earlier, intent ispart of this.
And it's not always a maliciousbehavior pattern.
But it can be.
So sometimes this behaviorpattern can be learned and it
can be subconscious.
But whether the person that'sdoing it knows it or not, that
(18:22):
doesn't mitigate the impact onthe other partner.
So one person bears the burdenwhile the other gets off easy,
whether they know they're doingit or not.
There's also some long termconsequences that happen, if you
continue in this pattern, itleads to resentment, exhaustion,
lack of trust, and an imbalancein relationships.
(18:43):
This lack of trust is big timefor me because If we ask for
something that needs to be doneand it continually gets pushed
back, That part is reallyfrustrating and I feel like
that's where the lack of trustis.
Yeah, it's lack of being able tosay to your partner or to
(19:07):
someone I really need this.
I can't do this by myself, butcan you do it because what
happens again while it continuesto be pushed off and put behind
and put behind what ends uphappening is you stop asking.
Cause you have no trust thatthey're going to do it.
You have no trust that they'regoing to do it.
And a hundred percent of thetime for me,, I won't say
(19:31):
anything until one other thingtips me off and I blow up and
that is definitely not wiseeither.
It's not the healthiest, butunderstandable at the same time.
Exactly.
So the trusting part is so key.
And I think, I'll just tell youwith mine, Jim's relationship,
(19:52):
because this is kind ofsomething that we still deal
with.
and he's got more time on hishands now, but it is still
something.
And so I've had to, at somepoints he's, he said, I'm going
to take care of it.
I told you I was going to do it.
And I'm like, well, how do Iknow you're really going to do
it?
And he said, I told you, and Isaid, I will say based on what
(20:15):
evidence Give me some evidenceNow what i've done he shouldn't
be offended by that, but heshould say That's a point and
when we have had discussionslike that and I am, able to keep
my emotions in check.
and I say, you know, I hear thatyou're, you're saying you're
(20:36):
gonna do it again, but I can'tbelieve that.
Yeah.
Because I don't have a trust inyou.
Right.
Right.
And a lot of women, I mean.
We've never had the resources,but definitely a lot of women
will just say, okay, I'm justgoing to start making a list and
I'm going to call a contractoror handyman and get them out
(20:57):
here and do it.
But again, that's not, that'sjust an enabling, enabling.
Right, right.
Okay.
Definitely.
I mean, and I think I've evenexperienced, like, me and Weston
have been together five years.
And he has been in collegeathletics, which is a very toxic
(21:18):
non work life balance thing.
So he's working 78 hours a weeksometimes.
And so I'm carrying a lot of themental load, which I knew that
going in, and that's okay.
But even when he's not atworking, we've had issues with
weaponized incompetence.
And I He's not conscious of it,he has ADHD as well, and he's
really tired from working somany hours, and I'll ask him to
(21:39):
do things, because I'm at mylimit, and I know I need help,
and then he'll forget to dothem.
And then, I have definitelyexperienced the same thing as
you, the lack of trust, whereI'm like, I don't even want to
ask him to do things anymore.
Like, it's not like that rightnow, but at a point it was,
where I was like, I don't evenwant to ask you to do things
anymore, because you're gonnaforget.
And I'm going to have to followup with you, which is another
(22:00):
thing on my mental load, and I'mgoing to have to remind you.
And he used to get annoyed whenI would nag him or remind him.
And I'm like, dude, well, youdon't do it.
So what do you expect me to do?
And he was like, you're right.
I'm like, maybe I am, and that'sjust like in little periods of
time and my relationship.
And when you're married, like.
Decades and you're just dealingwith this like long long term.
(22:24):
I can't imagine to think of howthese Long term consequences
just build up and then it'scyclical.
no one's perfect.
So it's always gonna be there,but it's how you handle it, how
quickly we can recognize it.
Not that somebody else is doingit.
How quickly can I recognize whenI'm doing it?
(22:45):
And, you know, typically if it'ssomething you recognize that
you're doing and you say, youknow what?
That was wrong.
I shouldn't have asked you to dothat.
I'm going to try to do itmyself.
That will help your partner tokind of like, Oh, that's how you
handle it when you blow it.
Because that's what we need themost knowledge on is how do we
(23:07):
respond when we blow it?
Yeah, definitely.
Awareness is what we'redefinitely we want to talk about
for sure.
Well our ultimate goal here Imean unless it's a very
unhealthy relationship.
We want marriages andrelationships to thrive and The
reason we're talking aboutthings like these is so that we
(23:28):
can raise awareness foryourself, for your partner, for
everything, because we want tosee success.
And this is actually an issue,an uneven division of labor has
caused a significant percent offailed relationships.
So, a statistic according toHarvard 25 percent of failed
(23:48):
relationships are due to Thingslike uneven division of labor,
and that could be related toweaponized incompetence.
Yeah.
So.
There's an interesting statisticfor you, why things like these
are important to know andimportant to work through and
get on the other side of.
Yes, work through it soonerrather than later.
And then you'll have to workthrough it again and again as
(24:10):
stages of life happen, but alsoyour partner is going to have to
work with your own.
Yeah.
So.
Yeah, definitely.
Well, we want to give you someexamples, not just in
relationships, but in theworkplace as well.
Because like we just said, a lotmore women are in the workplace
nowadays.
weaponizing incompetence issomething that is not just in
relationships, it can beanywhere else, but especially
(24:30):
the workplace as well.
So we're going to give you someexamples.
One is, can you take the meetingnotes?
You're better at that.
Hmm.
Hmm.
Hmm.
and what about, I'm not good atorganizing things, can you plan
the event?
Hmm.
So while there is value in aworkplace of identifying and
(24:53):
assigning tasks based onstrength.
I think sometimes this can getabused, especially with women.
There's a lot of research thatsupports that women tend to take
on like the office housework,which is like note taking,
scheduling, mentoring,organizing, stuff like that.
While men are able to focus ontasks that are more promotable
(25:14):
in nature, like financial thingsand project management.
Over time, and this isn'thappening everywhere, but it,
can be prone to happen, and sobeing able to recognize it is
important because eventually ifyou're doing all the office
housework and you're strugglingto get a promotion, you're going
to have burnout in your career,you just might be stagnant for a
time, and that can be sofrustrating, especially when you
(25:34):
want to climb the ladder.
Yeah, A psychological impact wewanna talk about.
And something I have noticedmyself doing is gaslighting and
self doubt.
So the person that is left doingall the work starts questioning
their own expectations.
They start thinking, Maybe I'mexpecting too much.
He does work really hard atwork.
Ding, ding, ding.
(25:55):
He does make more money than me.
Ding, ding, ding.
I'm saying ding, ding, dingbecause these are things that I
have thought in my brain.
I get frustrated with him, andthen I start gaslighting myself,
or I start doubting, like, thethings I'm asking him to do.
And, you have been instrumentalin helping me realize that I
can't be doing that.
I don't remember when you toldme this, about having a
(26:19):
marriage.
It's like, your husband cannotcome home and just check out.
Which is what Weston used to alot more than he does now.
But I am still justified inasking him for things because I
know when I'm at my limitmentally and physically and
emotionally, and I need help todo all these things that a
relationship and adulting andliving demands.
(26:41):
I'm still struggling with this,I'm still like, oh I'm asking
him too much or I always work sohard.
And then I also don't attributethat to myself.
I also work really hard.
Like I expect a lot of myselfand I know when I, I know where
my limits are.
So I need to stop gaslightingmyself.
Yeah.
Yeah.
there's not a free pass when youcome home to check out.
(27:04):
and I think we might havealready talked about this, but I
think it's, it bodes mentioningis, If your husband does have a
very stressful job, just ingeneral, they've been gone for
eight hours a day, especially ifthey don't get their energy from
people.
They get their energy fromquiet, solitude, nature, and
we're both married to those kindof men.
(27:26):
And I had to finally figure outif I gave him 30 minutes after
he walked through the door, thenI could pretty much ask him
anything.
Yeah.
If I was able to just give himbut see what happens is you get
in a pattern Of as soon as theywalk through the door, you're
exhausted.
You're at your limit You've gottwo in diapers and one that
(27:48):
needs help with homework orwhatever When you start
establishing a pattern of whenthey come home, you just unload
on them What happens is one theytake the long way home sometimes
But the other is they arealready we whoever it is.
We're already Ramped up andalready offended before we ever
(28:10):
get out of the car because wealready know what's coming Yeah
But you want to shock the pantsoff of somebody break that
pattern and then it it may takea while but you retrain neural
pathways that you know Hedoesn't have to be triggered or
frustrated on the way home fromwork because he knows when he
(28:31):
gets home I'm gonna unload andjust like expectations again.
Definitely.
Well yeah, utilizing that withWeston since he did have a very
demanding job.
He's getting ready to have amore balanced one soon.
Yay! So maybe I won't gaslightmyself as much.
Yeah.
But yeah, I would let him have anap or have like an hour or two
just unwind.
(28:52):
Cause he would be socializingand he'd be after like a 12, 13
hour shift.
So I'd let him have his time.
And I think.
Letting him have that time andthen still being able to like
ask him things to do I would notdoubt Myself asking him those as
much right?
So it definitely helps when youcreate little life hacks.
(29:14):
Yeah.
Yeah.
The other thing is if you needsomething done now, you need to
specify that.
Yeah.
But it needs to be an emergency.
everything cannot be the fire.
and so I have tried and I stillfail a lot, but I've tried to,
when I've asked Jim something, alot of times I'll say, I'll
(29:35):
preface it with, you know, inthe next few days, can you do
this,, and then just let it goand see the other thing is, if I
need something done right then Ineed to specify, I mean,
obviously, if he comes home inthe toilet and the house is
flooded, but if I need him toreally do something right then
specify that and don't leteverything be a fire or an
(29:58):
emergency because then you'vejust conditioned them to not
take you seriously.
Yeah.
And you're catastrophizing everyrequest.
And you're catastrophizing everyrequest.
The other thing that I would,suggest doing is when we ask, if
there are specific things,details that we want them to pay
(30:19):
attention to, first of all, Iwould say, can we?
Do this together.
If it's something that youreally are hung up on, it needs
to be done in this order withthis equipment or whatever.
I would suggest that you jointhem in that task, because if
you say, can you do this and,can you wash the car and I need
(30:42):
it inside vacuum and, becareful, Pay close attention to
underneath the mats in the back,because there's a bunch of
goldfish down there or whateverit is, it can grate on people's
nerves.
So I would just say you have aright to be specific, but just
use that when it's reallynecessary as you grow in your
(31:06):
marriage and in yourrelationships and partnerships
that can begin.
To have a little more presence,but when you're trying to, like,
establish a communication,tactic, I don't mean it that way
method, maybe a method more, butyeah, I'd say for sure, and
there is a, as far as like thegaslighting and self doubt, and
(31:27):
there can be a manipulativeaspect to this as well.
So if someone is more.
intentional with theirweaponizing competence and they
insist, like, they just can't,then that will make you feel bad
for pushing them.
And that's not acceptable.
So definitely, when they'reinsisting that they can't do
something or they won't, andthen you start feeling bad for
even asking them, hmm, hmm,maybe it's time for a
(31:51):
conversation.
Yeah.
Encourage learning.
That's the difference.
And we'll get to that in aminute, but that's the
difference when somebody says, Ican't or I don't know how, but
are they willing to learn?
Yeah, that's the whole thing.
The person that's carrying theload of experiences and
exhaustion and frustration, ifit stays there, it's going to
(32:14):
get really nasty.
Like I was saying, you know,it's something completely,
Irrelevant to what is actuallygoing on at the current time.
It's all this resentment thatwe've held back on.
It just explodes.
I'm guilty of that as well.
I'll be holding resentment overmy brain.
(32:35):
I'll be like, I asked him to dothis three weeks ago and he
didn't do it.
And then I asked him for thatlast week and he didn't do it.
And then he'll do like one veryminor thing that grates on my
nerves.
And I'm just like.
Yeah.
and you really understand,what's the best communication
mode.
I feel like that Jim does prettygood with list I don't do it as
(32:56):
much as I should because he justretired and I didn't want him to
go back to work.
So I've been really good and notasking for much, but lists
sometimes work for folks.
Uh, put it in priority.
You know, one means.
This is the first thing I needfor you to take off the list.
Weston I know does good withlists.
In the past.
(33:16):
That's about what we had to do.
and.
I do good with lists.
If somebody's expectingsomething from me, I love that.
I want the list.
I want to, for you to rank inorder of importance, you know,
that kind of thing.
Oh yeah.
I agree.
Same.
Yeah.
Cause, cause this is, oh, it canreally still kill and destroy
(33:41):
not only your relationship withyour partner, but your
relationships with other folksin your Family friends when
you're hurt because hurt peoplehurt people.
It's true.
So that's a big thing to kind oftake inventory and when you have
these thoughts just say okayWhere's this coming from and it
(34:04):
it doesn't have to be like anDialogue that you're having out
loud.
Yeah, but definitely try yourbest not to get in that
resentment mode.
Yeah, don't let it build up.
I, my family has not been greatat like communicating issues as
they come up, which is somethingI inherited.
Weston's been great at likeencouraging me to bring up
(34:25):
issues as they arise.
So that's something I'm workingon for myself and it definitely
helps our relationship when I'mlike noting things like.
Okay.
Hey, I asked you to do somethingand you forgot and that's
frustrating for me because Ifeel like I have to like follow
up with you about everything andhe's like, yeah, you're right.
Okay.
I'll do it right when you ask meto and I'm like, okay, that's a
lot better than me one monthafter the offense, keeping track
(34:49):
of everything he's doing andthen blowing up on him and then
he doesn't go on the defense,but it can just seem like so
much worse of an emotionalreaction from me onto him and
that's just not good for eitherof us.
Right.
Right.
So while we're talking aboutpsychological impact and we've
kind of already mentioned thisas well We're talking about like
(35:10):
older generations So there is alot of cultural and gender norms
that shape who's expected tonaturally handle certain tasks
So for example, I think everyoneknows this women are most
expected to manage Householdtasks and child rearing
especially if their husband isthe breadwinner But we just
wanted to encourage you guysthat just because these are
(35:32):
Quote unquote norms.
You can challenge these in yourown household.
communicate.
Just because your husband worksand brings in the income, that
does not mean he can check outand use weaponized incompetence
to keep doing so.
So, challenge the norms in yourhousehold.
Find what works best for you.
In some cases, maybe Fittinginto those norms is what works
best for you and your husband.
(35:53):
Like, you never know.
Every relationship is different.
There's no relationship that'sgonna be the same.
But make sure you're actuallyhaving the conversations.
I remember Weston and I did thislittle marriage workbook pretty
early on in our marriage and Weeach had to check off, whether
it was me or him, like, each ofthese random adult household
(36:14):
marriage tasks, like, what didwe think, who should we think
should be doing this?
And actually our answers werepretty much the same, but it was
interesting for us to, gothrough that, and then discuss
it together, like, I said heshould be doing all the car
maintenance, and he agreed.
And then I said I should also doall the cooking.
Well, most of the cooking.
He does help cook as well.
(36:34):
Yeah, he does.
He can.
But I just think having thisconversation was so important
for us to set up the rest of ourrelationship and obviously it's
an ongoing dialogue and lifehappens, things change, stuff
like that.
So it's important to keeptalking about these things, but
I think it's most importantfirst that you're challenging
the norms and finding out whereyour expectations lie, the both
(36:55):
of you.
Yeah, yeah.
Find out to What's reallymeaningful to your spouse,
especially if you have more timein the home, whether that's
taking care of kids or even justworking from home, a big thing
for me is, and it's you too, isif my.
Countertops are clean in mykitchen.
(37:16):
The whole world could fallapart.
I would be perfectly happy.
Yeah, I'm crazy about cleancountertops.
Yes, yes.
If you find something and youknow something that's really,
really important to them that,maybe at the end of the day,
Jim, you still love coffee.
I'd throw in a pot of coffee.
While I was making dinnerbecause I knew that he likes
(37:38):
coffee in the evening or justdifferent things like that
because the goal is to out serveeach other the Imbalance comes
when one person's doing it andthe others not yeah So.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
So the next section we're goingto get into is basically, you
know, how did we stop enabling?
How do we confront and preventthis behavior?
(37:59):
First we're going to tackle inrelationships, what can we do to
prevent this and confront it inour relationship?
So kind of like I was just goingon about set expectations early,
have conversations about sharingresponsibilities, expectations
you have and ensure that youguys reach what you both think
is a fair division of labor.
And it may take time and you mayhave to revise that constantly,
(38:22):
but you're probably going toavoid a lot of frustration and
all kinds of bad stuff if youcan communicate earlier rather
than later.
Right.
And, and all this, study yourpartner's family.
I think in this day and time, alot of folks don't move back
after college.
(38:42):
They're not living in the sametown that their parents did are
or where they grew up.
So you might have to, yourdetective work half might have
to be more about just askingthem, but kind of get a
temperature of how.
The household that he lived in,he or she lived in, how it was
run, who did what, because thatmore than likely is shaping
(39:05):
their expectations for what'scoming up and That's just smart.
So study, ask questions.
doesn't have to be like, we'regonna sit down and talk about
this.
But just as you guys are doingthings, hey, when you were at
home, you know, who, who washedthe cars or different things
like that.
(39:25):
You know, did you have to foldyour own laundry or, you know,
different things like that.
And I think that will really,one, it may, you may find out
after studying the family, thismight not be a good fit.
I would strongly discourage,marrying someone or moving in
with someone and making a moreof a long lasting commitment.
(39:48):
I would discourage it unless youcan really study the family.
And like I said, It doesn't meanthat you can be there every
Sunday for lunch.
and that's the other thing, notjust household chores and such,
who managed the social calendarin your home?
Maybe your, your father had anassistant that did everything
(40:08):
and it wasn't mom.
and I think that that will.
Always bid you and when indoubt, ask a question, you know,
just keep them talking becausepeople love to talk.
Why do you think we're on apodcast?
We love to talk, but, but yeah,just study the family dynamics.
(40:30):
Look at, your partner'ssiblings.
And how those dynamics betweennot just them as the siblings,
but how their marriages look andI think you can really find out
a whole lot.
Yeah, for sure.
I agree.
So another tip for.
(40:50):
Preventing and ConfrontingWeaponized Incompetence is using
the Fair Play Method.
So this is a system where eachpartner owns a task completely.
And I think there's a lot ofvalue in this, and I think me
and Weston do this in some ways,where like, this specific thing,
like the car maintenance, that'sWeston's job.
Yeah.
Again, I weaponized myincompetence and told him I know
(41:12):
nothing about cars.
No, I'm just kidding.
I think we both agreed on thatpretty early in our marriage
that and that's something he'sfine with doing.
And I am completely responsiblefor paying our bills, which is
fine with me, and that'ssomething we discussed before.
And I think there's value inthis, where you're completely
responsible for a task.
Because then I don't have toremind him to do things all the
(41:33):
time.
Like, he knows he owns this taskcompletely, and he does it.
And it's not like, You all youcan never ask for help if you're
using this method because youcan you just probably won't as
often as if you were Sharing atask.
That's great.
okay, I'm just guessing.
I would say in our relationship,probably 75 percent of what each
(41:57):
of us do is fair play.
Mm hmm.
At least 75, it may be more, butthat's after 30 something years
of being married.
but it doesn't mean that youcan't have it now, you know,
cause you learned from us, but Iwould say at least 75, if not
more, and they're just littlethings.
but it's just somebody got inthe habit of doing it.
(42:18):
And the other one does somethingelse to complement that.
if you're easily overwhelmed, oryour partner is easily
overwhelmed, this really canlower the temperature in the
room.
Yeah, which is great.
Yeah.
and then that, starts withencourage the learning.
(42:38):
Mm hmm.
and that's one thing When I wasdoing the research on this
weaponized incompetence, becausethat's kind of how Kena and I
have it set up.
We each do our own research andthen make our outlines.
So when you're hearing ustalking about it, it's off the
cuff.
I mean, we've got notes, butyeah, it's really just bullet
points.
And then we just go from there.
But, a person's willingness tolearn, is directly related.
(43:03):
To their weaponizedincompetence.
Yeah, and I would say even like,correlated with relationship
success.
Oh, a hundred percent.
Cause I mean, it's just not,it's not even just willingness
to learn tasks to support like,the household.
It's willingness to learn yourpartner, and I think willingness
to learn is like, willingness togrow.
Yes, and I just had a thought.
(43:25):
Think about emotional support.
It is difficult for most, men inparticular, to communicate their
emotions or to really, careabout what's going on with you
and your, your girlfriends, orwho hurt your feelings at work
or whatever.
It may be a Southern thing.
I don't know.
(43:46):
It seems like the way that hasbeen handled, in places that I
know of is more of, Well, I'mjust going to call my friend for
that.
Yeah.
And I'm just going to, you know,well guess what?
One day your friend's not goingto be available and you're going
to have to talk to that personthat you're married to and that
you've been in a relationshipwith for 20 years.
(44:07):
Yeah.
So that is not a pass.
I almost think that's like howyou get to the best friend
level.
Marriage is you treat them likeyou would a girlfriend because
honestly Weston loves the tea.
Oh GMT and a lot of times justbecause he's reactions are as
like it's Excitable or like justnot the same as like a
(44:28):
girlfriend would be I don't feelas inclined to like give him the
full report sometimes but thenI'm like He would love to hear
about this.
Right, right.
And we've talked about thatbefore and I'm not even sure
maybe on one of these podcasts,but you know as far as emotional
just to circle back on what thatoriginal comment was about was
(44:50):
you know, You can run to yourgirlfriends.
Jim, I'm gonna tell you, if Ihave something amazing that
happens, he is not my firstcall.
It's Kena.
If I can't get her, I'm callingClaire or Lisa or somebody, only
because his personality is notas animated.
(45:12):
And at that point, when I'm soexcited, I want to talk to
somebody that's going tocelebrate with me and he's, he's
going to celebrate, but it justmight be in silence.
So, uh, it doesn't, it doesn'tmean that he, he's not happy for
whatever happens and that Idon't tell him.
It's just again, managing thoseexpectations.
(45:32):
I know his personality.
And also history of running tohim with great news and not
getting the reaction that Iwanted.
Yeah.
So, so I'm just like, okay,I'll, but still you can't just
have your friends that arehelping you emotionally.
You, we have to lean into eachother as partners, to handle.
(45:59):
And discover how to handleemotional things that come up,
not just things within your ownrelationship, but, you know,
somebody hurts your feelings atwork or whatever, being open and
helping.
Sometimes we have to help ourspouse learn this, especially
(46:20):
like Jim grew up with all boys.
Yeah.
And Weston too.
I mean, they have, Weston hasfour male cousins, no girls on
that side.
So, a lot of times this stuffhasn't really been talked about
in a way that.
They can process it and learnfrom it and begin to implement
(46:40):
it.
Well, men and women are justraised so differently and I
mean, I disagree with that, butit's just kind of how it is.
It's how our culture and ournorms and gender roles society
have shaped parenting and thatmakes a lot of sense.
Yeah.
But I, I was telling you theother day too.
I saw a reel somewhere and itsays There's kind of a pattern,
(47:02):
and I think it was a therapisthad said, like, she finds it
interesting that a lot of womencome in to learn how to be firm,
speak up for themselves, like,things like that, and then men
are often learning, like, theopposite.
They're learning how to slowdown, how to listen, how to be
tender, yeah, like all thatstuff, and I'm like, well, a lot
(47:22):
of that is just how we treatdifferent genders when we're
raising them, and all thesethings that they're ingesting
from society that are saying,like, men are one thing and
women are one thing, which, Idon't like that, but it is the
way it is.
It is what it is, for sure.
Yes, it is.
I think, and we've mentionedthis before, like, this is the
biggest enabler to weaponizingcompetence, is do not reward the
(47:42):
behavior, resist the rea Theurge to redo their work or say,
it's easier if I just do it oryou don't do it.
Right.
Let me do it.
Don't honey.
It's going to be easier if you,if you do it, but in the long
run, it's not going to befulfilling.
It might be easier in theminutes.
give space and grace.
(48:03):
to not do it the same way.
It's fine.
Mm hmm.
Absolutely.
let's talk about work, since wedid kind of Tell you guys how
you can identify it at work.
Make sure that you're delegatingand holding boundaries.
So don't accept tasks justbecause you're better at it than
someone else.
Especially, I think, someoneelse that you're on the same
level with.
Yeah.
For sure.
Yeah.
(48:23):
And also speak up.
And this can be hard for women,like we just said.
a lot of women have to learn,like, later on in life how to
speak up for themselves and tobe firm and to, you know,
address things as they come up.
So Be comfortable and practiceaddressing imbalances and ask
for a fair task distribution,for example, saying things like,
I think we should rotate, whotakes notes?
(48:45):
Or, I'm happy to help this time,but let's make sure
responsibilities are sharedequally.
there's a lot of differentphrases and things you can use
to make sure that you're notgetting taken advantage of in
that, in the workplace.
Yeah, and, and, Be willing tosay, Oh, I didn't realize that
you don't know how to make aPowerPoint here.
Let's do it together.
So next time you'll know how todo it.
(49:06):
That to me, that can be one ofthe most productive ways if you
can get them to engage.
With doing it.
Yes, absolutely.
Well, yeah, that's the nextthing on the outline It's
encouraged training andaccountability because people
need to take responsibility forlearning tasks instead of
relying on others who know howto do it Or are better than them
or whatever.
(49:27):
Yeah last thing we wanted totouch on, not just relationships
and at work, confronting thisbehavior pattern, because I
think it is so prevalent insociety today, I think it's
important, the phrase, seesomething, say something.
So, challenge the idea thatcertain people should naturally
handle certain roles, call outthese harmful norms, because
when we're just saying that,everything is black and white,
(49:49):
Men should do this.
Women should do this.
This partner should do this.
That partner should do this.
Relationships are not all thesame.
People are not all the same.
Culture, society has changed somuch than it was two generations
ago.
So I think reinforcing gendernorms and stuff like that it's
doing more harm than it is doinggood nowadays.
And we instead should bereinforcing things like really
(50:13):
early communication, Managingyour expectations, setting your
expectations, like, so manyother things I feel like are so
important, but I feel like whenyou do see something, say
something.
And try to have like in depthconversations, not while you're
in the middle.
of somebody weaponizing, youknow, like go back and say,
remember when this happened?
(50:34):
I mean, there's certain things,obviously I'm like deal with it
immediately, but there are timesthat you might need to back off,
cool, cool, cool down and makesure that you're you're my
emotions.
Jim will say, stop yelling atme.
I'm not yelling, but I go up somany, just my tone gets
elevated.
Maybe it is a little yelling.
(50:56):
Okay.
I definitely yell.
I am so sorry, Jim.
I will do better at that.
I really will.
Cause my children hopefully aregoing to listen to this and
they'll call me out, um, Yeah,and then on the societal model,
healthy responsibility, sharing,teach kids that all genders
(51:19):
should contribute equally, andchildren need to be socialized
to take responsibility versusexpecting others to do it for
you.
So what that might look like is,it's a play date and we're
having a picnic.
Making sure like give the taskof handing out the food to both
girls and boys.
I think something that Simplecan really get the little things
(51:44):
that all add up to the bigpicture and what you also have
to understand Okay, we've nottold you about this, but I'm
just having a little light bulbmoment They're not they're not
as often as they used to be soshould probably hang on to this
light bulb moment is It'll beeasier for you to do whatever
(52:04):
your kids you're asking yourkids to do too Okay, it'll be
just easier for you to do it.
It takes more time to teachPatience, we're not doing our
children any favors Doingeverything for them.
Absolutely.
I have messed up on that in insome really key parts like
(52:28):
laundry and stuff like that.
I never really made, them do it.
Well, Garrett started doing hislaundry.
I think he was like six or sevenGarrett.
I hope you're listening to this.
He was probably six or seven.
And like I said, he liked hisclothes just so much.
So he decided.
I'm going to do my own laundry.
(52:49):
I don't want Weston's dirtyclothes touching my dirty
clothes.
He is a true unicorn of a child.
I don't think I've ever heard ofanyone else doing that.
So literally, six or seven.
And Jim would say, that'sridiculous.
He don't even have enough for afull load.
I'm like, that's what he wantsto do.
I'll choose my battles.
Well, overall, I think you did agood job.
(53:10):
I don't think you can be perfectin all the areas because, I
mean, I wouldn't know anythingabout raising kids, but I'm sure
it's a lot.
It is, but what you're raisingis little adults.
so, just as moms, as dads, asaunts.
As grandparents, make sure thatyou're, we need to make sure
(53:32):
we're not contributing to thatweaponized incompetence.
We're not laying the foundation.
For another brick, and anotherbrick, and another brick.
Yeah.
I think entitlement andweaponizing competence are
distant, maybe not even distantrelatives.
Oh.
They can definitely go hand inhand, I think, especially when
we're talking about parenting.
(53:54):
Mm hmm.
For sure.
So the last thing on a societallevel, and I think this can
apply to relationships as wellfor sure, is don't keep score.
So if you do notice a pattern,pay attention to it, and bring
attention to it if necessary.
But don't keep score becausewhat did you tell me earlier
today?
it's really funny.
I'm a little sidebar.
(54:14):
I was looking at the outline andwas putting something in.
And so I put something inearlier in the outline about not
keeping score.
And then I saw it on downfurther and I was like, Oh, she
already did it.
Um, you.
First of all don't keep scorebecause you will always win.
It's so subjective.
It is so subjective that Youwill win.
(54:36):
Yeah, the person that's keepingthat scorecard is always gonna
score better Especially when youhave, feelings of resentment.
Yes.
Because you're using thatresentment to, like, bolster
your score to make yourself feelbetter.
Or your resentment is just,like, clouding your perception
to where you're only noticingthings that your partner does
(54:57):
that will add a point to yourscore or whatever it is.
Yeah, This is probably one ofthe key, I think, contributors
to failed relationships is thewhole keeping score.
Well, I did it last time, heneeds to do it this time.
Or, I'm doing this while he'sdoing that.
Or, you know, even with friendsand stuff like that.
(55:18):
keeping score, first of all,against somebody that you're
committed to is basically likesaying, I win and if I'm
winning, they're losing and noneof us want these folks that we
love so much.
No one.
We're not looking to make themlose, but when we insist on
(55:40):
winning Individually, then wehave set up for them to be able
to lose Yeah So instead ofkeeping score between each
other, I would suggest Takeinventory and score Together,
like maybe you have and itdoesn't have to be a set amount
of time, but you know, you cansit down and talk, you know, we
(56:03):
need to grade our relationshiptogether.
I agree.
Definitely.
I think the perspective shiftyou need to have, if you ever
find yourself slipping intolike, I'm winning, he's losing,
or whatever, winning, losing.
Not good.
We need to shift perspective toit's us versus the problem, me
versus you.
Yes.
(56:23):
That's the perspective shift.
Yes.
And I have to like, check myselfon that sometimes when I'm
feeling very frustrated withWeston.
I'm like, okay, he's a greatpartner in the terms that he
listens to me and he takesaccountability for his actions
and he works to change thethings I need him to change.
And so I have to remind myselfof that and say, I need to go to
him.
I need to express how I'mfeeling and then we'll figure
(56:45):
out how we're going to tacklethis issue together versus I'm
frustrated and I'm keepingscore, whatever, whatever.
It's y'all versus the problem.
Oh, I love that.
I love that.
Well, guys, I didn't think ofit.
I've heard it many times over.
So what she said, Oh, this is agood one.
Go ahead.
You talk.
(57:06):
Yeah, this is, probably one ofmy favorite wishy seds that
we've had.
I just feel like it's very, verymeaningful.
So the quote is, Once you carryyour own water, you will learn
the value of every drop.
Oh.
It's an African proverb, too,which is interesting.
So good.
That is so good.
So this really ties in the ideathat when people take
(57:28):
responsibility, they realize theeffort involved.
And how this relates toweaponizing competence is, I
think, If you're noticing thatthis is a pattern or something
that's happening and you're ableto confront whoever it is you're
dealing with and work towards asolution and start to shift
things and they start to realizethat the mental load you're
(57:50):
carrying, once they start tomaybe help out a little bit more
and the division of labor is alittle bit better, they realize
the effort that you're spendingmentally and physically and
emotionally into each one ofthese tasks.
And so, I just think that's soimportant.
It's so important.
And again, I just want to pointout parents and grandparents get
(58:12):
your kids.
On board in sharing loads indoing things that they're not
great at, but they could learn.
That's why self people happenbecause they're never expected
to do anything that they're notgood at or that they want to do.
Yeah.
So, our challenge this weekendis think of the way you can set
(58:34):
a boundary or push back againstweaponized incompetence in your
life.
Um, yeah.
I already have some ideas.
You do?
Tell me one.
Well, I mentioned earlier thatWes is going to have more work
life balance, so he's got a newjob.
Oh, she's moving, y'all.
I am moving.
Sad.
We're going to film a bunch ofepisodes this week, but it's
(58:55):
actually going to be betterbecause we're going to have more
things to talk about in ourintros, because we would sit
down and be like, well.
What are we, what are we talkingabout now?
Other than the episode content.
Yeah.
But Weston's gonna have morework life balance and I do want
him to learn to do some of thethings that I do and like try to
(59:16):
do them even if I'm going to endup doing them long term.
I want him to realize the effortit takes me to get those things
done.
Cause I just feel like that willMake me feel like he's more of
an equal partner and I feel likeit'll make him have a better
appreciation for me if he knowshow to do things.
So if I need to ask him to payall the bills, he'll know how to
(59:36):
do it and he'll realize this ishow much effort goes into making
sure you pay every single billand tracking the whole budget.
And this is where the chat goes.
Boom, boom, boom.
Well, guys, we are so glad youjoined us today.
if you're listening to us onYouTube, we ask that you like
(59:56):
and subscribe to our channel.
You can also find us on Spotifyand Apple Podcasts.
Apple's podcast.
Apple's podcast at generationalteapod.
Yep, that's us.
like us.
Give us some information, and tocircle back, what are you fed up
with?
Yeah, let us know.
(01:00:17):
Leave us a comment.
What are you fed up with?
It could be anything.
Yeah, it might be the personyou're sitting beside.
Not, I'm definitely not fed upwith her, but you know what I'm
saying.
And that's the tea.
Thank you guys.
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