Measuring Worth

Several times in this relationship with Monica I was asked the following question: "is she worth it?" I thought it was kind of a stupid question. As far as I'm concerned, everybody is "worth it." But I didn't realize what the question really was until nearly the end of the relationship. What was really being asked was: "is the relationship worth it?"

That's a different question. In the case of the former, I would be placing a value judgment on a person. Judgments bear problems and consequences, whether or not the judgment is in the positive or the negative. By command of the Bible, we are not to judge others. I struggled with that question each and every time it was put to me. That is, until I realized what people were really asking me.

Is the relationship worth it? That's the question that people were really asking me. I had much less problem answering this question. The reason that is so is because of the nature of valuation and evaluation.

Here's the way I thought about it. If I were to measure my worth in a financial sense, I would add up all my assets, add up all my liabilities, and then compare the two. If I had more assets than liabilities I would have a positive monetary worth. Likewise the way people are evaluated at work. Do I meat all the requirements to maintain employment at my job? If I do, then I keep my job. If not, then I get fired. These are really more simplistic than what I'm talking about here, though. The best way I found to think about it was to liken the relationship to buying stock in a company. Let's say I put some money into a company's stock. In six months I check up on that stock. If it has done well, I may very well put more money into that stock. If it hasn't I'll probably sell what shares I had and try to recoup my losses.

That's the way I started looking at relationships. Was I getting a return on investment? Did I think I was going to get a return on investment? How much did I have to invest, and what would be the anticipated return? Once I understood the question, it was much easier to find a paradigm of thought to answer that question. Unfortunately, in this case, I decided that the return on my present investment was going to be a losing proposition, and if I wanted a more positive return, I would have probably ended up losing everything.

Ok, I admit, this seems a little cold-blooded, but I don't have a better frame of reference with which to compare. What do you think? Is this a good way of looking at relationships?