You want more sex.

You want more time together.

You want your partner to listen without becoming defensive. You want help with the children, more affection, more freedom, more reassurance, or simply to feel like your partner is interested in you again.

These are ordinary relationship desires. The more interesting question is:

What position do you take when you want something from your partner?

Victim: Do you become the person who feels powerless and waits for your partner to make things better?
Persecutor: Do you push harder, criticize, demand, or try to make your partner understand?
Rescuer: Or do you move quickly into taking care of your partner's feelings, solving their problems, or making yourself responsible for their experience?

These positions can become remarkably predictable.

And while they may feel like reasonable positions in the moment, they often make it harder to get what you actually want: greater intimacy, more honesty, better sex, more time together, or a stronger sense of partnership.

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Three Familiar Positions: Victim, Persecutor, and Rescuer

Psychiatrist Stephen Karpman described a relational pattern called the Drama Triangle, first published in 1968. The model identifies three positions people can move between during emotionally charged interactions: Victim, Persecutor, and Rescuer.

Importantly, these are not fixed personality types. A person can move from one position to another, sometimes within the same conversation.

Consider a couple who has not had much time together lately.

One partner says:

“You never make time for me. Obviously, everything else is more important.”

That may be a Victim position: I have no real power here. You are responsible for what I am experiencing, and there is little I can do about it.

The other partner responds:

“Fine. I'll cancel my plans. I'll figure it out.”

That can become a Rescuer position: I'll take responsibility for your experience and fix this for you.

Or perhaps the response is:

“If you don’t like it, you should do something about it. I can’t fix everything for you.”

Now the interaction may move toward the Persecutor position: You are the problem, and I need to correct, control, blame, or overpower you.

The positions can change quickly.

The Victim becomes angry and attacks.
The Persecutor feels misunderstood and becomes the Victim.
The Rescuer becomes resentful because their efforts are unappreciated.

The triangle keeps moving.

The problem isn't that any of these people necessarily have bad intentions. The problem is that none of these positions require you or your partner to fully occupy your own experience and remain genuinely available to the other person.

That's where the work gets more interesting.

Stating Where You Stand vs. Defining Your Partner’s Role

There is an important difference between having a position and playing a role.

A position might sound like:

“I want more time with you.”
Or: “I want to have sex more often.”
Or: “I don't want to continue having this conversation this way.”
Or: “I want you to know that I feel lonely in this relationship.”

These statements are different from:

“You never care about me.”
“You obviously don't want me.”
“Fine, I'll do everything myself.”
“If you loved me, you would know what I need.”

The first group expresses where you stand - your position. The second group often tries to establish a position for your partner.

That distinction matters.

When you say what you want without requiring your partner to agree, reassure, change, or validate you immediately, you are doing something more difficult than simply communicating a need. You are staying connected to yourself while allowing your partner to remain a separate person.

This is closely related to differentiation, a central concept in Crucible® Therapy.

In this framework, differentiation means maintaining a solid sense of self while staying emotionally connected to another person.

Research on the Crucible Differentiation Scale describes dimensions including maintaining a solid self, connectedness, managing anxiety through self-soothing rather than accommodation, and tolerating discomfort for growth.

In other words, you can want something from your partner without making your emotional stability depend upon getting it.

That is a very different position.

Wanting Something Does Not Make Your Partner Responsible for Giving It To You

This can be particularly important around sex and intimacy.

Suppose you want more sexual connection and your partner wants less.

You can approach that difference in several ways.

You might withdraw and think, Apparently I'm not desirable.

You might pressure your partner: We never have sex anymore. You don't care about this relationship.

You might accommodate completely: It's fine. Forget I said anything.

Or you might take a more differentiated position:

“Sex and physical intimacy matter to me. I want more of it in our relationship. I also understand that you may experience this differently. I'm interested in understanding your experience, and I want us to be able to talk about the difference without either of us having to pretend we want the same thing.”

That statement doesn't guarantee the outcome you want.

A conversation starter like the one above does something more fundamental: it allows both people to exist independently.

The Crucible approach, developed by psychologist David Schnarch, places differentiation at the center of work with intimacy, sexuality, and committed relationships. The approach explicitly addresses differences in desire, intimacy, and the tension between maintaining yourself and remaining connected.

At the Maine Relationship Institute, this is one reason the focus is not simply on teaching couples better communication techniques. Communication matters, but so does the person doing the communicating.

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Your Partner Has a Position, Too

Another part of this can be harder:

You may genuinely believe that your partner is wrong.
You may want more affection, while your partner wants more space.
You may want to talk about a problem immediately, while your partner needs time before talking.
You may want more sex, while your partner feels disconnected from you.
You may want more independence, while your partner experiences that independence as distance.

You have a position. Your partner has one, too.

Seeing your partner's position does not mean agreeing with it. It does not mean giving up what you want. It does not mean deciding that your partner's needs are more important than yours.

It means becoming curious enough to recognize that your partner is having an experience that is real to them.

This is one place where Gestalt Therapy can be particularly useful.

Gestalt emphasizes awareness of what is happening in the present moment—including what you are feeling, what you are doing, and what happens between you and another person. At MRI, founder and therapist Ben Borkan integrates Gestalt Therapy with the Crucible approach to help individuals and couples examine patterns of contact, conflict, vulnerability, and intimacy.

You can read more about Gestalt Therapy at the Maine Relationship Institute and how it is used with both individuals and couples.

Try This The Next Time You Want Something

Before approaching your partner, ask yourself four questions:

1. What do I actually want?

Not ‘what do I want my partner to stop doing?’
Not, ‘what do I want them to understand?’
Rather, ‘what do I want?’
- More sex? More affection? More time? More honesty? More independence? An apology? Help? Reassurance?
- Name it.

2. What position am I taking?

Am I asking directly?
Am I blaming?
Am I withdrawing?
Am I trying to make my partner feel guilty?
Am I trying to rescue them from discomfort?
Am I acting as though I have no choices?

3. Can I state what I want without requiring my partner to agree?

This is often the difficult part.

“I want more physical affection from you” is different from “You never touch me.”
“I'd like us to spend Saturday together” is different from “You always choose everything else over me.”
“I want to talk about our sex life” is different from “We don't have a sex life because you don't care.”

4. Can I stay interested in my partner's position?

You might ask:

“What's it like for you to hear me say that?”

Not:

“Why don't you care?”

Those are very different invitations.

Sometimes Individual Therapy is The Right Place to Start

You do not need your partner to participate in therapy before you can examine your own position in a relationship.

In fact, individual therapy can help you understand recurring patterns:

Why do I shut down?
Why do I pursue?
Why do I become controlling?
Why do I feel responsible for everyone else's emotions?
Why do I lose track of what I want?

At MRI, individual counseling uses Gestalt and Crucible approaches to explore relationship patterns, self-understanding, emotional awareness, family-of-origin experiences, and differentiation. Individual therapy at MRI can be appropriate even when a partner is unwilling or unable to participate.

For couples who can participate together, couples therapy in Camden, Maine provides a setting to examine the patterns that develop between two people rather than simply deciding who is right.

You may also find MRI's exploration of self-validated intimacy useful, particularly if you are accustomed to looking to your partner to determine whether your feelings, desires, or worth are acceptable.

Relationship Change Begins With What You Are Willing to See

Positioning yourself differently in a relationship is not about becoming endlessly patient, agreeable, or accommodating.

Articulate positioning is not about becoming the “better” partner.

And it certainly is not about learning the perfect words that will finally persuade your partner to give you what you want.

Positioning is about becoming better at knowing and saying aloud what is true for you while still recognizing that another person's experience may be different.

That can be uncomfortable.

You may discover that you have been asking your partner to solve something you need to learn to tolerate yourself.

You may discover that you have been rescuing when you thought you were loving.

You may discover that what looked like anger was actually fear, or that what looked like independence was avoidance.

You may also discover that something you want really does matter—and that you can say so clearly without making your partner wrong.

Welcome to The Maine Relationship Institute

This is the kind of relational work that Ben Borkan, LCSW, founder of the Maine Relationship Institute, explores with individuals and couples.

MRI's approach combines Gestalt Therapy and Crucible® Therapy to examine not only what happens in a relationship, but how each person participates in it. Ben leads every individual and couples therapy session at MRI.

For people in Camden, Rockport, Lincolnville, Belfast, and throughout Midcoast Maine who are looking for couples counseling or individual therapy, that work can begin in person in Belfast or online, depending on circumstances and licensure.

The question to bring with you may be a simple one:

When I want something from the person I love, what position do I take—and what would it look like to remain fully myself while making room for them to be fully themselves?

That is a different conversation.

And it can lead somewhere different.

Contact us for a complimentary 15-minute consultation.

We look forward to hearing from you.

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What Position Do You Take in Your Relationship When You Want Something?