Brian Johnson argues that people generally resist being coached by their romantic partners—even when both are into self-help—and that coaching in a relationship requires explicit permission. He defines a loving relationship as two individuals committed to being their best selves in service to something larger, and contrasts that with attachment, which is anything else.
My own wife doesn't like to be coached by me. She's a self help coach, I'm a self help coach. But she doesn't want to be coached by her husband. Most husbands or wives or boyfriends or girlfriends don't want to be coached by the other one, even if both of them are really into it. Even in that dynamic, coaching needs to come with a permission slip, and that's not the default. From my vantage point. A loving relationship is one in which each individual is committed to being their best selves in service to something bigger than themselves, and that relationship is a context through which each individual can do that. Anything other than that is attachment, not love.
