Cheating Vs Forgiveness, how far will you go?

 

Relationship experts say that it generally takes 1 to 2 years to forgive a cheating spouse. Some may forgive immediately, some may take a few months, others a year or two, and some may never fully forgive.

We talk about cheaters, we say once a cheater is always a cheater, but we don’t give much credit for the ones who forgive the cheaters in a relationship, do we?

Be it a man or a woman, being in the receiving end sucks. The one person you share your life, your intimate details, your insecurities and vulnerabilities chooses to share it with someone else without your knowledge. It sucks, it’s like going through hell and back. Cheating doesn’t only count for a physical relationship, it also means letting your mind or heart think, double think or triple think about someone else intimately. When we went to Pre Cana classes before getting married, (these are pre marriage classes conducted by the Catholic Churches in Sri Lanka) they spoke about infidelity and how one should deal with it, rather cope up with it. They said, forgive. I was not able to comprehend the ‘forgive and move on’ part, it needs a so much of guts and an immeasurable amount of grace to do it. I believe that grace is something that are not born with, we need to practice to be graceful every single day. 

Then there are ones who are ignorant about being cheated on, or choose not to see it. I’m sure all of us have had that girlfriend who has a partner who was cheating in a very obvious way, we all have gone through the phase of telling her about it, then we all go through the phase of watching being in denial and getting married to him. No. watching her getting married is not the worst part, when she finally catch him red handed, once and then twice, and finally decide to part ways is the worst part. Having to watch your best friend, your sister or your daughter collecting their hopes, dreams and that tiny bit of dignity to walk away to rebuild her life with zero self-confidence is the worst part.  

I never believed in forgiving a cheater anyway, I will lose respect and will never be able to see eye-to-eye with someone who cheated on me. That’s me, refusing to have any ounce grace in what so ever. But then, there are so many humans who forgive their partners, treat them well and live with them for the rest of their lives. I may not agree with them, but I do have a massive amount of respect for them. Recently I was reading Rishi Kapoor’s biopic, he starts about his father (ultra famous Raj Kapoor) with the line:

He was also a man in  love – at the time, unfortunately with someone other than my mother.

To accept that his father loved another woman while being married to his mother, publicly, needs a lot of balls. I found it intriguing and amazing. He also mentions how his mother knew about it throughout, and how she welcomed Nargis to her house 20+ plus years later by telling Nargis that she has no bad feelings in her heart about her. Raj Kapoor’s wife, Krishna Raj is known as the iron lady in the industry for her courage and resilience. Then Raj Kapoor’s name was linked with another actress, and Krishna left him with children, lived in a hotel for 8 months till he ended that relationship for good.

‘There comes a point where it all becomes too much. When we get too tired to fight anymore. So we give up. That’s when the real work begins. To find hope where there seems to be absolutely none at all’

Some people say, it is possible to build a stronger and a better relationship after one has cheated.  What are the side effects of it, can you trust them again? Can you respect them the same way?

Would you believe in second chances, or are you a strong beholder of ‘people don’t cheat by chance, people cheat by choice’? How many times would one bite the dust? Will someone tolerate cheating twice? I have come across so many who have forgiven and accepted the person for a first time, but haven’t met any who has forgiven in second time. Would you have grace and a really big heart to give someone a third chance?

3 un-orthodox things to check when finding the ‘right marketer’

‘’There are no great marketers !

There are no marketers who understand what we want!

 There here is no one who can execute our marketing strategy.’’

 

I’ve heard these many times from many people I’ve met across borders. Finding a good marketer, or the right marketer for your company or product is a challenge. Especially with social media, mobile apps, free design templates coming into play, everyone is a marketer. There are no barriers to become a marketer with so many digital marketing certificates to complete the checklist. When every Tom, Dick and Harry knows marketing, it becomes a struggle to get the right pitch across because everyone in the leadership team or product team has seen something ‘cool’ somewhere online and they insist that your product has the same pitch. In this confused digitally savvy era, finding a real marketer who ‘gets you’ could be challenging. Why? Because a majority of the gen-Z marketers will not argue with the ‘wanna be marketers’ in your organisation, they might finally settle to execute the ‘cool’ pitch, or just do it as a job, to take their paycheck home. This is where you define your boundaries in finding a good one, you find one with a passion.

 
Passionate.

This doesn’t mean being passionate about the job only, it means being passionate about every single thing that he or she lives for. Family, job, colleagues, hobbies, everything. Only someone passionate can create something within the heart, be connected with both brain and heart. Yes, thinking from the heart is very important in marketing, because at the end of the day your pitch is for humans. It is for real people, and they feel emotions and emotions play a big role in relating to a product or service no matter how tech savvy or innovative it is.

Tip – If you are head-hunting or recruiting, check their social media profiles other than LinkedIN. See how passionate they are about things on a day today basis. Ask random questions at an interview, ask what their favourite TV show is. If you watch it too, ask about a character in it. Their answers and insights might surprise you and give you a better insight about the person.

 

Empathetic and an active listener.

Something I’ve personally tried hard to develop over the years, these two traits could be interlinked or connected. Not everyone can give a good brief neither everyone can give constructive feedback, it is important that your core marketing person listens actively, not just listen to defend their pitch but to listen carefully on what rest of the team has to say. If the CEO thinks the copy is bad, it probably is, they need to understand why he thinks it is bad. It is important they know how to read between the lines, and be an empathetic communicator.

Tip – As a practice, if you don’t like the artwork and don’t understand to explain why, always ask questions. This would make you understand it better and make them understand you better. Always narrate a scenario at an interview, ask them to give you a swift response as to what they do. You will understand the quick thinking and strategy through discussions like this.

 

Similar understanding and ‘your kinda’ taste

Understanding your buyer persona, the brand voice, tone and

pitch is important.

 ‘This doesn’t look classy’, ‘This looks very …… says something extremely racist’’’ are some offhand comments that gets thrown at a marketing team on a daily basis. Your key communicator has to have a deep sense of understanding of your buyer persona, have your kinda taste, he or she should be able to read your mind, know exactly what you want to say in a media release. S/he has to be on your same level of thinking. We all come from different schools, backgrounds, our different acquired tastes and colour pallets, what you think is right may not be right at all. But what would help you is to have someone who understands your thinking so it makes everyone’s job easy in a marketing campaign or launch.

Tip – At an interview, get them to do a media release or an elevator pitch for you. Get them to narrate a story board of your dream event, see if you tick. Chemistry is very important here.

 

Marketing people are a different breed, if they know what is trending in Netflix or YouTube, be happy, that means that they are passionate and interested in their industry. Find someone who speaks the same language (not literally), who can read your mind, know your buyer persona’ in and out, after all compatibility is key.