"I'm in a relationship with a man who is very kind and loving. With me he is manipulative and I have to learn to deal with that. He says that in a relationship people have to compromise.”

What do you pick up on? That he's kind and loving? That he's right, people do have to compromise in a relationship? That he's manipulative? Or that F., the woman in question, has to learn to deal with it?

What I picked up on, when F. said that to me recently, was that it was exactly the same thing she'd been saying a few months back when she'd last spoken to me. In the interests of the relationship (allegedly) her partner had made it clear to her where her faults lay, the problems she was creating in the relationship by her stubbornness and how loving and long suffering he was.

F. had been spent a lot of time and energy trying to get him to see her point of view and her needs. But then, F. is a fighter. She will fight tooth and nail to save a relationship she believes has potential. She also believes it's her responsibility, as a woman, to nurture the relationship, single-handed.

My first question to F., a few months on, was: is this the same man, or another man? It was another man. Only the issues hadn't changed.

Now you might argue that if the same relationship happens to a person twice or more, then it has to be their responsibility. That's absolutely right of course. It's just a case of clarifying exactly where their responsibility lies.

F.'s partner would argue that problems in the relationship are F.'s responsibility; especially as the scenario is so similar to her previous relationship. F. herself has become conditioned by past experience to believe that anything that goes wrong must be her fault.

It seems that the person who apportions the most blame, often enough, as quickly as they can, establishes their credibility and innocence. F.'s a tryer, not a blamer. So she's come to believe that most of it is most likely her fault.

What F. is actually responsible for is being attracted to the same kind of man who has always attracted her in the past - hardly surprising when you think about; you tend to be most attracted by what you know and are conditioned to respond to. Especially when you desperately need to make it work in order to disprove some very harsh judgements about yourself.

F., like a lot of women, has looked at the man, not the baggage, and dived in headfirst. She hasn't yet realised that the baggage makes the man.

You can use words, the way you use clothing, to present your body in a specific way. Both can be used to make misleading statements about you; they can disguise your flaws and make you appear more attractive than you truly are.

There isn't that much that you can do with the baggage. It depends whether, like F., you act like a willing porter and start trying to heft another person's baggage around for them, or whether you are prepared to notice the quantity involved and start getting a sense of what it contains. F.'s responsibility is for being too self-denying a

Just as there are some people who are willing to carry gargantuan amounts of baggage for you, so too are there other people who are always on the look-out for a psychological porter. And that's how F. has ended up in the misery of the Different Man, Same Issues Syndrome.

So, how does F. stop it happening again? How does anyone stop it happening again?

First, take it slowly. Rushing in headlong may feel good at the time, but you usually end up with a sore head.

Second, take a long hard look at the baggage. And then see what happens if, instead of trying to heft theirs, you put yours down beside it companionably. A relationship should be a place where you lay your burdens down sometimes, rather than shoulder someone else's.

Any relationship that requires heavy lifting is likely to put intolerable strain on you before too long. And always remember, there are plenty of relationships, and plenty of potential partners out there, that are all about lightness and joy and making it easy.

Third, if you know that you have a tendency to carry other people's baggage for them and blame yourself for everything, get some support. Enlist the help of a supportive third party, like a coach or a counsellor who will help you see the wood for the trees.

Fourth, be very wary of the 'c' word: i.e. compromise. It's a funny old word, we all know what it's meant to mean. What it really means, most of the time, is: 'in order for this thing to work, the way I want it to work, you're going to have to sacrifice your hopes, dreams, beliefs and ideals.'

Better than compromise, any day, is negotiation. That's when both partners discuss the common ground they hold important and agree to each make concessions on the peripheral stuff, in order to make their partner happy and to nurture the relationship.

When people truly negotiate, both give and both grow. In other words change occurs. Both parties evolve. And it doesn't need to hurt, at all. So you need never be stuck in the Different Man Same Issues Syndrome again.

(C) 2006 Annie Kaszina