Lexicon ·
provider energy
noun phrase
- Stated meaning
- A quality of steadiness and generosity; the sense that a person can be relied upon.
- Operating meaning
- A solvency check conducted in the vocabulary of astrology, which allows both parties to discuss money while maintaining that neither of them is discussing money.
- Origin
- Circulated through relationship podcasts and social video in the early 2020s, where it describes a partner's capacity to provide, financially and otherwise.
May 30, in the car on the way to dinner. I raised something I had been reading about dating and money, and she said that it was part of her plan. Neither of us used the phrase and neither of us stopped talking about money.
The phrase does real work. It converts a financial requirement into a spiritual one, which makes it unfalsifiable and therefore unarguable. Nobody can be asked to produce evidence of an energy, and nobody can be accused of pricing one.
The conversion runs in both directions and the term has a sibling in men’s dating content, where “wife material” converts a list of household services into a moral quality by the same process. Both phrases allow a market to operate while everyone involved maintains they are discussing character. The ledger is identical on both sides. Only the vocabulary on the cover has been changed.
What the phrase does not describe is provision itself, which is dull, itemized, and appears on a statement. Energy has no unit. Provision is itemized: dinners, a drive-in, roses, $70.00 on a go-kart card that was handed over and never used, 495 minutes of driving. Each one is a figure. None of them is an energy.
I am the wrong person to be sceptical about this. In 41 days I have entered $812.94 into the cost column and $0.00 into hers, on all 5 forms, and I designed the forms. At no point has either of us said the word provider, and at no point has the arrangement differed in any respect from what the word describes. The term was not needed. The term is never needed. It exists so that the arrangement can be discussed by people who would rather not read the statement.