To challenge or to support, that is the question

I am wondering whether it's better to be challenging or supportive. My husband has said he wants to feel challenged to be better, whereas I would prefer supportiveness in our relationship. To me, to challenge my partner to do something sounds like I think they're not necessarily going to be able to do it without my urging. But if I support them to do something, it's more like I know they can do it and I'm standing beside them cheering them on. A challenge is 'I'll make you do it'; being supportive is 'I'll help you to do your best, but love you either way'. I think it sounds better and more stable to say I'm in a supportive relationship than to say I'm in a challenging one. I like this definition of "support" from my Apple dictionary: 'be actively interested in and concerned for the success of'. This is a nice way of summing up "to challenge": 'to invite (someone) to do something that one thinks will be difficult or impossible' ( thanks again, Apple dictionary). Maybe it's all just a matter of opinion, which doesn't really solve anything, does it.