Why Mars and Venus Collide: Improve Your Relationships by Understanding How Men and Women Cope Differently with Stress. John Gray
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as well. Without becoming like a woman, he can provide the support she needs even when it doesn’t look the way she thought it should.
A woman can learn ways to lower her partner’s stress by helping him feel successful in helping her. Though a man does appreciate domestic support, positive communication, and romance, what is most important to him is to feel he is providing his partner with some measure of fulfillment. Instead of thinking of direct ways to support him, she can actually do less and simply appreciate what he does for her. This works well, because women are already doing way too much. Wouldn’t it be great if a woman could do less, and a man would feel more supported? Well, it’s true. It is such a new concept for women that it takes a little time to sink in.
When a man takes action to support a woman’s needs, she feels supported, and her stress goes down. But the opposite is true on Mars. When a woman does less for him and allows him to do more for her, his stress is lessened. A man’s stress is reduced when he feels successful in meeting her needs. Instead of giving more to him, she just needs to help him be successful in meeting her needs.
By giving less, a woman can actually be more supportive of her partner.
“Helping him help her” as a strategy for success seems very foreign to most women. They don’t imagine that they are pushing away his support, but in many ways they are. Every time she complains, every time she makes demands, every time she gets upset, every time she doesn’t ask for help, every time she resents having to ask for support, she may be giving him the message that he is not a success. Unknowingly, she is increasing rather than lowering his stress and ultimately pushing his support away.
In short, “helping him help her” involves asking him for support instead of just expecting him to give it, and then requires that she acknowledges how much she authentically appreciates whatever she gets. This is achieved by feeling and being, not by doing. Her “feeling response” to his actions is much more important than anything she can ever directly do for him. By being grateful for what she is getting in her relationship, she is actually helping him to succeed. On the other hand, when a woman focuses on what she is not getting, she gives the message that he is not a success, and his stress goes up. He then has less to give. She is pushing away his love when she focuses on what she is not getting.
A woman’s response to his actions is much more important than anything she can ever directly do for him.
This simple principle can produce immediate results in any relationship. There are endless ways women fail to acknowledge a man’s sincere desire to provide his support, just as there are countless ways a man can respond to her needs to provide her with greater fulfillment. Finding authentic ways to give a man the message that his efforts are appreciated does not involve the old-fashioned notion of sacrificing her needs to avoid demanding anything of him. Instead, it requires a greater responsibility to fulfill her own needs and to learn how to ask a man for support in small increments that are realistic and reasonable.
Even when a woman takes time for herself, she can help a man feel like a success in a relationship. When she is happy, he will always take credit and feel better. Without this insight, a woman would never think that taking time for herself could actually help her partner. When men take time for themselves, women often feel neglected. For this reason, a woman might find it hard to believe that taking time for herself actually supports him in giving more to her. Understanding our differences provides a completely new direction for men and women that not only brings out the best in our partners but makes relationships so much easier.
Why Women Need Men
Fully receiving a man’s support is not as simple today as it was in the past. Women today are confused when it comes to the role a man can play in their lives. She either needs him to be more like a woman, or she feels she doesn’t need him at all. Neither approach works. Being more independent and self-sufficient, modern women want a man to share their lives with but don’t really feel the need for a man. They want a man, but to need him makes them cringe. When they do need him, they often want him to be someone he is not and cannot be.
Ultimately, men want to feel needed and are most attracted to a woman who appreciates what they have to offer. When a man is needed, he can make a difference. A woman who can appreciate what a man has to offer automatically reduces the stress in his life. Women who clearly feel the need for a man attract them like bees to honey.
Women who are very successful and independent often remain alone, because they don’t realize why they need a man. Statistically, the more financially successful a woman is, the lower her chances of getting married, and the greater the possibility of divorce. Most of these divorces are initiated by the woman. These statistics change as women learn to feel their need for a man and appreciate what he can offer. It is challenging to appreciate someone you do not think you need. When a woman doesn’t open herself to a man in this way, she is pushing him away and increasing the stress in his life.
You can only appreciate what you have when you authentically feel a need for it.
Independent women don’t have to give up their freedoms to feel their need for a man. You can be independent about some things and depend on your partner for other things. It doesn’t have to be all or nothing. Some women watched their mothers deny their needs and submit themselves to please their husbands. They have vowed never to allow that to happen to them. By seeking a life of complete independence, they, too, are denying their needs and following in their mothers’ footsteps. To avoid submitting themselves in a relationship, they have denied their needs altogether.
For other women, the process of surviving or trying to get ahead in their careers distracts them from getting in touch with their feelings and need for a relationship. To get ahead in the workplace, they have to express their more independent selves and have difficulty shifting back to their feminine side that easily feels the need for a man. These women often think they need a more feeling or sensitive man, but they really need to connect with their own more feminine side.
If he is more sensitive, such a woman might imagine that it will be safer for her feminine side to emerge. She has fantasies of talking with her partner the way she would with a girlfriend or with a wise mentor. Unfortunately, when a woman gets a “more feeling man,” it doesn’t help her connect with her own feelings. The more sensitive a man is, the more their conversations will center on him and not on her. A needy man is a huge turnoff to women. After a while, she doesn’t even want to talk with him, because she will have to listen to more of his sensitive feelings or his opinionated tirades. When she thinks she needs a more sensitive and vulnerable man, what she really needs is to express her more vulnerable self. What she really needs is to be heard, which all men can learn to do.
A needy man is a huge turnoff to women.
Other women, who are able to feel their needs but don’t understand how men are different, expect them to react and respond the way a woman would. For these women, determining what they need in a relationship and what is possible can be very confusing. The days of women needing a man just for survival and security are gone.
So what do modern women need? When I ask this question, single women often have no idea. At first, they don’t even want to admit that they need a man. They prefer to have a partner. They want to share their lives with someone, but they don’t need a man. Needing a man would make these women feel weak rather than just feminine.
Women need to rediscover the power and strength of their femininity. Women don’t have to be like men to be powerful and get what they want and need. Likewise, men don’t have to become like women to be loving and supportive in their relationships.
Many successful women are repelled by the idea that they might need a man.
Needing a partner is not a weakness. It is why we partner up. Men and women just have different primary needs. Men need to feel needed, and women need to feel they are not alone. Just as a woman is happiest when she feels she is getting what she needs from her partner, a man is happiest when he feels successful in meeting his partner’s needs. This is an important distinction. We certainly need each other, but for different reasons.
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