can’t find it. With these insights, you will discover a new level of acceptance and love that will transform your life. Instead of trying to change what cannot be changed, you will be able to focus on what is possible to change. In this process, you will discover that you have the power to bring out the best in your partner.
Rather than dwell on what you are not getting or what you don’t want, you will begin to focus on what you do want and what you can get.
This important shift will provide a new foundation for you to create a lifetime of love. The scenarios in this chapter demonstrate some of the many ways men and women commonly collide. See if you can relate to any of these common complaints or hot spots I hear when counseling both single or married women and men.
Do any of these complaints sound familiar? They are only the tip of the iceberg, but they represent a new trend in relationships. If we can see our differences in a new light, we will not only enrich communication in our relationships but also make our relationships a solid base to support all the other areas of our lives. Equipped with new insight, we can actually come closer together while coping with stress instead of being torn apart.
Why We Are Stressed
A dramatic new source of stress in our lives during the past fifty years has been the shift in the roles of men and women. A man used to go to work to provide for his family. The sense of pride and accomplishment he felt, along with the love and support he received when he returned home, helped him to cope with the many stresses of his day.
Women used to spend most of their days creating a beautiful home and family life, while nurturing friends and contributing to the community. Though being a homemaker was demanding, having time to focus on what she had to do enabled a woman to pace her life to minimize stress. There was men’s work and women’s work. Any additional demands on her partner beyond being a good provider were few, and usually involved heavy lifting.
With today’s rising costs, this lifestyle is no longer a choice for all women. More often than not, a woman is expected to contribute financially to provide for a family. At the same time, the women’s movement has awakened women and inspired many to find a fulfilling career in order to develop all their talents. When a woman returns home from work feeling responsible for creating a beautiful home and nurturing her family, she has to do this around the demands of her job. This is a new stress, and it requires a new kind of support. No wonder women feel so overwhelmed as they balance the demands of work and home.
Having a job or career is often no longer a choice for most women, but a necessity.
Men need more support as well. Instead of coming home to rest and recover from a stressful day, a man faces a wife and family who need more from him. His wife expects more help from him to run the household and to participate in their children’s busy schedules. No longer enjoying the sense of accomplishment that comes from being a provider, he returns home to his next job. He attempts to provide some measure of support, but he has not had the time he needs to recover from his daily stress. Eventually he, too, becomes tired and irritable. After tending to the many duties of domestic life, there is little time or inclination for couples to concentrate on their relationship. This new male-female dilemma has created an undercurrent of stress that affects all areas of our lives.
Even when a woman chooses to stay at home, she is often too isolated to get the support she needs. More than half of all married women work, and the pool of available friends and organized activities for the nonworking woman has shrunk. In addition, work demands on a man who is the sole supporter of the family are extreme, because raising a family on a single salary has become increasingly difficult. He has neither the time nor energy for his marriage or relationship to be his top priority, to cater to the needs of a partner who seems to be demanding too much of him.
Today, at home we are dealing with the side effects of women becoming more like men in the workplace. Success in the work-place often requires an enormous sacrifice for most women. Without enough time during the day to nurture their feminine side, women commonly become tired, drained, and resentful. At home, natural feelings of comfort, ease, appreciation, and grace are often overshadowed by anxiety, urgency, and exhaustion.
Without new skills for coping with this stress and nurturing their emotional needs, women inevitably expect too much from their male counterparts. This puts an even greater stress on their personal relationships. Habitually and instinctively acting out outdated roles that were created in a far distant past for a different world, both men and women today relate in ways that increase stress rather than lessen it.
Women Want Men to Become Like Women
What we have learned from the workplace is that women can do any job that a man can do. Just because a woman is different and may resolve problems in a unique manner, that does not mean she cannot be just as competent as a man. There is no need for a woman to change who she is to get respect in the workplace or at home.
Being equals does not mean that we have to be the same. To give equal respect, we must recognize that we are different and support those differences. Respect is honoring who a person is and being open to appreciate what he or she has to offer.
Being equals does not mean men and women are the same or should be the same.
Just as women should not have to change themselves to be respected and appreciated in the workplace, men should not have to change who they are at home. Given their hours working outside the home or the increased demand on them as mothers and homemakers, women undeniably need more help at home, but that need should not require men to change their nature.
In our collective fantasy of an ideal relationship, men still want to return home to a happy partner, who has prepared dinner in their magazine-perfect home and who is responsive to his every sexual desire. Though most women today lack the time, energy, and inclination to live this fantasy, they have their own unrealistic expectations. When women today return home from work, they often wish a loving and supportive wife was there waiting for them.
Women today are so tired and stressed, they too want a happy wife to greet them at home.
This trend in relationships is creating a new area of conflict. In various ways and to different degrees, women want men to become like women. They want men to share equal responsibility at home and in the relationship. It is no longer enough for a man to be a good provider. If she works outside the home, then to be fair, he should contribute to work inside the home and be more supportive in the relationship. If she is doing traditional “men’s work,” then he should do traditional “women’s work.”
This sounds good, but there is another point of view. Just as women want men to change, men want women not to change. Most men, to some degree, want their partners to be the domestic divas their mothers were. A man wants to come home and be supported by his loving wife. Since he is doing what his father did, his wife should do what his mother did. Oblivious to how much it takes to organize a smooth-running household, he expects the impossible from her.
Unrealistic expectations make changing gender roles nearly impossible.
As men cling to old expectations, women are creating new expectations that are equally unrealistic. To various degrees, women want a sympathetic partner, eager to talk about the
