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A good book....
Daniel Goleman's Emotional Intelligence. This book makes sense to me.
Right now, the chapter I'm in is talking about marriages. And it uses gender stereotypes. Okay, that's mildly irksome, but the points it makes about two different methods of relating are actually very handy to me. I guess it makes me stereotypically feminine, too; I'm firmly on one side, and people who land on the other frustrate me. Especially if I ask them not to try to fix things when fixing isn't what it needs, and they go on to do it.
It's nice to read a book that at least says I'm not a stupid freak for reacting this way, which is how I've sometimes been made to feel. On the other hand, it's not very productive to let people I know don't "deal" that way in very far if I haven't already, is it?
The passage (page 142 in my copy):
"Men also need to be on guard against short-circuiting the discussion by offering a practical solution too early on -- it's typically more important to a wife that she feel her husband hears her complaint and empathizes with her feelings about the matter (though he need not agree with her). She may hear his offering advice as a way of dismissing her feelings as inconsequential."
You know, that's exactly it? All too often, if I'm upset, a solution offered to the underlying cause - unless it is something difficult! - feels like a pat on the head. "Here's a solution, now go away." If it's a particularly obvious sort of thing, it feels downright insulting. If I want help, I'll ask for help. If I just want to complain about something, to be heard, that's a different matter.
You learn over time who you can and cannot trust, that way. Really, what I'm looking for is recognition - not solutions - most of the time. Now, if it's an odd, difficult pattern, offering a solution after the recognition is hardly gonna upset me. (Before? I'll thank you later - but probably not right then.)
It's talking about marital situations, and the advice to the woman is more specific to that, about not making the person feel attacked. The advice to men applies even to situations where they're not involved, and frankly, I could care less about genders in both of these. Amen, for all of us, please!
Sorry. Just, after some conversations in the past year, reading this passage made me feel better. And I felt like sharing it.
Right now, the chapter I'm in is talking about marriages. And it uses gender stereotypes. Okay, that's mildly irksome, but the points it makes about two different methods of relating are actually very handy to me. I guess it makes me stereotypically feminine, too; I'm firmly on one side, and people who land on the other frustrate me. Especially if I ask them not to try to fix things when fixing isn't what it needs, and they go on to do it.
It's nice to read a book that at least says I'm not a stupid freak for reacting this way, which is how I've sometimes been made to feel. On the other hand, it's not very productive to let people I know don't "deal" that way in very far if I haven't already, is it?
The passage (page 142 in my copy):
"Men also need to be on guard against short-circuiting the discussion by offering a practical solution too early on -- it's typically more important to a wife that she feel her husband hears her complaint and empathizes with her feelings about the matter (though he need not agree with her). She may hear his offering advice as a way of dismissing her feelings as inconsequential."
You know, that's exactly it? All too often, if I'm upset, a solution offered to the underlying cause - unless it is something difficult! - feels like a pat on the head. "Here's a solution, now go away." If it's a particularly obvious sort of thing, it feels downright insulting. If I want help, I'll ask for help. If I just want to complain about something, to be heard, that's a different matter.
You learn over time who you can and cannot trust, that way. Really, what I'm looking for is recognition - not solutions - most of the time. Now, if it's an odd, difficult pattern, offering a solution after the recognition is hardly gonna upset me. (Before? I'll thank you later - but probably not right then.)
It's talking about marital situations, and the advice to the woman is more specific to that, about not making the person feel attacked. The advice to men applies even to situations where they're not involved, and frankly, I could care less about genders in both of these. Amen, for all of us, please!
Sorry. Just, after some conversations in the past year, reading this passage made me feel better. And I felt like sharing it.