Tag: Women

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Big Duh Men and Women Are Not Alike!

I just heard about yet another study on the differences in male/female behavior. When are we going to finally understand that we are not the same. It is essentially a big DUH !

Get a group of guys together about last week’s golf game. What will you hear? Unless it’s talk about the weather, more often than not you’ll hear them brag about how well they did: best game I ever played.” “You should have seen me hit right to the green on the seventeenth hole. It was beautiful.” Men like to reinforce their dominant position. Whenever they’re in a position of having won, of beating out a competitor or leading the tribe to victory, they want everyone to know it and admire it. Women, on the other hand, usually feel very uncomfortable in similar situations and more than likely will do the opposite. If they’re talking to other women about themselves it will likely be in a disparaging way. “Oh, I feel so fat today.” Or “ My hair really looks awful today. No matter what products I use, it always looks the same. I just can’t win.” Why? Because women know that talking about their own insecurities will draw other women in and make them instinctively comfortable. Women want to bond with other women, they want to complete the circle and create an aura of mutual nurturing. Men don’t have that need and actually get a kick out of ragging on each other. Their primal programming drives them to strive to put each other down, and helps to amuse the group.

This behavior seems to create closeness and the clarification of where they stand in the pecking order. They rarely try to boast each other’s egos. It is taken for granted that each member of the group feels good about themselves. To show weakness in this area would be to show vulnerability. A trait that is not considered a male strength. On the other hand women love to share their problems and their image issues. It brings us closer together and feeds our caretaking needs. In fact we can go on and on for hours about problems that affect us and others, even individuals that are friends of friends of ours. Men might off handedly mention that someone had a heart attack, but they don’t spend an inordinate amount of time adding small details like what their cholesterol count was prior to the attack, and how they should have eaten better. The bottom line is it can all be pretty amusing, and the more we can laugh with each other about our differences, the better we’ll get along!

 

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We All Need Good News

By now the majority of the world has witnessed the miraculous rescue of thirty three trapped miners from Chile. How these men were able not only to survive but to do so with grace, dignity and even traces of humor is beyond comprehension. Yet they emerged from a hellacious ordeal to the embraces of families, friends and co-workers who stood vigil anxiously awaiting their return. I for one cannot imagine living in the conditions they endured. It certainly isn’t something any of us are prepared for. Much of what they did to survive was contingent on their unbelievable ability to work together as a team, along with those who created and helped with the rescue. What lifted my spirits and filled my heart with joy was how the human spirit can rise to such spectacular heights. We have seen these types of heroics over and over when disaster strikes, and we are in awe and proud that we humans are capable of rising to the occasion. I know from conversations I have with family, friends and colleagues, that stress, anxiety and depression have become much more prevalent and have begun to erode our outlook as Americans. Many individuals I deal with in my work have also felt a certain trepidation as to where our culture is headed. So much of what we read and hear about in the media feeds into our deepest fears ; i.e. the economy is tanking, politics are filled with rancor, prejudice continues to raise its ugly head, bullying is growing exponentially and reality shows continue to showcase entitlement, dysfunction and bizarre behavior. If I watch too much news, I start to think that the next image that I see will be of Nero fiddling on a roof. It is easy to forget that many people have good hearts, work through their problems with integrity and do the best they can with what they have. We need to focus more on man’s ability to be kind, empathic, and generous. Our minds need a break from the relentless messages that permeate our airwaves that focus on the dark side of humanity. I don’t expect not to be informed of things that could be hurtful or harmful, but please let’s start sprinkling some good news in between the mayhem. It just might make us feel that we are more the same than separate.