Sunday, August 24, 2014

Response to, "Why Women Aren't Crazy" by Yashir Ali, with Admiration and in Cooperation Toward Solutions

The article link I'll post was most moving. Far from a list of how men are wrong, or how women are just nuts, this is extremely insightful! Man or woman, I'd encourage anyone to read it. 
Here's "Why Women Aren't Crazy." by Yashir Ali 
from, "The Good Men Project"
Click Here! (Like you mean it.)

   Refreshing! This man, Yashir Ali,  is being, "emotionally naked," and I find that to be one of the greatest, most admirable strengths in men. This isn't the time to list a man's errors. It's a cue to listen with compassion. Often I find that men in my own life will address what may have been bothering me when I give them a little time to talk. Listen without forming a response. Just hear him, as you'd hope he'd do for you... This is written by a man to other men, and it's compassionate. 

   I wont have the insight into men that another man might, but what I do know is that it usually hurts men deeply to think they've hurt a woman. Sometimes when things are pointed out (even if she is considerate, and asking for an easy change in behavior) so she wont be hurt, physically or emotionally, he can feel so emotionally naked that he can go on the defensive to avoid his own pain at being told he hurt her, that he can transfer that pain back to her by writing off her feelings as, "overreactions," or sometimes, he can simply run...
    
    Women, on the other end of this, learn that to say anything to a man of what they did that hurt us (and sometimes other females) can trigger them to insult us, or in more aware moments, we can learn the terrible error I once believed:  that we just have to be stronger than men, take the brunt of the pain silently, and never point it out to them, because they just can't handle it without shutting down (which hurts us more, and seeing them in pain isn't worth it to us, exactly like it is to men when they see our pain..It can be unbearable in the moment.) 

   This is the equivalent of when men joke about it always being their fault, and smoothing things over with admitting that whether it is or not..This is how women do it: in silence, and it's the same thing. We teach each other these things, and form these habits together, because they work for a short period of time, or they seem to while building very destructive walls between ourselves and the person we want to be closest to. At the writer says, "It's heartbreaking." .... 

   This is for women and men who care deeply about each other. Most of us have had serious conditioning since childhood to avoid being, "The bad guy," and sometimes we're simply wrong, we can admit it, and make amends, and the world wont end. It just might be a new beginning. 

   Me? I'm very often wrong, in fact, I may be now, but tears or saying, "That hurt," have never meant there was something fundamentally wrong with me, in fact they often mean something is very right. Pain is supposed to hurt. That's our cue to grow. By the same token when a man needs time to respond, it doesn't mean there is something fundamentally wrong with him. 

   The other may grow with us, but if they don't or can't yet, we'll still be o.k. I'm often at fault, but I'm not always, and often who is to blame isn't nearly as important as stepping up to mend each other, and finding that often the other will join us. 

Owning it daily, Me.

tina jones