A friend recently gave me a great idea. He thought I should post on the idea that men sometimes don’t know what to do or say when women get upset. He thought that men who do not consider themselves emotional have a hard time empathizing or dealing with women who are upset emotionally, especially if they are in a relationship with those women.

I can say two things about this phenomenon: practice deep listening, and don’t try to fix anything yet. Try to not be logical for once.

Men are notorious in their desire to fix a situation, and when this happens, deep listening cannot happen. We are fixers by nature, and this trait is good, when it comes to hunting big game, fixing a car engine, or making everyday decisions. It is a hinderance when it comes to connecting with the women in our life.

We run from, try to fix, avoid, lack empathy or do a thousand others things when the women in our lives get “emotional” because we are not in touch with those similar places within ourselves. The more we, as men, can get in touch with those emotional places (no, you won’t be crying or overly sensitive from now on), the quicker we will be able to connect and empathize with what women are experiencing emotionally.
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I read an article that says most people end up breaking their New Year’s resolutions by February. I could be true, but I find that depressing. I’d like to think that people, especially the men that I work with, are able and ready for real changes to better their lives and their relationships. Are you up for the challenge? Leanne and I sat down to create our 2009 goals yesterday, and they were quite an exercise in detail-orientation.

What goals do you have for the new year? Do you find that they work out best for you when you’ve written them down or typed them out? Do you need a partner to help you develop your goals? And, most importantly, how will be hold yourself accountable to accomplish them week after week? 

Here’s some tips about goal setting:

1. Practice visualizing exactly how you will be in 12 months. What will that picture look like? Will you be in that new job? What will it look like? What will your new relationship look like? Will she have brown or blonde hair? It’s details like that that help the goal form itself, and get you to it more quickly.

2. Practice creating simple, attainable and yet challenging goals. Is the goal attainable enough yet just out of arm’s reach? For example, paying off a credit card with a $5,000 balance may be a goal that is attainable, but will take some fortitude and commitment to it over some time.

3. Create a system to help yourself track the goals each and every week. Will you use a day planner, your iPhone or the help of a friend? Some of my friends created goal groups, where they meet every so often and discuss how their goals are coming, and hold each other accountable. There is something to be said for having someone hold us accountable. I know my sense of commitment kicks in, and I would hate to disappointment myself if I didn’t reach my goals, especially if I told someone else out loud that I was going to be doing them.

These are some ideas to help you in the design, creation and implementation of you annual goals. I hope this helps you to create the kind of new year that you want.

- Jason

It shouldn’t be that hard for you to understand: you should know exactly what she wants, when she wants it from you, even when she doesn’t come out and tell you about it. Understand? I thought not.

Reading her mind, or at least attempting to and failing miserably, is something that men have a hard time mastering, and rightly so. Men and women do communicate very differently, and, many times, couples I work with (and, yes, yours truly) fail to communicate based on assumptions rooted in the age-old practice of female mind-reading. 
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(This is a NY Times article published 11.23.08)

Happy people spend a lot of time socializing, going to church and reading newspapers — but they don’t spend a lot of time watching television, a new study finds.

That’s what unhappy people do.

Although people who describe themselves as happy enjoy watching television, it turns out to be the single activity they engage in less often than unhappy people, said John Robinson, a professor of sociology at the University of Maryland and the author of the study, which appeared in the journal Social Indicators Research.

While most large studies on happiness have focused on the demographic characteristics of happy people — factors like age and marital status — Dr. Robinson and his colleagues tried to identify what activities happy people engage in. The study relied primarily on the responses of 45,000 Americans collected over 35 years by the University of Chicago’s General Social Survey, and on published “time diary” studies recording the daily activities of participants.

“We looked at 8 to 10 activities that happy people engage in, and for each one, the people who did the activities more — visiting others, going to church, all those things — were more happy,” Dr. Robinson said. “TV was the one activity that showed a negative relationship. Unhappy people did it more, and happy people did it less.”

But the researchers could not tell whether unhappy people watch more television or whether being glued to the set is what makes people unhappy. “I don’t know that turning off the TV will make you more happy,” Dr. Robinson said.

Still, he said, the data show that people who spend the most time watching television are least happy in the long run.

Since the major predictor of how much time is spent watching television is whether someone works or not, Dr. Robinson added, it’s possible that rising unemployment will lead to more TV time.

So you aren’t sure if you want this relationship. OK. Maybe it’s been really great for a while, and now you’re just not sure. You know you’re confused, that’s for sure. And you think you want to stay with this girl, but, damn, there comes the confusion again. OK. You’re sure that that you want it now – the times got good again! Oh, wait, uhh, maybe it’s going bad again…. you just have no idea, and you are driving both of you crazy.

Here’s what I think: something else is going on (you’re thinking, yes, Jason, of course it is). Here’s some (oversimplified) explanations that might point you in the right direction and help lower your immediate confusion. These tips/ideas are by no means a quick fix, and understanding where you are stuck will take some time and work to unravel (preferably in men’s counseling). But, it’s a beginning to bring your sanity back.

One: maybe you’re afraid to commit to her. The stereotype that men are afraid to commit in an intimate relationship has some truth, and, although I shy away from stereotypes (especially about me), this one may have some truth to it. Is this you? You may not know the answer to this, except to know that when you get closer in your relationships, you freak out and either directly (or more likely, indirectly) “plug out” or “check out” of your relationship.

Two: you do really know what you want, and it’s not with her. Except you’re too afraid to be alone, and the mere idea of being with the loneliness could keep you in your relationship, even though you don’t want to be in it at all. It’s “sustained comfort,” and you can have this is you want. But it’s fear that is motivating you, and you’re not taking responsibility for your own happiness, and not allowing your beloved the chance to get on with her life and meet someone else.

Three: You’re scared of not meeting someone again (or someone like her). It took you this long to meet her, and the idea that it will take you all that time again is really overwhelming to you.

Four: You have messages from the past about saving your relationship, or not being a kind of person that ends a relationship. The thought of it is incompatible with your idealized image of yourself. You don’t see yourself as someone to end this relationship, help it, or make it grow. You stay trapped in the relationship, and in indecision.

Taken further, some guys then stay stuck in the relationship, and then do stupid stuff and push their girl away, so that she is forced into ending it. And then you don’t look like the bad guy, because she ended it. If you’re doing this, get in here right now and see me. That’s just passive-aggressive behavior, and you need some help communicating yourself clearly and directly.

So, these are some ways that guys stay in relationships, and really don’t want to be there. Let’s talk if one of these things defines the way you do relationships.

- Jason