Emotional Immaturity
The Big Mistake
There is a basic issue that men struggle with that I would say turns into a huge mistake when it comes to making a relationship work long term...
...and it is how men ignore and at times even celebrate their emotional immaturity!
Creating intimacy with a woman requires some kind of emotional participation from men, and emotional immaturity makes it virtually impossible for men to become equal intimate partners.
We all know that the basic challenge for most guys is that we are not as familiar with our emotional world as we are with our intellectual and physical worlds.
And because of this, any guy trying to articulate and reveal his feelings to another person is an experience that goes against all that is manly, because it is a vulnerable thing to do.
The whole guys-don't-talk-about-their-feelings characteristic of being a man is actually a huge burden on any relationship that aspires to be a partnership.
The idea of a partnership is one that usually requires equal participation in feeding the relationship, and wherever that is not true...
...that is where one or both people feel alone in the relationship. This is especially true in the emotional connection.
Hey, a single guy can get away with not being familiar with his emotional world and do just fine, but the moment he gets into an intimate relationship and tries to get by without sharing his feelings with his partner...
...as he remains emotionally disconnected from himself...
...it means he will stay emotionally disconnected from her...
...and he essentially bails out on his half of the job of feeding the relationship.
The problem is that women have been trying to address the issue of becoming more self-sufficient and financially independent so that they don't have to depend so much on a guy.
Men have not been similarly motivated to work on their emotional communication skills unless they get an ultimatum from a wife or girlfriend threatening to leave the relationship.
There are a couple of exceptions, however.
Men can talk about happiness, and most men are familiar with their anger. Anger is the one onerous feeling that is "okay" for guys to feel and show...
which means that it is the least emotionally vulnerable feeling for men to feel and express that doesn't challenge the whole strong and silent, manly man stereotype.
When it comes to revealing or talking about fear, pain, sadness, shame, or even confusion, however...
we fumble around and stare at our feet because we are at a loss as to how to identify and talk about those very real feelings.
"Showing up" as a Real Guy in any situation calls for us to courageously look into our hearts and become aware of whatever is in there.
The one thing that gets in the way of us being real in those difficult moments is how we mistrust our emotional world.
It makes sense that if we don't know the terrain of whatever landscape that we are exploring...
that we are tentative if not downright scared to venture forth.
Because of this:
There are ways that we may still feel alone, even when we are in a relationship.
There are ways that we may still feel unfulfilled--even if we make a lot of money and have successful careers.
There are ways that we don't know who we really are or what we really are passionate about.
Most men I work with want to know why women always want to talk about their feelings.
What I try and get them to understand is that emotional intimacy really is the glue of a relationship, and women are acutely aware of this fact.
Women who are familiar with their emotional needs look to their intimate relationship as the place to get those needs met. Because of this, women's need for emotional intimacy is way different than men's.
It doesn't mean that men have no need for it.
It just means that it's probably different than most women's.
Women search for deep intimacy with their girlfriends, then they look for that same level of intimacy with their relationships with guys.
That's when most guys start to get confused about how to do that, and then they start to feel inadequate because she reminds him that she isn't getting her emotional needs met with him.
Men and women have to understand that they have different levels of need for emotional intimacy in their romantic relationships.
The trick is how men and women learn to dialog about these differences without freaking out about them.
Men don't have to talk about their feelings the same way that women do.
Men just have to understand that until they get better at doing it, their ability to be real is VERY limited, and their ability to create and sustain intimacy is VERY limited.
The emotional needs of a relationship (there's a phrase that brings a quizzical and confused look to every guy's face) really is the glue that not only defines the quality of a relationship, but also keeps that relationship together.
And the emotional connection of every relationship needs to be forged equally by both people.
This puts guys in the unenviable position of having to "play catch up" in terms of what they have to contribute emotionally.
A lot of times it comes as too little, too late for the woman because she has usually gotten past her limit of frustration and loneliness to try to save the relationship.
Most guys try to get help to save a troubled relationship only after a wife or girlfriend threatens to leave.
Many of you reading this right now may be doing so because your wife or girlfriend shoved this into your hands and said, "Read this web site, or go get some therapy, or go to some seminar to figure out your stuff, or else I'll be gone."
What is both sad and amusing about this is that, the one thing that men get relatively little information about as we grow up is how emotional maturity can help a man succeed when it comes to creating intimacy in a relationship.
The biggest reason for this is that the one thing that men get relatively zero information about is how to recognize and acknowledge their own emotional world.
It's not any one guy's fault, but it is a condition that pretty much every guy has to deal with sooner or later.
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