What to do when men become emotionally distant
Why can't men talk about their feelings? Get help communicating with an emotionally distant man. Learn why men become distant, and how to communicate with emotionally distant men. If you know someone can't communicate a certain way, it's up to you to find a better way!
I realized something important this week about how men think and act.
It's that men who pay attention and think about the feelings they have, why they have them, what they mean and how to talk about them are RARE.
And it's even more unique and special for a man to pay attention to his feelings in relationships with women and to be able to talk openly about them.
Here's what I want to talk to you about:
Why can't men talk about their feelings?
It's like they're helpless morons when it comes to knowing and sharing how they feel with you.
And why do men react so weird when you want to talk about things like issues, emotions, relationships, commitment, marriage?
The answer is pretty fascinating but has more than one simple dimension to it.
Let me ask you...
Have you ever asked a man how he feels about you or your situation and then he starts acting all freaked out?
He turns into a deer in headlights.
Or even worse, he starts getting angry and frustrated and turns the conversation back on you with unrelated problems or issues.
Well, you've run into the BRICK WALL guys have with relationship communication.
And guess what?
It's YOUR fault!
Yep, I'm not letting you shift the blame to someone else for what matters in your life.
As some of my more enlightened friends like to say:
"Don't go to victim"
If you know someone can't communicate a certain way, it's up to you to find a better way.
Then once you can reach them you can help them improve.
As the saying goes,
"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice and shame on me."
So are you continuing to bang your head against the brick wall?
Shame on you!
Lots of women do - all their lives over and over in relationships until they've become convinced that men are idiots and you can't ever make things work.
Quit it for cryin' out loud!
There's a better way, but you'll never figure things out just trying what makes sense to YOU. Don't be RIDICULOUS!
Planning and approaching issues in your life just by what "makes sense" is not only naive, it's honestly pretty stupid.
That's why people go to school, they go to college, they study and read, they go through job training and THEN they go out and make a go of it.
So how much thinking, planning, reading and learning have you done around the things that effect your relationships and your love life?
Maybe you picked up the latest best-seller by some publishers daughter on something dumb like how swans mate and are monogamous and you and your guy can be beautiful and happy like swans in love too...
Hey, not a bad idea. Maybe I'll write a book about that. Not.
Seriously though...
Are you banging your head against the wall?
Or are you looking to learn?
Here something fascinating to learn...
Men have a "SECRET BUTTON" you can push that will make communicating with them almost effortless.
And if you learn what it is and how to use it you'll be able to get at what he really thinks and feels... and teach him how to talk to and understand you.
So let me take you through a situation I guarantee you've either been in before or you'll be in with a man...
HELLO!
That means pay attention because this is one of those "universal situations" that can mean priceless knowledge for you.
Let's say your talking with a man you're interested in and you want to take things to "the next level" but you don't know how.
And you've been waiting on him to talk to you or express his interest or love for a while.
But he hasn't done that, and you get a little disappointed and frustrated with things.
You've tried being patient and talking with your friends but you've got to know how he feels and you need things to move forward.
So what do you do?
Well, most women build up everything they're thinking inside until they have to let it out in one big emotional release.
And guess what men see when this happens?
No, they don't see how much you care or love them and how amazing it is that you want to be with them.
Somehow instead of seeing the good and the positive intentions you have, they see intense negative emotions that they can't understand.
And men get scared of emotions that are really intense or that they don't understand.
Most of all, they just aren't used to them.
So when you share your feelings and want to know his feelings for you, he freaks out.
He either becomes the "deer-in-headlights" guy or the "angry-frustrated-scared" guy.
Most women do what makes sense in this situation - they push and encourage the man to talk, to get in touch with his feelings and to share HER feelings.
But men don't see it as positive encouragement.
They see it as you being "over-emotional" and pushy about the issue.
(Yeah, I know... Men are freakish emotional creatures!)
When you resist or react negatively in any conversation, everything becomes more difficult.
And the WORST mistakes you can make here with a man I call the 4 Deadly Sins:
- Assuming - that he knows what you want or expect
- Begging - for him to "give you" what you want
- Convincing - trying to make him feel the way you do
- Bullying - bullying him into your way of thinking or feeling.
You will never have any long term success with a man if you keep doing these.
You'll be beating yourself against the "BRICK WALL".
So what's the "SECRET BUTTON"?
Well, remember that there's a catch to all improvements in your life, right?
So the same goes for this button thing.
You've got to make it happen by changing YOUR communication first in order to push his communication button.
It's up to you to get a man's fears and defenses out of the way so you can get to the bottom of things.
And getting past the masks men can wear with women out of fear is the essence of "pushing the button".
Here's the 5 basic steps I've recognized that you can use to push his "secret button". And I'll give you some examples to give you a general idea of what these are as best I can in this short article:
Step 1) The Primer
This is a the "starter" for the conversation that will build an entirely positive context - and it might seem like something you could skip, but it's actually the most important step. It might be something like starting off talking with positive comments about the time you've been spending together and some of the great times you've had. The idea is ALL about setting the right context so a guy becomes positive, comfortable and opens up.
Step 2) Casual Introduction
This is the first step into "where things are going". Instead of springing "the talk" on him, keep talking about positives, the good things, the things you want to continue that are WORKING. If you don't have too many of these things, think harder. You're interested in a future with this guy for some reason, right? But don't just compliment him. Make sure it's about BOTH of you, and how you are together, not just about him.
Step 3) Applying With Positive Strokes
So now you're tuning into each other a bit in the conversation and sharing thoughts about the good things you have together.
Then tell him, "Hey, you know what's great? I bet you and I see things differently, which is OK, but I love spending time with you and we have such a great time together".
Again, you're getting into a conversation about relationships that will eventually turn to your situation, but you're doing it in a way that doesn't trigger any resistance or fear from the man - and this is what you're aiming for.
Step 4) Non-situational Honesty
Step 5) Active Listening
Step 4 and 5 are a bit more complex so I'll save them for another time.
But steps 1, 2 and 3 are a lot to work with and get you thinking.
If you follow these it will blow a man away
AND even better... it will create massive ATTRACTION!
Yeah, imagine that.
By talking about serious relationship "stuff" you won't scare a guy off.
No, you'll actually make his attraction for you STRONGER.
How?
Well, men secretly wish that they had women that they felt completely open and comfortable with to share their feelings, thoughts and desires on subjects they usually have a hard time with.
It feels REALLY good to talk about things, especially if they've been bottled up!
I bet you've felt that too.
When you push the button for a man, he experiences a kind of open and honest communication "release".
And the more intense the topic or issue is, the more amazing and "freeing" the experience is.
For men, there's nothing tougher and more foreign than getting really in touch with their emotions and sharing them with someone.
When you're then one to do this, men almost can't believe it.
They instantly see you as someone unique, rare, and "cool".
And when you can talk about tough issues in a way that makes them easy and fun and you have the right amount or "detachment" from the outcome, it makes men EXTREMELY attracted to you.
So what exactly are these 5 detailed steps to push a man's communication button?
You can check out all the details here:
Click Here For Your Free Newsletter And eBook Download
I talk about each step in detail, exactly what to do, and the common mistakes to avoid.
Why A Man Gets 'Scared Away' When You Try To Get Him To Commit For The Long-Term-And What To Do About It...
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How To Read And Respond To A Man's "Emotional World"
As you probably already know, men can be dangerous, or just plain ignorant, when it comes to dealing with their feelings and emotions. Here's a quick story along these lines that I've got to share with you.
Several months ago I was invited to speak at a conference to around 200 men about dating and relationships. I thought it would be fascinating for all of us if we talked about how a man and a woman can emotionally "connect" in a more direct way and bypass a lot of wasted time in dating, arguments, rejection, hurt feelings, mini break-ups, etc ...
I knew that if men could have more awareness around this, and use the tools I had for them in my presentation to better connect with women, then they'd be a whole lot better off. (And so would the women they were dating!)
As you might expect, I saw more than a few blank stares in the audience during this topic. It's not often you have a room full of men talking about how to better "emotionally connect" to a woman. Well, we were, and here's where it got even more FASCINATING!
When I got to the end of my presentation, I decided to take some one-on-one questions from the guys in the audience. The first two were great questions from a couple of guys that I could tell got a lot out of the conversation. But then this third guy stood up. He looked like your average, nice, thoughtful, polite guy and had a soft and calculated voice. He quietly stood up, took the microphone and asked, "Excuse me, but um, what's a connection?"
Wow! I was floored by the question. Not because I couldn't answer it, but because of what it meant about him, and about other men who were thinking the same. At that moment, I couldn't believe that a human being could actually not know what an emotional connection with another human being was. That still messes with my brain. Ok, maybe he actually WAS an alien. But here's the point:
After thinking about it, I remembered that this guy who asked the question about a connection was really just another man, and not even much of an unusual one. And right then, as I thought about this, I had an AMAZING REALIZATION. All the thinking, research, writing and explaining that I've done in the past on how men are different when it comes to communication and relationships seemed to actually sell the idea short now that I had heard the truth "from the horse's mouth". The way men understand (or don't understand) emotions, feelings, relationships and connection was even more extreme than I had thought (and I already thought the differences were pretty extreme.)
Of course, after this happened, I scrambled for my journal, my notebook and my laptop to write down what started pouring out of me. I began digging even deeper into studies, research, interviews, observations, and experiences from my life so that I could explain exactly what this meant and what was really going on here inside the minds of most men. That's when a lot of my most recent material on emotional connection and what creates lasting and long term attraction in relationships with men was created.
Lately, I like to ask women, "Have you ever taken the time to sit down and really and truly picture and imagine what it must be like to be an attractive and 'masculine' man?" Of course, the answer is always, "No." Men might act emotionally strong, indifferent, and even cold, but most men are surprisingly fragile emotionally. The thing is, it's just not part of their more "masculine" make up to display or talk about these things much of the time and to avoid the opportunity they bring for connection and intimacy.
Instead, they often express their emotions in more symbolic and indirect ways when it comes to dating and relationships, most women commonly misinterpret or react negatively to a man's "natural" emotional displays. Think about this. Attractive men who are smart, handsome, and successful are flirted with and approached all the time. These men have OPTIONS. And some of the more "needy" and desperate women who try for their attention have no idea whatsoever what it takes to get an attractive man's attention and KEEP IT.
And even if these women do date a guy for a while and things "seem" good, if a woman doesn't understand how things work for HIM, and how his feelings are triggered without all the neediness, emotional pleading, sexual enticements, etc., then there's no way the man's going stay attracted and interested for the long term. It isn't "fair", but if a woman doesn't understand how to create attraction, how a man's emotions open up and close off, and why %u2026 then a man just won't FEEL IT for her as time passes - even if the connection USED TO BE THERE.
Understanding this mindset, how it affects a man's personality, and (this is key) what kinds of "games" men play to diplomatically and politely excuse themselves or withdraw from any future commitment is HIGHLY important. I know how frustrating it can be with what seems like so many "games" going on and so much to think about just for the simple feeling and sharing of love. And isn't true love supposed to just "happen" and be free of all this?
Well, the thing is, once you start to understand more about a man's emotional world and how to help him tune into yours, it won't seem or feel like work to you at all. You'll be able to get back into that "flow" where love IS shared and expressed easily--and you will both start to naturally understand and fulfill each other. Instead of letting typical male "games" get to you, learn how to understand them so you can keep them from happening, and make them work FOR YOU if they do. If there's one thing that attractive men seem to respond to universally, it's A WOMAN WHO GETS WHAT'S GOING ON EMOTIONALLY for herself AND for him. THAT'S when a man will share his love with you.
Being a woman who already "gets" what an emotional connection is, you're way ahead of the game with a man. Now you've got to learn exactly how to put that advantage to use in your love life for good. It's time to learn to see things in a completely different way, which will lead to you becoming attractive to men for more than just a fling. Really. Your emotions and your ability and power to connect are your own set of "pre-wired tools". All you need to do is start using them the right way.
Free email courses on understanding men's emotions.
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- Divorce Decision - Decide If Divorce Is The Answer
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- 1000 Questions For Couples
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- 500 Secrets About Men
- This package is required reading for every woman who loves a man. What you absolutely must know about him to make him yours.
- How To Survive An Affair
- Work through the healing and restoration of your relationship after an affair. Learn how to restore the honesty, safety and trust back into your relationship (even if your partner isn't yet willing).
- Beating Cheating
- Discover the "TRUTH" ( in 48 hours or less) about whether the "love of your life" is actually being unfaithful to you, or not. Find out who they are cheating on you with, where, when & for how long. THIS SITE IS ONLY MEANT FOR THOSE WHO CAN HANDLE THE TRUTH IN EVERY SITUATION (however hurtful it may turn out to be.) By the time you've read this page you will know exactly what next steps to take.
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How To Keep Other Women Away From Your Man
protect your relationship from infidelity
One of the hardest things in life is watching someone you love, loving someone else. Don't let that happen to you. Wouldn't you like, not to ever worry about losing your man to another woman? Stopping infidelity only takes you educating yourself about what to do and how to go about doing it. Isn't your relationship worth the extra knowledge you will acquire from reading about solutions to infidelity?The advice in this book has been provided through research from men who have openly and freely shared their experiences about this topic. If you want to know how to keep other women away from your man, you need to learn from the advice given by men about how to go about doing this..
Also included in this first of its kind book is advice from the "other woman" about what you need to do to keep them away from your man. Believe me when I say you don't want to miss this very revealing book.
Rather than live in fear of the possibility that your spouse is committing adultery or remain paralyzed by a betrayal that has taken place, you can educate yourself on infidelity and empower yourself to prevent infidelity from happening.
Learn how to prevent infidelity, affairs & cheating in your relationship, here.
Men Don't Listen; Men Don't Communicate
Life for both sexes is arduous, difficult, a perpetual struggle. It calls for gigantic courage and strength..... Virginia Wolff
If a woman could accept such a never, then she might galvanize herself to learn different methods that might lead to much increased effectiveness of communication. There are ways, but they will often not look like the typical communications among women. These ways involve increased quality and effectiveness of the communications attempted. Some suggestions follow that presume a mythical/ average couple who want better communication (Note- these suggestions do not depend upon their spouse's actions):
(1) She must reduce her quantity of words. After a certain length of time he will tune her out no matter what. He must be more truthful about when he starts tuning out and why.
(2) She must be careful about preciseness. An accusation that he never takes out the garbage when he knows he took it out once three months ago may lead to his rejecting everything she says. He must express how he is affected by such globalizing comments.
(3) In his seminars on relationships Gary Smalley describes a method he calls word pictures. This method involves communicating feelings by word pictures.
There are many books written about communication. Whatever your sex, read them if communication is a problem in your relationship(s). Almost all of us could learn to be more effective communicators with the people in our lives.
How to Be Your Own Therapist
How to Be Your Own Therapist: A Step-by-Step Guide to Taking Back Your Life
Provides tools to replace unhealthy behaviors with actions for satisfaction and success. Drawing from her 20 years as a licensed therapist, Dr. Patricia Farrell has developed an approach to help individuals manage their own lives by reclaiming their personal power.
Amazon Price: $11.21 (as of 07/19/2008)
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Used Price: $1.67
Lef Brain, Right Brain
She speaks twice as many words as the man and has done so even before the age of two. Boys and men are much more nonverbal, usually preferring physical spatial activities even as small toddlers. So the evidence is clear that women hang out more in their left brains, whereas men tend to hang out more in their right brains.
Am I saying that beer-guzzling/ TV-glued/ sex-driven man in your life is more intuitive than you, the average woman? Yes, for he senses a situation and takes action intuitively (though his responses may be very restricted). He does not go through a long internal verbal process in choosing his path - he reacts, knowing it is right for him to do so.
Intuition is defined (Oxford, 1980, s.v. "intuition") as "the power of knowing or understanding something immediately without reason or being taught." He responds immediately with sexual feeling to sex objects (no planning or long decision making process for him in these matters). This is an immediate response to his feelings (i.e., right brain work).
If you say something he doesn't want to hear, he will not respond verbally, but spatially as he moves to the TV to watch hockey reruns. He senses your words are wrong for him, and his intuitive response is to move away. As a woman, on the other hand, you may have long debates in your head before you come to make a decision or take some action. Such internal thinking and debating are left brain activities.
Note to Women. Men are not generally as comfortable on the verbal side of their brains as you are. When you say to them "let's talk," you are asking them to join you in an activity in which most men feel somewhat inferior to you. As soon as possible, many men therefore will opt out of talking to return to their preferred nonverbal spatial activities.
There is major confusion between the words intuition and creativity. Intuitive people are not necessarily creative, some just keep duplicating old ruts without much conscious left brain thinking. Creative people, on the other hand, manage successfully (though perhaps only temporarily) in the intuitive right brain.
Major contributors to the confusion about left-right brain activity are feelings, which usually have been attributed to the right brain. It has been a recent societal value to consider right brain activities as more desirable.
Yet some recent research suggests that happy feelings reside in the left brain and unhappy feelings in the right brain. Who wants to rush to be the right-brained person now?
Because men do seem to have more difficulty with feelings, it has been often believed that men must not be in the right half of the brain. On the contrary, they often compensate for their difficulties with certain feelings by feeling others. Typical compensations are:
(1) they may feel sexual in all sorts of situations that are not particularly sexual
(2) they may just head for their TV addiction instead of hanging out with an uncomfortable feeling or
(3) they may get angry in situations that might call for a different response. Men, when they repress their feelings, do not routinely move to the verbal left brain. They often stay in the right brain and compensate by feeling other feelings or by choosing some addictive behavior.
Thus, I make the following assertion that is contrary to much published information: women are more left-brained, men are more right-brained, perhaps 80-90% of men and women. (My thanks to Patricia Sun for planting in my brain the possibility of this being the truth .)
Test Yourself for Left-Right Brain Tendencies. A one-question quiz (without scientific basis) may give you a good clue. The question is - "Assuming you hold up your share of the words, do you usually spend significantly more than an hour each week on personal phone calls?" If you do, you have left-brain tendencies. If you don't, you have right-brain tendencies.
Of course, many situations are more complex or are exceptions: (1)many men and women don't fit the typical mold, (2)lefthanders often are the exception, (3)the average woman may have better access to both halves of the brain and (4)men often seem to shift from wholly left to wholly right and back rather than find a middle ground with ready access to both halves (as might the average woman). These more complex situations tend to confuse us.
Each of us would do well to examine our own favorite brain location. Historically, women and men have tended to cluster in occupations that fit the above described right-left brain tendencies. The choice of our jobs is vital to our happiness (see Chapter 14). Selections based upon some socially-correct view of today, instead of our own natural inclinations, could well produce much unhappiness in our lives.
Non-traditional job opportunities are vital for that significant minority of both men and women whose natural gifts (and favored sides of the brain) are non-traditional. Because men and women have different preferred sides of the brain, it seems a faulty goal to have a 50-50 female-male balance as a societal goal in any occupation that is left-right brain oriented. (On the other hand, equal opportunity is desirable, as is equal pay for equal work.)
Books I've Read and Personally Recommend
Five Keys for Understanding Men, A Woman's Guide
Twenty-eight percent of all women murdered in this country are slain by their intimate male partners. Every twelve seconds a woman is beaten, raped or maimed by a man in this country today.
Five Keys For Understanding Men exposes the deepest drives and most pervasive needs that lay at the core of the male psyche. Dr. Gary Malone and Susan Mary Malone collaborate to reveal the five needs driving the lives of all men, and that by knowing what these are, women can understand their men, who they are, how to predict their responses and actions in any given circumstance.
Complete with case studies, checklists, as well as questions and answers, Five Keys For Understanding Men will enable women readers to separate the healthy traits of their men from the unhealthy, borderline, and dangerous ones. This is "must" reading for any mother of sons, as well as the wife, sister, daughter, friend or co-worker of a man.
Amazon Price: (as of 07/19/2008)
Men Who Can't Love: How to Recognize a Commitmentphobic Man Before He Breaks Your Heart
Amazon Price: $10.85 (as of 07/19/2008)
Women Men Love, Women Men Leave: What Makes Men Want to Commit?
Amazon Price: $7.99 (as of 07/19/2008)
Men, Women and Relationships: Making Peace with the Opposite Sex
Amazon Price: $11.16 (as of 07/19/2008)
Truly Mars and Venus: The Illustrated Essential Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus
Amazon Price: $13.57 (as of 07/19/2008)
Other Relationship Books Worth Reading
The Relationship Rescue Workbook
Amazon Price: (as of 07/19/2008)
Leaving Him Behind: Cutting the Cord and Breaking Free After the Marriage Ends
Amazon Price: $17.10 (as of 07/19/2008)
Why Men Don't Listen and Women Can't Read Maps: How We're Different and What to Do About It
Amazon Price: $10.17 (as of 07/19/2008)
Letting Go: A 12-Week Personal Action Program to Overcome a Broken Heart
Amazon Price: $7.99 (as of 07/19/2008)
Why Men Don't Have a Clue and Women Always Need More Shoes: The Ultimate Guide to the Opposite Sex
Amazon Price: $11.20 (as of 07/19/2008)
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* We love and care for our lenses each day! Show us some love too? If you've found this lens interesting, useful, enjoyable, informative, or fun please lensroll us, leave a comment, vote for us or--even better--add us to your favorites!
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ShawnsBidness
What a fantastic lens! Not only great info but the answers that are needed to deal with this issue. 5 BIG STARS! Posted July 02, 2008 |
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Lizblueberry
I love your lens. It is obvious that you have put a lot of hard work into it! Kudos to you! Posted June 09, 2008 |
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over30anddatingwebsites
Wow 5 out of 5! Posted June 07, 2008 |
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julieashcroft
Hi, Posted May 06, 2008 |
| UMT
Now this is one great lens, and you have hit the nails right on the head. But one thing I wonder is, how many women really care to take all this trouble. Posted April 01, 2008 |
