Before I challenged myself in love for a year during my Love Project, I used to be one of these women who expect men to initiate everything and who believe that if a man doesn’t behave the was he is ’supposed’ to then he is not good enough! Because everybody told me so. Because the advertising, the movies, and all the books promising me ’Happily Ever After’ told me so. They told me that we’re ’goddesses’ who men should adore and shower with attention, compliments, diamonds and luxurious get-aways just because we are fabulous!
Partly to blame for this sort of attitude are books like ’The Rules” forbidding women from initiating conversations, flirting, messaging, eye contact etc. with men they like. The ruling principle of ’The Rules” is that by playing hard to get women are more likely to get a guy to commit to them and it’s based on the premise that men have the instincts of the hunters they once were and ultimately enjoy the chasing.
But during my running session today I realised how much all this propaganda has been messing with our heads. On one hand, we fancy ourselves as strong independent women who want to be treated equally by men, but on another hand we’re comfortable playing the role of the Ice Princess who requires men to slay imaginary dragons in our honour on daily basis. We really should be making up our minds already, don’t you think?
’He should be the one asking me out, not me!’ said a friend about a guy who was being unclear about his intentions after I suggested that she should invite him out.
In the past, I would have never suggested to any of my friends to ask a guy out but today I truly believe that if a woman asks a man out this is not a sign of weakness. Asking a man out shows confidence and it creates the opportunity to allow the man to express his intentions, which doesn’t mean that the woman has to agree with. She can see if their intentions coincide or not and make her own decision.
’He behaved unacceptably and I do not tolerate this kind of behaviour’ said another friend about her boyfriend of almost a year.
Normally I would have sided with her, agreed that he behaved badly and encouraged her in pursuing the conflict but this time I surprised myself. After a bit more digging she admitted she wasn’t entirely blameless and she opened up to the idea of initiating a conversation from a more loving place, instead of letting her ego do the talking.
This made me see how quickly we let these destructive ingrained mentalities to destroy our relationships. We keep ruining present relationships in the pursuit of perfect imaginary ones because we don’t realise than men are people too and they too are afraid, they too have been hurt, they too are being protective of their hearts when we women start showing our teeth.
It’s really silly but we do this all the time. We don’t see that our perfection lies in making two imperfect people work together. [Tweet this]
This can only be achieved through conversation and through showing our vulnerable sides. Being strong does not always work in our favour.
I think women need to soften up a bit and be more flexible in their relationships with men. If we’re expecting them to take us seriously, if we’re expecting them to realise we can do the things they do, then wouldn’t it be fair that in exchange we expect them to have sensitive souls like us too, to cry sometimes and to want as much love from us as we want from them? After all, the roles of the genders are now more blurred than ever. And that, my friends, is a very good thing!
Lord, grant that I might not so much
seek to be loved as to love.