What She Wants

What does she want from me, anyway? by Holly Faith Phillips (This article originally appeared in Today's Family magazine and is taken from the book What Does She Want From Me, Anyway? by Holly Faith Phillips with Greg Lewis, 1997, Zondervan Publishing House). During 1995, Holly had the unique opportunity of being the only woman to speak at Promise Keepers to over 750,000 men. It was through her experiences at these events, her own marriage, and questions from hundreds of men about women that she wrote What Does She Want from Me Anyway? Holly is the wife of Randy Phillips, president of Promise Keepers. Not long ago, Promise Keepers received a poignant letter from a man who admitted he struggling in his relationships. He wrote: "The area I have the most trouble with is in expressing my feelings.

I usually stuff them inside. I never feel too comfortable sharing with others one to one. "For instance, just my doing business day to day involves communication. But I do my best to initiate as little contact as possible. I have the biggest problem letting people know my needs.

And when I do, I usually feel shame. "I have had many dreams and plans for my business and my life. But when I try to talk about them, a gush of self-doubt hits me, and I end up throwing the plan away or filing it in the back of some drawer and try to forget about it. "The other sad part is when I get down on myself like this, I won't let anyone else into my world. I push my wife and kids away and feel even more frustrated.

We hardly know each other. "I want to ask for help. But instead, I freeze up, and then I get more discouraged." WHAT AM I SUPPOSE TO SAY? Most guys I know are more comfortable showing than telling. Given a choice they'd pick action over words.

They would rather do something than talk about almost anything. Verbal communication is critically important to relationships. Men are told again and again that they are going to have to talk if they want their relationships to go forward. Many men have learned that not communicating sends a message of it's own. We intuitive women are practiced at reading the smallest nuances in nonverbal communication.

If nothing is said, we're very good at jumping to our own conclusions. If you're not talking, we may conclude that you don't want to talk, that you don't care, or that you don't love us anymore. This helps explain the sense of urgency I often hear behind men's question: What am I suppose to say? To answer this question, we need to identify some common barriers that arise when we try to communicate. Men tend to isolate and internalize. When Randy and I first met, he was a Private First Class at an Army base in Hawaii.

A few months before we were to marry, Randy had accumulated several parking tickets at the base because he had not updated his registration. He realized that if he registered now, he could be in big trouble. A couple of weeks before our wedding, I began to sense that something was wrong. Randy was not only afraid of getting caught and severely disciplined, but was also worried about what my father would think. (He was a Lt.

Colonel at the same base.) He was afraid to tell me because he thought he would lose my respect. He was ashamed. When he did open up, I think I surprised him with concern and sympathy. Randy saw that I loved him no matter what he'd done.

Far from losing my respect, he'd actually endeared himself to me by allowing me to share his private distress. Men and women see and use conversation differently. Guys deal with problems by identifying them and then moving directly toward the solution. Women typically want to discuss until we feel satisfied it, and all our feelings about it have been adequately acknowledged and understood. In other words, for women, talking about something shows caring and is an important problem-solving technique.

Men often don't feel they are good at communication. Because we don't enjoy what we're not naturally good at, we may actually avoid those things. The parts of the relationship game we feel we're best at, we want to practice the most. Those areas where we're naturally weaker (for men, communication), we avoid. As a result, we'll become even weaker over time and lost our best shot at success.

Men are naturally protective. Emotionally honest, open conversation can make a man feel vulnerable. What he shares may come back to haunt him. Also, a man doesn't want to expose those he loves. When he is distressed about something, his natural tendency is to keep quiet because he's afraid it will distress his wife or because he's embarrassed and doesn't want to admit being weak.

This leads to another reason men are protective-- women immediately butt in instead of just listening. No sooner has Randy let down his defenses than I begin to overwhelm him with my own felling about his feelings. That isn't what he needed or wanted at all. He needed me to just be quiet and listen. To give him the opportunity to vent.

Men may be harboring deep, dark secrets that are taking a serious toll. It's impossible to build a wall high enough to seal off some particularly painful, unresolved secret issue (homosexuality, an affair pornography, drugs, or alcohol) without destroying or damaging the entire communication process and therefore, the overall relationship. Resolving the problems in your marriage isn't all the man's responsibility. Women also share responsibility. But if you want to show here you really care, you can begin by allowing yourself to be changed.

If you can be the initiator in changing the areas mentioned above, you wife will notice, and chances are your relationship will be transformed.