How to Have Great Communication
HOW TO HAVE GREAT COMMUNICATION Research shows that there are major and significant differences in the way men and women are 'wired'.
The more you expect, accept and respect those differences, the better you’ll get along and the more powerful your communication will be!
Far and away the most frequent complaint men have about women is that women are always trying to 'change' them. Women do often try to change men's behaviour by offering unsolicited advice and criticism and becoming a one woman man-improvement committee!
When a woman seeks to give unsolicited advice to a man, more often than not he'll hear that he's incompetent, doesn't know how to do something or can't quite manage something on his own.
Interestingly enough, the most frequent complaint women have about men is that men don't listen!
When women seek empathy, men tend to offer 'solutions'. They believe solutions are the best way to be helpful and show love. Women may just want someone to sincerely listen to them. Men often try to change a woman's mood when she is upset by offering solutions to her problems, which she interprets as discounting and invalidating her feelings.
Men often feel responsible or to blame for women's problems, when they may not be to blame.
Many men feel demeaned by doing housework. For many women, the cleanliness of the house is a manifestation of a warm, homely nest. There seems little doubt that men and women generally have different thresholds for cleanliness and dirt.
When women are upset, it's not the best time to offer solutions. These may, however, be highly appropriate at a future time when she has calmed down and gained cathartic release from expressing her feelings and being sincerely listened to. A man appreciates advice and criticism when it is requested. Men are more likely to want to make improvements when they feel they are being approached as a solution to a problem (rather than as the problem itself).
Men have a greater need for status and independence (emphasis on separate and different); women have needs for intimacy and connection (emphasis on close and similar).
Women need to receive caring, understanding, respect, devotion, validation, and reassurance.
Women are motivated when they feel special or cherished.
Men need to receive trust, acceptance, appreciation, admiration, approval, encouragement.
Men are motivated when they feel needed. A man's deepest fear is that he is not good enough or not competent enough, though he may never express this.
Useful Books and Sites
Relate offers advice, relationship counselling, sex therapy, workshops, mediation, consultations and support face-to-face, by phone and through their website. Click here for details:
Informed Book Choice: Communication Miracles for Couples: Easy and Effective Tools to Create More Love and Less Conflict
: by Jonathan Robinson.
: by Jonathan Robinson. Do YOU have any top tips on how to communicate in your relationship? Why not share them? Why not post a quick comment below....
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