When you grow up a guy, it’s not cool to talk to other guys about how you feel. If fact it’s kind of discouraged. Most of the time, when you’re a kid or teenager, the other guys are just thinking ‘Oh god, get me the fuck out of here.’ or ‘Fuck this. When’s he gonna shut up? I just wanna talk about the triple double Jordan dropped on Charles Barkley in game 4 of the NBA finals yesterday.’
And that’s why, as a guy, it becomes hard for when you’re no longer a kid or teenager to convey exactly what you’re feeling (especially to a girl). One, because you had shitall practise putting your emotions into words, and two, we’ve been conditioned that as a man you have to be strong, not weak. To show your strength, not vulnerability.
So it’s no surprise that when you see crazy people on the news, serial killers, sexual predators, rapists, mass shootings, terrorists, the ones doing them are about 99% of the time they’re men (should the news just be called the ‘Bad Shit Done by Men’ television show?)…
The two words that get the ball rolling when talking about your emotions
But from recent personal experience at trying to get better at this, I’ve noticed as in most things, the simplest approach works the best. When you’re struggling to know from which angles or which perspective to start, or worried you’ll say something you regret or worry that you’re words will come across selfish, Start with two words:
‘I feel…’
The ability for women to connect through showing vulnerabilities may also be a contributing factor to them knowing themselves better than men on average, not acting out in fucked up ways (like above) and more often than men, also living the life they want. Because when you say ‘I feel…’ it’s being true to yourself, and if you don’t worry about how the other person’s going to react or how they’ll take it (as long as you’re being respectful) you find you’re living a life that is true to the person you are right now, and the one you want to work at being.
Who would’ve thought that the best way to talk about how you feel is to start by saying ‘I feel…’?
Yep, a guy wrote this, in case you couldn’t tell.