The Critical Observation at Women's Defensive Shields - What Men
Really Need to Know
Like most interactive situations that we come across in our
everyday life, women too appear with their defense shield
intact. They are "on guard" most of the time. But to reach her
heart (hmmm... other areas too), you have to break that shield
or loosen that defense mechanism.
So what are the typical concern areas of a woman? Why does she
pull up her defenses? To begin with, there are two primary areas
where she finds herself vulnerable. One, her physical safety and
the other her mind. There does exist a concept called "mental
rape" as well, you know.
But then, defense mechanisms are all but natural in humans as a
race. We protect our identities, we protect our bodies and our
minds from external assaults by drawing up defenses. Not
necessarily with armors and battle gears, but we do that with
our ego states too! Think of a typical business deal, where at
times, more than one player battles against the other, all with
their superior or inferior ego states. (For reference, I suggest
you read the book "Games People Play" by Eric Berne).
One guy makes a comment from his ego state to another who is in
another ego state. The receiver of the comment interprets it as
a harsh criticism, because he has viewed it from his own ego
state and so on. Situation escalates further and as it happens
most of the time, a verbal battle is launched.
Now, does it not sound familiar? It happens in man-woman
relationships too!
There is a way to solve this however; one of the best ways that
I have come across is to start looking at any situation from the
other person's point of view. It's all the perspective, as they
say. Learn to put your ego aside for a few minutes, or hours,
and see the other side of the coin.
This is one of the most difficult tasks; let me tell you, for
the simple reason, which you now have to work on and review your
own sense of self-esteem (or, your own ego state, which could
have stayed inflated all these years!). This is the only way you
can relinquish your full-time desire to "impress" others and
change the stance of "I'm OK, others not OK". It is not easy,
but probably the only way to minimize inter-personal personality
clashes, romantic or otherwise.
You can then see the rationale of the other person's behavior
and be able to answer many "whys" with "why not's", thereby
avoiding many confrontational and hurtful relationships. No, you
can't solve all the problems in life with this stance, but at
least, you will be regarded and respected as a more
understanding human.