Hi Colin, I'm so glad to see you back. I hope you're feeling better.
colin wrote: > > ...people who ttreated me like those who brought me up. thus I > was always unhappy and always being mistreated.Then i wised up. I can relate to all of that. And, rather than get angry at myself whenever I end up saying "damn, I thought I'd learned that already!!", it's also important to realize that "wising up" is much easier said than done. Just when I think I've thoroughly learned the lesson on a particular issue, I encounter the same "thing to be learned" again, usually in a less drastic form, so I guess that's progress. I think of it as being on a spiral journey (rather than a circular one), so I pass by the same issues but with a slightly different viewpoint. > People are different, mrena nd women are different. each deals wiht life > differently, feels differently and expresses life differently.Quite > often we expect from others that which they cannot give. We expect them > to be like us when they are not. Just ebcause a man does not express > his feelings in the way we wuld wnat, does not make them 'unfeeling'. It > just emans they deal differently. True, although if there's a huge gap in the way people are communicating, then it's just not a good relationship "fit" and that needs to be recognized from the start. When I look back, I can always see the clues to how things turned out. I'd rather see and accept those clues from the start, and not do any ignoring of those little truthful whispery insights or do any hoping for change... although there is the "love is blind" effect, so who knows? We all do the best we can. Thinking of "talk to me" also reminds me of a discussion with a woman friend a long time ago. We started by talking about Sam Shepard and her saying she liked him so much because he seemed like the strong silent type. My reaction was first of all who knows what Sam Shepard's "really" like, and secondly that I didn't want anything to do with any strong silent type ever again! We'd just seen one of Shepard's plays, so obviously the guy has a lot to say and why would he be silent? That's just coldness and there's not necessarily anything strong about it. Anyway, we ended up agreeing to disagree about all that. That was even pre-"I hate 'talk to me'" and she and I were both surprised at my reaction to what she was saying. That strong silent stereotype for men has got to be a straitjacket for some of them. I'm glad it's not as popular a stereotype or expectation as it once was. Debra Shea
