These days, so many people run around, looking to see how their world can be fulfilled. Many times they turn to relationships to search for that fulfillment. The issue that people often run into is that they don’t understand why they want a relationship.
Many times they wanna believe that it is for companionship and someone to be by their side. While this is a product of a relationship, this doesn’t explain what most men want out of a relationship.
People expect to find joy and happiness in a relationship, but you are the only one responsible and incapable of achieving those emotions. So you can’t receive that from a relationship either. How others jump from person to person looking for sexual gratification and again you can get that from a relationship or even a one-night stand. And interestingly, enough sex is only a small portion of a relationship.
Again it is what people are hoping they get from a relationship and the key part is what they can give to a relationship. What do they bring to the table? This brings up a whole new range of thoughts issues and problems. This is because marriage and relationships aren’t about what you can get. It is about how you can serve the other person. This is why there is the 100:0 principle where you give 100% and you expect zero in return. Now this doesn’t mean that you don’t have any expectations from a relationship. When you don’t receive certain aspects of a loving relationship, the relationship starts to falter and fall apart.
Yes, marriage is about giving. The issue that we often don’t realize is what we truly need to be giving. And for us men, the average generalized form of a relationship. Is that men want five things out of a relationship.
To know that we are good enough
The number one requirement for men in a relationship is to know that they are good enough. When we do not get this requirement, this is where men start to withdraw, pull away, stone wall, and turn to different forms of buffering.
Men want to know they are good enough. This is the first big major question they ask their dad. The answer to this question they constantly wanted to hear from their wife and their band of Brothers. Men want to know they are good enough. It sounds like a simple answer. However, our wives not realizing what they’re doing often hit them with a know you’re not adequate. No, you’re not good enough. And yes, our wives are struggling to communicate with us, but when we are being told that we have done something wrong, or that we failed or let our wife down this hits us hard.
When we are nagged, when we are scolded, when our wives try to tell us how to do something this can often come across as you saying that your husband is not good enough. Yes, it’s understood. You are trying to help your husband. This is very similar to guys trying to fix problems that their wife has. He’s not doing it to invalidate your emotions. He’s doing it because he cares about you.
This ranges in many aspects of a man’s relationship with his wife. Lack of sex tells him that he is not good enough in bed. Being scolded that we are short on money tells us that we are not making enough, and we are not providing enough for our family. So you see how one worry can be taken incorrectly by the other.
Respect
Another requirement a man needs in his relationships is respect. This want has been slowly eroded away. Thanks to many aspects of today’s society. Respect is the last thing many spouses believe they need to give to their husbands.
Thanks to philosophies like feminism and their belief that anything masculine-oriented is horrible. These women have shown that men don’t deserve any type of respect. Many believe that men should work strictly for the benefit of their bride.
Often these women show little to no respect to the man they’re dating. They show up often entitled in their actions.
When you have no respect in a marriage. When you do not respect your husband. He will continue to work so that he can earn that respect from you. The problem that you have is that that time is very limited. And the moment that he finds a woman who does respect him, you’re losing that man. Because that husband will turn to that respect and will drink it up like a man who’s been lost in a desert.
And sadly, the spouse will act surprised and hurt because she has been betrayed by her husband. After all, someone is showing him respect.
Affection
Another requirement men want out of a relationship is affection. I hear more men yarn for this than they do respect. Yes, affection does include hugging and kissing, though some men are not into hugging and kissing it does not mean that they are against affection.
That is because affection isn’t just physical contact. It also includes words of affection. Men hearing that they are good enough can be seen as a display of affection.
Affection for men also means cuddling and holding.
Now what men make affection mean is different than what women make affection mean.
This is where many men and women run into problems. This is because men typically take physical touch to mean physical intimacy. Women on the other hand take affection to just be a physical touch. They often find just being hugged or cuddled to be enough. While men would like to take the physical intimacy to sex. Because sex is one of the ways, men understand that they are good enough. We put a lot more weight. Affection than what women do.
This is why many men after 10 or so years of marriage often are not as affectionate as before. They have been told that they cannot have affectionate touches with their wife. They are rebuffed for taking a simple cuddle to possible sex. So to keep ourselves from being rejected and being told incorrectly, that we are not good enough, we abstain from that affection.
Now we can learn that affection is only to one level. It doesn’t allow for us to go beyond that level. And though this is tough for us to learn, we can grasp that fact.
Intimacy
For many men, we hear intimacy and we think of what happens when we become affectionate. We think that that means we the work going to be able to have sex. As mentioned before sex to men means that we are good enough. We provided food, shelter, and warmth for our family, and as a means of gratitude, the requirement of intimacy should happen.
Now we understand that intimacy isn’t just physical intimacy. 10 podcast episodes on this site talk about several different types of intimacy. We have from conflict in intimacy to emotional intimacy. And men actually like all of those types of intimacy. We come to understand the benefits of aesthetic intimacy. We come to appreciate the wonders of experiential intimacy. We may not like conflict or intimacy, but we like the benefits that come from that type of intimacy. We like to trust that comes from intimacy.
The problem that we run into with this particular requirement is that we both lose sight of some of the important intimacies. The man may be focused on physical intimacy while the wife is focused on emotional intimacy. Yet we turn around and forget that intellectual, intimate, and spiritual intimacy is as important to us as all the other intimacies.
Many of us men apply sex as an important part of a marriage, and they would be right. It is very important because it combines, physical, spiritual, intellectual emotional intimacies, all into one activity. However, other intimacies are needed for our wives to be able to open up and trust us enough to want to have sex with us.
So when it comes to intimacy, we have to continue to work on it. We have to build each of the 10 different types of intimacy. That does include us sitting down and having discussions with our wife. Hearing those hard, scary words that may not mean what we want them to mean. But when we encounter different types of conflict and disagreements, we do build trust that we’re not going to run simply because our wife hurt our feelings.
Support
The final requirement is Support. And no feminist would love to say that it is our fragile ego. They want just as much support as the men do. Our wives want us to support them with the housework and the raising of the kids. We want to be able to support our wives and let them know that she is raising the kids well.
We also want our wives to support us. Support us in our endeavors to provide for the family. Support in those scary times when we’re not sure what’s gonna happen. Support in that we’re not going to destroy everything on purpose.
When we try to start a business or go on some new field, though it is scary because of the uncertainty we desperately need that support from our wives. Because if we don’t get it, then we will sacrifice ourselves and turn away from what completes us as men for the sake of our wives and children. When we don’t get support, we will bury that yearning deep within us. And to be able to withstand that we have to have the support of our wife even more.
But if our wife doesn’t support us in any of our actions, then this is where you start to see men become broken. They start to withdraw they stop communicating. Why should they communicate everything that they do? They see rejection from their wife. It hurts emotionally for men to not be supported by their wives.
To get that support men you do have to build up all of those different intimacies. You have to talk to your wife regularly. Do not assume that she won’t be interested. Tell her even when she’s bored with the discussion. If she’s satisfied with what you said she’ll tell you to get lost. You have to communicate and over-share with your wife. When you over-share what your thoughts and actions are she will be grateful. But you also have to sit and listen to her questions her concerns and her worries. Listen to those do not reject them, but allow her to voice her concerns. Because when you do, she feels heard which allows her to feel safe.
