Читать книгу Why Mars and Venus Collide: Improve Your Relationships by Understanding How Men and Women Cope Differently with Stress - Джон Грей, John Gray - Страница 9

Relationships are suffering because men and women deal with stress differently. Men are from Mars and women are from Venus, and our differences are intensified by stress. When we do not understand our different coping mechanisms, Mars and Venus collide.

Our greatest challenge today is that men and women cope with stress differently.

Since men and women do not respond to stress in the same way, the kinds of support we require to relieve stress differ. What helps men release stress can be the opposite of what helps women feel better. While he withdraws into his cave to forget the problems of his day, she wants to interact and discuss things. When she shares her frustrations, he offers solutions, but she is simply looking for some empathy. Without a clear understanding of their unique needs and reactions to stress, they will inevitably feel unsupported and unappreciated. By remembering that men are from Mars and women are from Venus, we can overcome this tendency to collide and instead come together in mutually supportive ways. Rather than being another source of stress, our relationships can be a safe haven in which we can expect support, comfort, and ease. We need to understand our differences if we are to support each other in overcoming this challenge. This new understanding of how men and women react differently to stress will allow our relationships to thrive rather than just survive.

Recent scientific research, which is covered in the next two chapters, reveals that these different stress reactions are actually hardwired into our brains, and to a great extent are determined by the balance of our hormones. These reactions become more extreme under greater stress. In Why Mars and Venus Collide, we will use these scientific insights along with common sense to guide our way. Being aware of our innate biochemical differences frees us from the unhealthy compulsion to change our partners and eventually leads us to celebrate our differences. Instead of resenting each other, we can laugh at our differences. In practical terms, we cannot change the ways our bodies react to stress, but we can change the way we respond to our partner’s reactions to stress. Instead of resisting, resenting, or even rejecting our partners, we can learn new ways to provide the support our partners need as well as to get the support we need.

When hopelessness turns back to hope, the love in our hearts can flow again. We all intuitively know that love includes acceptance and forgiveness, but sometimes we just can’t find it. With these insights, you will discover a new level of acceptance and love that will transform your life. Instead of trying to change what cannot be changed, you will be able to focus on what is possible to change. In this process, you will discover that you have the power to bring out the best in your partner.

Rather than dwell on what you are not getting or what you don’t want, you will begin to focus on what you do want and what you can get.

This important shift will provide a new foundation for you to create a lifetime of love. The scenarios in this chapter demonstrate some of the many ways men and women commonly collide. See if you can relate to any of these common complaints or hot spots I hear when counseling both single or married women and men.

Do any of these complaints sound familiar? They are only the tip of the iceberg, but they represent a new trend in relationships. If we can see our differences in a new light, we will not only enrich communication in our relationships but also make our relationships a solid base to support all the other areas of our lives. Equipped with new insight, we can actually come closer together while coping with stress instead of being torn apart.