Having a male twin that I've (female) reconnected with over the last three years highlighted our emotional maturity differences. Part of it I'm sure is a reflection of having been in therapy from my divorce, but I have this theory it has way more to do with how we were socialized and lived experience.
All women at a relatively young age viscerally experience a fundamental truth that we are not our thoughts or emotions. That they are just feedback from our surroundings and current experiences, and frankly not always super accurate. Every woman alive has had an experience where she got her period and then breathed a sigh of relief knowing she wasn't "crazy" that while there's always underlining things, the general over-reactiveness was linked to hormonal imbalance. But MANY things impact your hormones, like lack of sleep, poor diet, and stress. Things everyone experiences.
The crux of my theory is that because men don't experience the external relief that something outside of their control influenced their behaviour, and they have the double whammy of having limited emotions they're allowed to freely express sans judgement, their emotions and thoughts feel much more personal to them and they view them as a direct reflection of the kind of person that they are, which is part of why many men keep them to themselves. So, many young men grow up very rarely expressing the myriad of emotions we all experience and so they don't get practice with labeling them or understanding them whereas some believe all women do is talk about their emotions (we certainly do, but they're like a tenth of the content).
However, one of the emotions they're allowed to express is anger. Emotions are energy just like everything else in this world and they have a current and either you let it flow out or you bottle it up but now it's fucking in there and it'll resurface one way or another and usually not how you intended. But since anger seems to be allowed perhaps some weird defaulting happens and so as they grow into men, any emotion that falls into the spectrum of dissatisfaction is expressed as anger.
The tragedy in my eyes though is that most people recoil from anger or give anger right back. So say the real emotion is sadness, jealousy, lonliness, or being misunderstood and what they need is a smile, reassurance, a hug, or to be heard but their outward expression has rendered it nearly impossible to receive any of these things and so they stew in their anger.
I think parents of today are really focused on giving their children emotional literacy, but my parents generation and many of my peers didn't all luck out with parents aware enough to teach these things. I'm not condoning abuse, emotional or physical, but I wonder how many fights and how many situations and relationships would change if people took half a beat to wonder is it really anger they're feeling and could I possibly respond with love and compassion.
(Obviously there tons of women with anger issues as well and what have you, I'm aware generalizations all have pitfalls)
Having a male twin that I've (female) reconnected with over the last three years highlighted our emotional maturity differences. Part of it I'm sure is a reflection of having been in therapy from my divorce, but I have this theory it has way more to do with how we were socialized and lived experience.All women at a relatively young age viscerally experience a fundamental truth that we are not our thoughts or emotions. That they are just feedback from our surroundings and current experiences, and frankly not always super accurate. Every woman alive has had an experience where she got her period and then breathed a sigh of relief knowing she wasn't "crazy" that while there's always underlining things, the general over-reactiveness was linked to hormonal imbalance. But MANY things impact your hormones, like lack of sleep, poor diet, and stress. Things everyone experiences.The crux of my theory is that because men don't experience the external relief that something outside of their control influenced their behaviour, and they have the double whammy of having limited emotions they're allowed to freely express sans judgement, their emotions and thoughts feel much more personal to them and they view them as a direct reflection of the kind of person that they are, which is part of why many men keep them to themselves. So, many young men grow up very rarely expressing the myriad of emotions we all experience and so they don't get practice with labeling them or understanding them whereas some believe all women do is talk about their emotions (we certainly do, but they're like a tenth of the content).However, one of the emotions they're allowed to express is anger. Emotions are energy just like everything else in this world and they have a current and either you let it flow out or you bottle it up but now it's fucking in there and it'll resurface one way or another and usually not how you intended. But since anger seems to be allowed perhaps some weird defaulting happens and so as they grow into men, any emotion that falls into the spectrum of dissatisfaction is expressed as anger.The tragedy in my eyes though is that most people recoil from anger or give anger right back. So say the real emotion is sadness, jealousy, lonliness, or being misunderstood and what they need is a smile, reassurance, a hug, or to be heard but their outward expression has rendered it nearly impossible to receive any of these things and so they stew in their anger.I think parents of today are really focused on giving their children emotional literacy, but my parents generation and many of my peers didn't all luck out with parents aware enough to teach these things. I'm not condoning abuse, emotional or physical, but I wonder how many fights and how many situations and relationships would change if people took half a beat to wonder is it really anger they're feeling and could I possibly respond with love and compassion.(Obviously there tons of women with anger issues as well and what have you, I'm aware generalizations all have pitfalls) https://ift.tt/eA8V8J https://ift.tt/3hM3fb5
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