Understanding Women Requires Understanding Men
For men to understand women, they need to know what turns women off, and what turns them on. “What turns a woman off,” says Sansby, a marriage counselor from Minnesota, “are criticism, denial of feelings, anger masquerading as logic, and fleeing. What turns a woman on is a man who knows what’s on his mind and speaks what’s in his heart.” The OuchKit is a clever communication tool that helps men do both.
(PRWEB) December 19, 2004 -- Ask any man and he’ll tell you: he just doesn’t
understand women. But according to Betsy Sansby, a marriage and family therapist
from Minnesota, men don’t understand themselves either. “Ask a woman what she’s
feeling,” says Sansby, “and she’ll tell you. If she’s hurt, she says ‘I’m hurt.’
If she’s sad, she says ‘I’m sad.’ But ask a man the same question and you’ll
hear something like ‘I’m not sure I know what you mean.’”
According to
Stedman’s Medical Dictionary, there’s a term for this condition: alexithymia. It
means not being able to identify or describe one’s feelings. “It isn’t that men
don’t have feelings,” says Sansby. “It’s that they can’t always recognize them.
And even when they do recognize that they’re feeling something, often they can’t
put those feelings into words.”
So what’s a man to do? Sansby, who has
worked with couples for over twenty years, recently came up with a solution: The
OuchKit—A First-Aid Kit for Your Relationships. The kit was originally designed
as a homework tool for couples in her therapy practice, but it’s also being used
by parents and teachers to teach emotional fluency at home and in the classroom.
The OuchKit contains six kinds of exchangeable cards: Ouch, Sorry,
Thanks, You’re Welcome, I’ve Been Wondering, and Now That You Mention It. On the
back of each card are fill-in-the-blank questions and checklists of emotions
that help men—and women—identify their feelings and express them without
defensiveness or blame. When you get a strong feeling, you fill out a card and
leave it for your partner. Your partner responds with another card, whichever
one feels right. The idea is to keep exchanging cards until you’re ready to talk
face-to-face.
The beauty of the cards is that you don’t need to know what
you’re feeling in order to use them. The process of filling them out
automatically uncovers hidden feelings. “For example,” says Sansby, “imagine
you’re a guy who’s upset because your wife has refused to go to your mother’s
for Christmas. This time, instead of launching an attack, you grab an Ouch card.
As you read through the checklist of emotions, you quickly notice that in
addition to feeling mad, you’re also feeling hurt, insulted, embarrassed, and
rejected—feelings you didn’t know you had when you started.”
For men to
understand women, they need to know what turns them off, and what turns them on.
“What turns a woman off,” says Sansby, “are criticism, denial of feelings, anger
masquerading as logic, and fleeing. What turns a woman on is a man who knows
what’s on his mind and speaks what’s in his heart.” The OuchKit helps men do
both.
The 36-card kit costs $19.95 and is currently available only at: http://www.theouchkit.com. To
read other press releases, interviews and articles, go to the OuchKit website,
or: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/11/prweb176143.htm, http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/10/prweb169137.htm.
Contact
Betsy directly for review copy or distribution information: (952)
933-0942.
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Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/12/prweb190121.htm