Men Are Pants

When we were small our parents used to try and protect us by telling us all the things we shouldn’t do. “Don’t touch the fire, you’ll get burnt”, “Don’t eat too many sweets or your teeth will fall out”, “Don’t have a tantrum, it won’t get you your own way”.

They’ve learnt through their experiences and they want to protect us as children, as well as install their values into the way we live our lives. It’s only natural! But do we listen though? Do we hell. We learn through our own experiences not someone else’s, and rest assured most things we’ve been told not to do over the years, we’ve tried. At least once, and probably a lot more than that!

Experience is a wonderful thing. It’s personal, it’s unique and its lessons teach us a lot about life. Experience is all part of making us who we are today. Experience forms part of our character and enables us to deal with issues that arise again and again. Our choice is whether or not we make the same mistakes twice!

It’s the same with love. If we let ourselves be protected by the bad experiences that a relationship could have, we’ll never know all the positive benefits it could bring. And if we build our perceptions on someone else’s experiences and problems, we stand to lose out on some of the most wonderful times of our lives. There is one particular man I’ve known that was so scared by the possible failure of love, that he wouldn’t let himself get involved enough to take the chance. His fear of ‘true love’ was enough to rule his every action and the only consistent thing I could pinpoint about his behaviour, was his ability to let me down. Time and time again. Now this particular individual will continue to go from experience to experience just scaping the potential surface and refusing to get involved at a level that will benefit and reward him. It’s a terrible shame, that fear and other people’s experiences have tainted his life to the point that he’ll never know. He’ll wake up one day and wonder what life is really about and realise he’s lost out on a repertoire of fantastic opportunities and all he has left is his himself and his selfish but safe life.

As for me I’m an incurable romantic and tend to keep going back to try and make an experience right. Maybe it’s the nurturing female inside me that won’t give up on something until I know every ounce of hope has gone. Unfortunately being a ‘perfectionist’ too, I rarely succeed! But I think I know when to give up and move on with my life. The thing is, although my experiences may not have always been good ones and hurt more than anything, I learn from them. Well, when I say learn from them, I guess I mean I don’t give up on life because of them!!

That’s where women tend to be different to men. We love to talk and work through our experiences, however painful they may be, and at the end of the ride we come out the other side a stronger and more confident person. Albeit a little cynical for a short period! Is it any wonder that the majority of councillors and support groups have a predominately female take up? We lay the memories to bed and embrace life with the fresh start it deserves. It does take time, but it also means when we eventually bounce back, we can get on with our life afresh. From personal experience I find women also tend to re-invent themselves when they emerge from the transitional phase of heart break. They look good, feel better and are ready for the next challenge that is thrown at them. It’s one of the unique tools we possess. Plus, there is no better diet than one borne from heartbreak. Perhaps there should be more books written on how to go from a size 12 to a size 8 in 4-weeks! Or maybe not!

Whilst men tend to talk to themselves and have to work a solution out on their own, we talk, friends listen and we eventually allow ourselves to put the baggage behind us. When men throw everything into their work and refuse to discuss emotional issues, we cry ourselves to sleep at night and pray for a brighter day. Whilst we are busy facing the consequences of the experience, men are busy avoiding it. I guess this is where the two sexes are very different. It doesn’t mean at the end of the long period of mourning the death of a relationship that we are ready for the next episode and a man isn’t, it just means we have managed the experience differently. I would say that we have dealt with the consequences and have built this into our make-up. For a man he has ignored the problem and eventually feels it is hidden well enough to take the plunge once again! Sound familiar??

Thinking about love though –yes that dreaded four letter word which signals trouble, I wouldn’t have missed that feeling for the world. It has made me who I am. Okay so each time I venture back out into the world at large, I feel a little more vulnerable and a lot more determined to hold back. But I still do it and I still take steps to find the blissful fairytale ending I deserve.

Oh and by the way my Mum was right about one thing, having a tantrum doesn’t tend to get me my own way. However, if I lace my view point with charm, emotion and power of manipulation 99 times out of 100 I get what I want. I guess by tweaking my approach and learning from experience I’ve managed to nearly perfect the art.

But you know that anyway don’t you?? You can stop pouting now and pretending that this is all new to you!! I guess you learnt the lesson the hard way too!!