Hello Africa,
I totally agree with the saying, “Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus”. Indeed, we are soooo different in everything, particularly the way we think and approach issues. To be able to manage this big difference effectively and build loving relationships, Guys, we need to learn EMOTIONAL PATIENCE.
In continuation of his mentoring Letters to Jack, Leke Alder provides some profound insights on this issue. I am learning. What about you?
1. Dear Jack, I spoke to Jil yesterday and in the course of our conversation I asked after you, about your relationship. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
2. She was self-contented that she had a relationship but wasn't happy. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
3. Wishes you'll talk to her more, especially during the week. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
4. Now I know you're busy at work (she knows that too). But you've got to engage her. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
5. You're not naturally disposed to such emotionalism I know but there are things we do for the sake of happiness. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
6. You've got to try. Need not always be vocal conversation. Text or its cousins can supplement. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
7. Engagement is important to women. They don't do passive relationships well. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
8. They want to feel they're part of your life. That connection is important to women. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
9. And they like pouring out their hearts. It's a listening ritual for many married men. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
10. Since you're serious about the relationship you might as well start learning. You're acting husband. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
11. As a man you have to develop the emotional capacity to listen to your woman. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
12. That can seem like an extra burden. (It IS an extra burden). #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
13. But we listen 'cos she won't be happy otherwise; and if she's not happy you won't be happy. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
14. You need emotional patience to hear her out. Emotional patience is not the same as patience in general. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
15. Patience in general leans more towards tolerance, not being reactionary, long suffering. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
16. But emotional patience requires absorbent capacity. Her problem becomes yours. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
17. She's not necessarily asking for solution to the problem though she sometimes is. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
18. She's more or less fulfilling an obligation of sharing of burden. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
19. At that moment she wants to be sure you're listening. Sometimes the problem has no solution really. She just wants to talk. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
20. It's because she wants to look up to you emotionally. That's why she wants to burden you. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
21. This emotional leadership is important if you want to be her man. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
22. You need emotional patience. We can define it as being open, listening, absorbing and being "involved." It's a capacity. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
23. Emotional patience is you hearing her out even if it could have been said in just two sentences. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
24. Emotional patience is you not rushing to pronounce the solution as she's laying out her case. Let her talk. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
25. The laying out of her problem is more important than whatever solution you have. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
26. If you interject with your solution she'll feel you cut her off. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
27. She has her logic planned. The talk must follow the sequence. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
28. After the talk you must act engaged. Don't be dismissive with your answer. That will hurt her. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
29. One of the best ways to learn emotional patience is to go shopping with her. Trust me, you WILL learn emotional patience! #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
30. You don't know how a woman shops? It's important she goes round the store looking at items she wouldn't buy. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
31. She can spend an hour going round and not buy anything. That will appear indecisive to a man and he loses patience. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
32. You see, her shopping happiness is not centered on what she needs. It's based on exploratory experience. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
33. There are thus two emotional needs – the material item she wants to buy and the shopping experience. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
34. Men go for what they want in a store. A woman is an explorer – a consumer Mungo Park. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
35. Her discussions follow the same logic. The solution is as important as the verbal navigation, sometimes less important. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
36. But they are two separate things. Bible says you dwell with a woman with knowledge. This is knowledge. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
37. Emotional patience is you accepting the mantle of maturity she confers on you. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
38. It's her looking to you for solution to a problem that may not even be a problem. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
39. Emotional patience is you listening to what Bunmi did and Bunmi said and you wondering why she doesn't just ignore Bunmi. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
40. Emotional patience is you being the sounding bag (not board) on what she wants to wear to that event. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
41. She's made up her mind and planned it out item for item for a week, even tried on the look. Just wants your approval. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
42. No, not approval of the clothes. Your loving approval of her look and beauty for you. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
43. If you don't understand the logic of that illogical statement you still have a lot to learn! #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
44. Emotional patience is you enduring another indirect question on a simple request. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
45. Emotional patience is you being able to accommodate 1004 questions on things that seem so straightforward. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
46. Emotional patience is endurance of millimeterisation – the breaking of a simple centimeter plan into 200 millimeters. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
47. You can't have a successful relationship with a woman if you're not willing to allot emotional capital to her emotional needs #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
48. If you don't pay attention to those needs she's going to be frustrated and feel you don't have a relationship. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
49. There's a difference between titular relationship and substantiated relationship. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
50. Men are okay with titular relationship. Women are not. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
51. Titular relationship is simply based on officially acquiring the title "boyfriend" and "girlfriend". It's a status. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
52. If it's not substantiated with engagement and affection the woman is going to be frustrated. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
53. Men treat relationships like something bagged and kept in a safe deposit box. Not so for women. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
54. A relationship has to be an interactive experience for a woman. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
55. Women need engagement and constant affirmation. A woman suffers as an emotional orphan. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
56. Don't let another man supply her emotional needs. You may lose her. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
57. Communication matters to women. She can't stand being ignored, or not being paid attention. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
58. She wants to be the centre of your universe, to take a journey with you through galaxies, to be carried along. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
59. If you can't find something to say or don't know how to open a conversation send an emoticon. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
60. Your phone has a few hundred: a smiley, a kiss, a heart, a darted heart, an enveloped heart; even vibrating heart dey sef! #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
61. (You can tell when women got involved in the design of emoticons. #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
62. When men designed emoticons there were only ten. Now there are fifty varieties of heart alone). #Letr2Jack
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
63. What are you waiting for? Send an emoticon my friend! 🙂 Your mentor, LA. #Letr2Jack ©Leke Alder
— Leke Alder (@LekeAlder) September 21, 2013
Need I say more?
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