Julien Aklei

I’m trying to figure how men and women can be in long term relationships. The problem is the difference in how they process emotions. It appears that men place all emotions into two categories:

A) Positive emotions. Yay! Good!

B) Negative emotions. Bad! No!!!

Positive emotions mean “Wow! You are a Great Man!”
Negative emotions mean “I’m Angry Because You Suck!”

To women, emotions are colors and flavors. There are thousands of them and always new ones to be discovered. They rarely stand alone but are combined to form intoxicating brews. A dash of anger, 3 tears, a laugh…. now some bitterness to make the joy pop…. a glug of euphoria grounded by a trickle of disgust. Emotions are paints and we paint something new every day. It is an exhilarating world. But strangely- to men- this world does not even exist.

They see “good” emotions. YAY! “Bad” emotions. BOO! The emotional experience they crave seems- to the female palette- like the sort of tasteless goo you would serve an invalid. That’s what men call happiness.

They want Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. Every day. Try serving something more complex and they excuse themselves. To give you space until you get it together. They’re not mad at you. They’ll just give you the time you need to get back into Mac & Cheese mode.

To a man, the perfect woman has one emotion. Happiness. If you curve your lips upward and say “Gee that was Terrific!” they are satisfied. Happiness has been reached. Happiness is the goal.

From a female perspective, happiness is the yellow crayon. What can you draw with just that? Straight happiness is a stack of saltine crackers. Yay, yay, yay, yay, hooray, hooray, hooray. Eventually you can’t eat anymore. But he doen’t want you to eat anything else. Black coffee means you’re mad. Black coffee means he’s bad.

Being pressured into permahappiness is like a slug being salted to death. Every bland smile is more salt on your back. Unadulterated happiness is mental and dehydrating.

But men need you to pull out that yellow crayon every time you see them. NOT THE RED CRAYON!!!! NOT THE BLACK ONE!!!! THOSE ARE BAD CRAYONS!!!!

And it hurts to give up this magic. It’s like being lobotomized; just in a different part of yourself. It makes life flat. Something is gone that no amount of smiles can replace. The man can no longer please you because you’ve been separated from the source of pleasure. Pleasure is hatred, terror, insanity, confusion, intrigue, jubilation, awe & crankiness. The full range of feelings running wild.

But I don’t like hurting people. And to men, complex emotional palettes are a form of torture. Same as it might be torture for a woman to listen to a man explain engines for three hours. So I try to be nice by being the sort of woman they understand. Somebody with a brain like theirs, but only half as large and twice as smiley. I don’t want to give nobody nothing they don’t want.

But then I can’t breath. So what is the solution? I don’t think men are bad for disliking emotions. Nor do I think it makes them less loving. It just seems to be a form of energy they can’t process.

It makes sense that women speak the language of emotions since it is the language of babies. We automatically interpret cries and screams as opportunities to connect and help.

Sometimes men prey on this. Life has shown me that… generally when men cry and scream like babies they are not communicating anything real. They just know it triggers something in us. I think men’s most common response to pain is to hide it. It probably makes sense for warriors to hide their vulnerabilities. An excessively emotional man is usually being strategic. Perhaps then, when women are emotional men see it as strategic as well. Trying to control.

My opinion is that women rarely try to control men simply because we lack the desire to dominate them. The idea of throwing a man down on the bed and trying to mount him is repulsive.

But men interpret dark and negative energy as an attack, rather than an opportunity for depth, romance & healing. A man reading this post will likely respond “Wow you hate men! You think they suck!” To a male brain, I am discussing problems because I am mad at men and want to attack them.

To a female brain, I am discussing problems because I value men and want to make things better. Women dwell on problems as an expression of love. We find it enjoyable and transformative, like marinating in a broth. New understandings gel. Possibilities open up.

But men don’t like this. And you care about him so… you try not to bring up problems and focus on compliments instead. The compliments become repetitive, because without dark energy to carve new spaces, light energy has nowhere new to go.

Of course the dynamic changes when men want to have sex. The man in pursuit is not a man at all, but his own species. These creatures can take all your emotions. They swim, they live underwater. Your very essence is beautiful to them. Finally, a man with whom you can be yourself!

The problem is, much like sperms, these humanoids have short life spans. They die once their goal is reached. Even if they don’t reach their goal, they die soon enough. A man appears where the sperm being once was. His mind is transformed from an accomodating squiggle to a tower of fragile cubes. It is no longer safe to jump up and down in his presence. Positive energy only. Your days of being free are over.

So what is the solution?

To only date males in their sperm phase then throw them back once they turn into men? A tempting idea, but they turn into men at the exact time you are getting attached to them. It is hard to let go of someone you love once every cell in your body wants to please them instead.

Perhaps the answer is to always stay immersed in a private world of creativity, like a fish in a bowl, a secret universe where you can use every crayon in the box. Maybe this magic world does not need to be shared with them, maybe that’s too much. Maybe they just need the depth subliminally absorbed from the little things women add to their life…. a mug, a meal, a scented candle. Women fret that men don’t notice these things, but that may be for the best. They swim into his subconscious directly, never dried out and sealed inside his cube tower.

And we need men to hide much of themselves from us as well. We like to enjoy the benefits of male intelligence. But can you imagine if they shared all their thoughts? We would die of boredom within the hour. Perhaps when we open our female worlds to them, they drown.