Advice, Dating Online Personals

They say that if you want to know what a man will be like when he is older, take a look at his father. Also, a girl’s mother is a lot like how her daughter will be. Although, this is not always the way, as sometimes a son is more like his mother, while a daughter can be more like her dad. It all depends on the family dynamics, which are always unique. Family often plays a very important, yet sometimes subliminal role in a couple’s relationship. The role of family in relationships takes many forms.

When a child grows up in a family, they develop male and female role models which are often respectively their dad and their mother. A child’s relationship with their parents shapes the potential relationship that they will have with their partner in life. In addition, a man will treat a woman as his dad treated his mom and a woman will only give the type of love that you had received yourself, when growing up. Sometimes, this is not the case as a child can also grow up into an adult whose goal is to be everything his parents were not. The motivations to be a certain way toward other people are often the result of something an adult has experienced as a child. Children are often molded by their parent’s mannerisms, thoughts, beliefs and values in combination with their own.

When in a relationship, it is critical to understand the family network on both the man and the woman’s sides. Family is a very powerful influence in a relationship and should be respected and understood accordingly. It is always a good practice to befriend your partner’s family as much as possible as they will always be part of your lives in different intensities and for various purposes. A successful relationship seems to be a delicate balance between family, friends, work, play and each other.

Finally, family can enrich a couple’s relationship by making it more complete and full of interesting experiences and events. Sometimes it can be boring to just be with yourselves for indefinite periods of time. It is good to inject some variety into the picture with family and friends. Every personality adds a new variable to the relationship picture. Try your best to maintain a powerful personal life in your relationship, while still making time for other important people like family and friends.

Have you ever been down and out and have called on a friend and they were there for you? True friends that help you in your life should not be taken for granted and should be maintained. Just because a person finds the love of their life, does not mean that they have to lose or neglect all their friends. Friends should stay a part of a happy love relationship in various appropriate capacities. Your significant other should meet your friends and know who they are, so that they can continue to be part of your life both individually and as a couple.

It is normal for a man and a woman to have friends while in a relationship. In fact, having friends is critical to making a loving relationship work effectively. Without friends, couples rely too heavily on each other for all things and this can cause stress and unhappiness for both of them. Plus your friends feel neglected and hurt by being given the boot. Nobody should expect another person to be everything, as this is simply not fair to either person.

Friends provide perspectives and insights on things, which help to nurture your love relationship in many ways. Not to say that you should involve your friends in the intimate aspects of your personal love relationship, because you shouldn’t do that. It is important to keep your personal love life personal and between the two of you, as it builds trust and respect in your relationship. Conversations with friends should always be respectful toward your significant other by not disclosing intimate details about personal things. Sometimes men and woman say too much to friends and the love relationship they have loses its intimacy and the relationship may even deteriorate to the point of ending. It is important to be selective as to what you say to who and when.

Finally, love relationships need to have a social outlet to them, which should include occasionally going out with mutual friends, ideally other couples, but not necessarily. Having another couple to do things with, adds a necessary dimension to the love relationship and in fact can make it better balanced and happier.

There is a time and a place for everyone who is important in your life, you just have to manage your time wisely and be fair. Place your priorities where they should be, yet balance the time that you spend with people carefully. It you do this well, everyone will be happy, including yourself.

Friendship is important for men and women. In men, a strange dichotomy exist, however, that can be the source of eternal vexation when women try to figure them out. Men have a strong need to have male friends. They want at least one “good buddy” who relates to them even when they are happily married. The trouble is that, though a few good men have the ability to develop and cultivate deep, meaningful male relationships, most men don’t know how. So, they compensate by evolving relationships around work, sports and the age old game of outdoing each other and bragging at every turn. And, depending on a man’s relationship with his father in the formative years growing up, many men may never be able to move beyond this shallow form of “male bonding”.

One of the biggest factors in a man finding one or more good friends is trust. Many men find it hard to trust one another. Their lives center on competition and, whether they are at work or at play, there seems to be an underlying spirit of “don’t trust anyone; instead, outdo them. You’ll find security in being on top”. Perhaps this stems from our hunter/gather times where the office competition took men out in the field to hunt food. There, every man was your enemy. If you got the game that I was after, me and the family I was providing for might go hungry, or die. The stakes were pretty high. And, it seems that we haven’t lived down that possibly innate need to beat our neighbors. This is one of the factors at the heart of male distrust.

Personal security also plays a role. Many men, because of their spirit of distrust, possess little personal security. Worse, many are also uncomfortable with their sexuality and so their sexual security is very low. If a man’s wife asks her to carry her purse for a moment while walking in a busy mall, a lot of men would actually say no. Or, they may tell her to set it on a bench and they will “sit” with it. Some might even hide it under a jacket or other item. Another manifestation of this lack of male security is very applicable to the male want for friendship. Men desire close, deep friendships but are insecure about expressing the emotions that accompany those types of relationships. You frequently see women hugging each other, dancing together in public or even touching each other’s hands in public. They will even tell each other how they feel. Most men struggle with this a great deal. 

Men harbor many homophobic feelings that make them think that if they show any sort of emotion towards another man, others will think they are gay. Worse, they may feel gay themselves for engaging in a hug or an emotional gesture towards a man. These are really just psychological fears that are unfounded but such a part of our nature and nurture that they form very powerful and real fears in many men’s minds. So powerful, in fact, that a man may verbally or physically attack a homosexual man in front of his peers to show how “unhomosexual” he is while inside wishing he could express himself with some of the sensitivities of the homosexual man.

Men’s lack of sexual security also causes their relationships with other men to center around verbal insults and other negative commentary as a way to say, “I care” without actually uttering the words or showing the genuine feelings. It is easier for them to maintain the hard, negative edge then to actually expose any kind if genuine compassion.

So, what is the answer? Men need to begin to get more in touch with their genuine emotions. They need to not be afraid to express their want for a male friend or their feelings towards that friend. Women can help in this endeavor by guiding their willing partners down a path of emotional exploration. This can have a powerful effect on not just the man’s growth as a human being but on the quality of the relationship between the man and the woman.