Here are a few thoughts about a woman’s perception of value. Although these may not apply to all women in every circumstance, they may help men understand their wives a little better.
Women tend to value intimacy, communication and relationship. Their primary fulfillment comes from sharing their heart within a close relationship. Most reflect these values by being relationship oriented rather than goal oriented.
A woman’s identity comes through the quality of her relationships, the most important of which, being that of her husband. And her primary desire is that her husband would make her his highest priority in life (not withstanding his relationship with the Lord).
That priority is best demonstrated by her husband when he is willing to listen without a running commentary on her feelings. She needs to feel that she can express her feelings completely, and that it’s okay to be upset. She longs for his empathy, not a Mr. Fixit, practical, logical solution.
For you men, this may be difficult to understand, but offering a solution instead of empathy is the wrong course of action. It’s like giving a man who is dying of thirst in the desert a lecture on how he could have avoided his predicament, and then directions to the nearest river, when all he really needs is a sip of water from your canteen.
When a woman’s feelings are seemingly ignored and a solution is offered instead of empathy, she often closes down. That approach makes a women feel that her identity has been invalidated and that her husband just doesn’t care.
Men, instead of advice, a solution or a fix, may I recommend that you just put your arms around your wife and listen to her heart. She will feel valued and loved, and you may just find that there was really no need to fix anything.
