“It takes two!” and other bullsh*t that men in unhappy, sexless marriages believe
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- Опубликовано: 1 авг 2024
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men.mentoring.men Because we're a community focused on the well-being and betterment of men, we meet a lot of men in relationship distress.
Many we meet just after they've experienced some very devastating relationship events, such as:
- A wife who said, "I want space."
- A wife or girlfriend who said, "I love you, but I'm not 'in love' with you.
- A wife or partner who asked for a separation or divorce
- A wife or partner who cheated or is cheating and having an emotional or physical affair.
- A man having an affair of his own.
- A man tired of trying and ready to call it quits.
- A disgusted or disgruntled wife or partner who says, "I can't see myself ever wanting to have sex with you again."
- A dead bedroom and a wife or partner who stops participating intimately in the relationship.
Most of these men have learned lies, half-truths, and just plain ole' ineffective information for how to flourish and prosper in a long-term relationship.
One of those half-truths and easily-misunderstood things that men believe is that "it takes two" to have a happy relationship.
In this video, Mentoring Men Co-founder and men's mentor Sven Masterson explains why this statement derails many men and how it can keep a man suffering in endless waiting and limbo for a life that never comes.
Gottman Reference Sven Mentioned:
“What men do in relationships is, by a large margin, the crucial factor that separates a great relationship from a failed one. This does not mean that a woman doesn’t need to do her part, but the data proves that a man’s actions are the key variable that determines whether a relationship succeeds or fails, which is ironic, since most relationship books are for women. That’s kind of like doing open-heart surgery on the wrong patient.”
--John Gottman, Julie Schwartz Gottman, Douglas Abrams, Rachael Carlton Abrams, authors of The Man’s Guide to Women: Scientifically Proven Secrets From the “Love Lab” About What Women Really Want.
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Honestly think us as men take too much responsibility at times in changing something about ourselves in an effort to fix things. Many times we don’t have the luxury of being “too tired” or needing a “mental break” we just gotta get it done. So that mindset makes it very hard to relate to a wife that won’t be intimate because we can’t imagine not being able to power thru doing something that you don’t want to. Especially something that makes your significant other happy. What compounds it is the fact that you have no other outlet, you have to try to make it work or suffer thru a divorce that makes you look like a villain for ending it “over something as small as sex”. Not to even mention the financial ramifications and kids. That’s a HEAVY price to pay all because your wife couldn’t stomach sleeping with a man that she married.
We have talked to plenty of men who "... take too much responsibility at times in changing something about ourselves in an effort to fix things." and agree with your statement on some levels. Many men make inauthentic, "nice guy" changes to themselves hoping to get their partner to change. This is ineffective and hurts intimacy. Sex isn't small for men, and you're right - many females view it (unfairly) as a small/trivial reason to end a marriage. That's really unfortunate and sad.
We feel deeply for men who feel like their only option is divorce or no sex and intimacy. That's why we help them blaze a trail they can't see by discovering WHY their wife doesn't want to have sex and growing in their power and capacity to create attraction and intimacy. Those that do, most often (but not always) get what they've wanted all along.
Crazy man
Owning your own power is great advice. It should be mentioned that that ALSO includes being willing to walk away when it’s clear the relationship isn’t going to work out.
Thanks for pointing that out, Eric. This is a point we routinely make, just not in every video.
We encourage men to never erode or undermine themselves for the sake of a relationship.
Having said that, we’d also assert that “clear that the relationship isn’t going to work out” isn’t something most men we’ve met are at all clear about.
In fact, they’re most often confused because they don’t lead themselves or the relationship.
Often, they’re looking for their partner to create that clarity because they’ve forfeited /exchanged their power to create clarity.
They traded clarity for dependency on their partner for feeling valued and secure.
Such men aren’t clear about anything but their pain, which their convinced is someone else’s fault and responsibility.
We help men get clear about who they are, regain their power and clarity, own their emotions and well-being, and then they’re able to make wise decisions about their relationship.
Some decide to move on, others decide to repair. We’re most concerned with helping men reach the point where they can make level-headed, calm and clear decisions.
It takes one to say no.
Thanks for your comment. That’s a point we agree with.
Often, a man won’t say no, even though he wants to. He’s too frightened to do so. He’s lost his power and agency and is waiting for his partner to do all the changing.
Yet, when he will say no and no longer be willing to sacrifice himself to a life he doesn’t want, he becomes trustable and reliable as a man unwilling to sacrifice integrity for comfort.
Such men are rarely in unhappy marriages because they don’t allow themselves to be.
I don't think "it takes two" is BS... it's just different at different stages. it's bs for the first stage of this particular scenario. For the first stage, that's right, you can't control them, so you take initiative and get moving on your locus of control. This is where the polarity gets weird. I happen to believe that we're all mixed polarity inside first of all, which complicates things, but then there is an outside polarity in the "relationship" as well. So then if you change your polarity to a positive one (from the inside out), a more masculine one and she was already in a masculine one, then it actually might produce a repulsion... it was like a fake magnetic attraction keeping the "marriage" together in an unhappy state... Then you flip... then she has to flip to her feminine in order for a new relationship to begin. She may resist the hell out of that for many reasons... cultural or personal. that's when the old relationship is done and the new one will actually take 2 people coming to the table. Just my two cents. If she doesn't flip then they going flying off their separate ways...
The chasing thing is also complex, because some women like to be chased/dominated/sought after, etc.... especially when the relationship is in a good place... so it's really driven by the bad state and neediness. I'd propose needy chasing vs. confident pursuit? or something like that. But once again that gets complex too. it's simple and complex at the same time.
You’re a deep thinking man! I’d love to see a long-form article or video about this.
Great vid
Thank you
💯
I'm all done changing my polarity.
Are you positive? (see what we did there? ;-p)
Ok, good point, look inward and take responsibility for my own security. I agree. So, what’s the point of pair bonding? what do I need her for?
Thanks for your comment and question, Marty!
I don’t need my wife. She doesn’t need me either.
We both believed we did - for about 2/3rds of our marriage. Those were the worst years.
We’ve both greatly prospered for being with one another for thirty plus years despite those hard times.
Despite each being immature and in need of growth and maturity, we were both born whole and complete when it comes to our value, worth, and significance. There wasn’t any “needs” that we truly had that the other must provide at the risk of loss of life or limb. Single people don’t die for the singleness. Many flourish, actually!
We each had and have always been a whole “self”. You are whole and complete also.
Yet we didn’t know that.
Like most people, we were insecure in that reality. In that insecurity, we looked for someone who could answer our deep, existential questions about self.
Am I okay? Am I enough? Am I valuable? Am I worthy? Am I lovable? Do I matter?
These are questions that each person must answer! They are needs!
Yet, they aren’t questions another person can really answer. We think they are, but w spend a whole lifetime trying to get others to answer them and a whopping amount of energy trying to convince ourselves and others that we should be approved and valued.
The nature of finding answers to these questions in other people is that they’re lost to other people also. That’s a dead end and a path to certain suffering.
Relationships provide a great place for seeing ourselves. Like a hall of mirrors.
They’re a great way to discover who we are and where we need to grow.
I believe a spouse provides a “reflection” to me that no one else really can. My parents, siblings, and friends each do likewise.
I believe all relationships serve the purpose of allowing us to encounter unique experiences of ourselves that allow us to find our best selves along with the shadows that need to be drug out into the light and refined.
Letting go of the “need” for one another has also allowed us to choose to be with one another because of want and desire; To offer true, non-transactional love to one another. Free of demands, expectations, and demands for one another to change to suit us.
Does that sound limiting to you, or as something worth experiencing? How does it strike you?
Well, good. We both strive to be healthy with the goal of not needing each other. So, again, the question, what’s the point of being together in the first place? You and your wife don’t “need” each other and that is the goal. What is the value of pursuing a relationship then? What value does getting together bring in light of the goal to function just fine independently?
Again always the mans fault. FO. Any decent man reading this its not your fault. You dont need to become somthing or someone for your wife to like you. If you do, its time to let her go. What i dislike is most men will accept their wife as she is. To think that men cannot get that treatment back makes me resentful. If i have to change to regain respect and intimacy i have changed into a new man that will no longer deem the current woman in my life acceptable. Seems like a fair exchange to me.
Thanks for your comment. We don’t believe or teach that the man is at fault or to blame, or that men or women even focus on that. Blame is a useless waste of energy. We show men how to stop focusing on others and to take responsibility for what happens next in their life. Sometimes, moving away from a relationship is a necessary part of that.
Many confuse our statements about unconditionally accepting a person as being synonymous with an unconditional relationship. They aren’t the same. Unconditional marriage is a horrible idea, and negates the distinction of marriage.
Standards for a relationship are a must. What are some of yours?
I’m in a unaffectionate and sexless marriage for last 20 of 25 yrs. She never initiates or reciprocates any affection. Never touches or kisses me just b/c and when I touch her it feels like I’m touching a dead body as she doesn’t react at all or touch me back. Try to lay closer to her in bed to watch tv and never puts phone down or get closer to me. Not had sex in 25 months and 20 months prior to the last time. Never thanked, hugged or kissed for gifts and flowers on VDay, Mother’s Day, anniversary and bdays. I can’t remember when she cuddled or hugged and kissed me just bc. Hell I haven’t had bday sex in 11 or 12 years not even my 40th bday. Anniversary sex the same or longer and never for Fathers Day. The constant rejection and unappreciation creates so much anger and resentment and have given up as I don’t give an F anymore bc the pain is just too much and easier not to put myself in any situation for disappointment and get angry/resentful. It’s not insecurity with me. She has been given almost everything she wants…house, luxury car, kids, stay at home mom and so on…nothing has helped and I have brought it multiple times over the years but nothing changes. I should have seen the signs in her parents affection for one another as a red flag and moved on. Feel like I have wasted my 30s and 40s now. Not looking forward to divorce after 25 yrs but when I kissed her on our anniversary and she said nothing and forgot put the death nail in the coffin.
Hey Jason, we get it. Sorry for your pain man! Your story reads like 99% of the men we speak with. We'd recommend you take a look at our brief, free, no-info-collected mini course on sexless marriage. We help men just like you turn things around. mentoring.men/sexless-marriage
I am experiencing a similar (not quite as severe) situation. So this 🤡 says it is our issue(s). I disagree. There are other videos here that look at the relationship in a different way. They make
suggestions for both men and women. It may not take two, but one person working on the relationship without their partner is not going to end well for most.
There are many different issues that affect couples. These manifest in many ways. Multiple modalities are available for the various varieties of people and relationships.
I wish you the best and hope that your situation and the relationship improves.
Excellent polarity example and excellent "it takes one" demonstration. In many of the sexless situations the lady is more focused on control, thus she will nit pick and fault find in an effort to maintain the distance and polarity being lined up so there is a repulsion. What's funny is those same woman can find so many others attractive and desireable.
Hi Dennis, thanks for the comment! The popular author David Snarch labeled what you’re referring to as “normal marital sadism”. It’s when a partner keeps trying to push the dilemma of what they want or don’t want onto their partner to resolve. It’s essentially blame.
She often does want control, as does he. This is why this stage of marriage is often labeled a “power struggle”.
The man always does it too for a while.
He wants a sexual relationship, but he doesn’t want it badly enough to end a relationship that isn’t working for him, so he pushes it back to his partner and asks her to resolve that dilemma by asking her to change what she wants.
It’s this bi-directional blame and waiting for the other person to change that leads to the gridlock that is characteristic in sexless marriages and which prolongs them for decades.
Someone must start to own 100% of what they want and stop waiting for a change in the other.
What we find is that most men in these relationships don’t values themselves deeply enough to see themselves as worthy of the life they want. Thus, they are too fearful to decide on a new future. They basically love everyone else’s happiness and well-being more than their own.
Such a man isn’t often/usually sexually attractive to a woman. Women aren’t sexually attractive long-term to men that devalue and disrespect themselves.
A man that stays in a long-term relationship that he doesn’t want is a man doing so. He often thinks he’s being virtuous and living based on values and commitment. Yet, he’s often inwardly filled with anger, resentment, rage, and hostility. He may even be wishing his partner would get hit by a bus or die in her sleep.
How is that virtuous?
The real issue is that he’s afraid of what cost would need to be paid to have the life he wants and is waiting for someone else to love and care for him more than he loves and cares for himself.
That never happens. No one can effectively love, value, and respect us more than we do ourselves.
When such a man becomes the man who loves, honors, and values himself enough to no longer be okay being in a sexless or dead marriage, he often finds he’s no longer in one.
It was often his lack of self-love, self-worth, and self-respect that was largely responsible for his partners disinterest.
That’s not always the case of course, but it’s true in the vast majority of men we encounter in this situation. Anecdotally, we find when we can help a man improve those things, his sexlessness begins to end.
As you point out, the woman is attracted to another man. We agree!
That’s evidence that she’s not sexually disinterested overall, just disinterested in this man.
That’s not arbitrary - and fortunately, something that can be rectified. That’s what we help men do - reconnect with themselves and start living as an attractive man again.
Excellent writing and i also fully agree.
Could it ever be possible that a man is married to a narcissist or borderline personality disorder crazy woman? Or can what a man does fix everything? I love how you and many religious teachers use examples of things like magnets that behave in a way because of physics and use that as proof of how things work in relationships when it literally doesn't have a single thing to do with that.
@Merdog anything is possible and a partner can certainly have issues. The trouble with pointing to external factors as the exclusive source of our problems is that it places us in a powerless victim mindset where we are dependent on someone or something outside of us to be different so we can be okay. When we know what we value, who we are and want to be, take ownership for our own happiness, and act in alignment with our values, then we come from a place of self-reliance and empowerment. When we are simply reacting to her reacting to us, we put ourselves in a ping-pong state of mind that keeps us off balance and off center, which is a difficult place to make decisions from.
@@MentoringMen I agree with the "extreme ownership" part of your philosophy however when you get to this place of self reliance and empowerment you will start to see clearly. You will start to see the relationship for what it truly is. To use your magnet analogy. If you flip yourself but she also flips she is not going to stick to you. There are still 2 magnets. If you counciled a significant number of men and you've never had to say to one "look you're doing a really great job and you have shown a lot of improvement but this woman has severe trauma and needs some professional help to get over the things in her past that have made her who she is" you are putting men in harms way and living in lala land. You may call it being "unequally yoked". Him getting with the program isn't going to change who he's yoked to. You are trying to red pill men without teaching anything about female nature. Your wives need to start their own counseling to women so they can learn how to behave in relationships or does that not really matter? If the man is doing all the correct things they magically just fall in line?
@@merdog3190 facts, my dude. Facts!
@@merdog3190couldn’t have said it better myself. All of this “recapture your old self” talk is narrow minded. The very nature of marriage, especially how a lot of significant others see it, goes against the philosophy of grounding within yourself. Oftentimes you simply don’t have the time for this. Or for example you stay at the gym 2 minutes too late according to your wife and get accused of cheating and it starts arguments. When wives do this it should be recognized as abuse and can put you in a dark place and make you feel trapped. Sometimes it’s better to simply walk away.
I am into the resentment camp
It’s miserable, isn’t it?! We’ve spent enough time there to know! We are sorry you’re experiencing that, Lewis!
What’s your plan for moving out of the resentment camp and into the freedom and fullness camp?
No need for resentment brother. Contrary to popular belief your situation is not your fault. Start taking care of yourself and reconnect to things you used to love to do. If the female in your life can't appreciate you, it's time to thank her for the years and move on.