Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus: The Classic Guide to Understanding the Opposite Sex

by John Gray

Asking for help when you can do it yourself is perceived as a sign of weakness.

He wants to help her feel better by solving her problems. He wants to be useful to her. He feels he can be valued and thus worthy of her love when his abilities are used to solve her problems.

A woman has no conception of this male sensitivity because for her it is another feather in her hat if someone offers to help her. It makes her feel loved and cherished. But offering help to a man can make him feel incompetent, weak, and even unloved.

When our partner resists us it is probably because we have made a mistake in our timing or approach.

A man wants to make improvements when he feels he is being approached as the solution to a problem rather than as the problem itself.

Venusian feels good about herself when she has loving friends with whom to share her feelings and problems. A Martian feels good when he can solve his problems on his own in his cave.

She can tell he is upset but mistakenly assumes he doesn’t care about her because he isn’t talking to her.

Just as a man is fulfilled through working out the intricate details of solving a problem, a woman is fulfilled through talking about the details of her problems.

Most men have little awareness of how important it is to a woman to feel supported by someone who cares. Women are happy when they believe their needs will be met. When a woman is upset, overwhelmed, confused, exhausted, or hopeless what she needs most is simple companionship. She needs to feel she is not alone. She needs to feel loved and cherished.

To fully express their feelings, women assume poetic license to use various superlatives, metaphors, and generalizations.

A woman should not be judged for needing this reassurance, just as a man should not be judged for needing to withdraw.

What women don’t know about Martians is that they need to have a reason to talk.

When a woman attempts to change a man, he receives the message that she thinks he is broken. This hurts a man and makes him very defensive. He doesn’t feel loved and accepted.

Men rarely say “I’m sorry” because on Mars it means you have done something wrong and you are apologizing. Women, however, say “I’m sorry” as a way to say “I care about what you are feeling.”

Women don’t start out keeping score like men do; women give freely and assume men will do the same. As we have seen, men are not the same. A man gives freely until the score, as he perceives it, gets uneven, and then he stops giving. A man generally gives a lot and then sits back to receive what he has given.

On the other hand, if you quietly sacrifice your needs and don’t ask, he won’t have any idea how many times he is needed. How could he know if you don’t ask?

When a man grumbles it is a good sign—he is trying to consider your request versus his needs.