HaveTheRelationshipYouWant

So, How Do You Let Go And Stop Rowing The Boat?

You start in your imagination. You imagine enjoying the scenery, talking with the man,
sharing food and conversation and time. You tune in to how it all feels in your heart and body
– and you imagine dropping the oars.

You stop trying to make plans, stop pushing the relationship forward, stop trying to get him
to be or do anything.

You let him pick up the oars and start rowing. And, even if he doesn’t pick them up as
quickly as you’d like – you never again touch them. You let him make the plans, let him push
the relationship forward, let him be whoever he wants to be. You just sit back, follow your
feelings, choose your words, set your boundaries, and let yourself be surprised.

In A Committed Relationship Or Married: Overfunctioning As A Form
Of Control

Overfunctioning is doing too much.

In a marriage, partnership, or committed relationship, Overfunctioning looks like doing
more than your fair share, doing other family members’ work, and helping where no help
is needed. It’s stepping in when you know you could do a better job, stepping up to rescue
someone, jumping in to save the situation.

How did we find ourselves here?

If we choose to be the feminine-energy partner in the relationship, and then continually
take masculine energy home with us, we completely deprive our men of the pleasure of
being men.

We make it unrewarding for them to act like men, which is to be the doing, managing and
thinking partner in the relationship.

By doing everything, we are communicating that we don’t trust him to be the caretaker
and provider.

We are undercutting what makes him feel strong as a man and good about himself, which
is his ability to care for us and make us happy.

What happens to our men when we Overfunction? They become lazy and complacent and
vaguely resentful and stop trying to make us happy. They sense our distrust in their ability
and intention, and feel criticized as a result. They opt out of masculinity, hand it over to us,
and let us do it all.

You can see how this leads to chronic conflict. In a huge effort to keep everything in the
household, the relationship, and our daily lives running along smoothly, and in an even
bigger effort to keep our resentment and anger quiet and hidden, we Overfunction.

Let’s Take A Look At How You’re Overfunctioning

Do you find yourself picking up after everyone, or taking all the dishes in all the time,
or doing your husband or boyfriend’s chores because he forgot, or generally acting like
Superwoman?

We’ve taken on the “doing” of the world – in fact many of us feel as though we are actually
holding up our world.

We’re accustomed to the idea that being a good wife and partner means we need to take
care of everyone and DO everything. We’re accustomed to the idea of “nurturing” a man,
and that nurturing is “our job” in the relationship.

We become confused. We think being loving to our men means DOING everything,
managing it all. We completely miss the joy of loving our men by experiencing them.

Experiencing men, like experiencing a sunset, or a walk in the forest, or a work of art, or
childbirth, or rain, or sex requires that we let go of the urge to do: To photograph the sunset,
to hike through the forest, to write about the art, to push the baby out, to dodge the rain, to
work toward an orgasm.

And we’ve forgotten how to let go. Our minute-by-minute need to keep our profoundest
and seemingly darkest feelings hidden blocks all feeling. A running commentary from our
minds becomes our normal sense of experience.

Bt it doesn’t have to be that way. Baby steps of practicing experiencing feelings will take
you further than any amount of trying to force a breakthrough.

Doing Some Things, Not All

When directed toward men, our Overfunctioning energy is often perceived as mothering.
We are taking care of things for them. Our actions seem intrusive. We’re assuming we know
what they want. We seem to be judging men and finding them coming up short – otherwise,
why would they need taking care of? On the other hand, they love attention. Don’t we
all?

Understandably, there are some things that do need our attention. Someone needs to
get the groceries and pay the bills and plan the vacation and sign the kids up for summer
camp. The idea here is that your relationship is a partnership, and certain chores and
responsibilities should be negotiated and discussed. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t do
anything, I’m saying that you shouldn’t do everything.

To help you strike some sort of balance when we are all so mightily out of balance, I’m
asking you to pull back to zero. To at least imagine pulling back to zero. The baby steps you
take may seem huge.

I’m asking you to stop doing for your man and your family what they don’t really need you
to do. Even though he’s grown accustomed to your doing so much and may resent your not
doing it anymore, your man will absolutely find himself relieved that you’ve stopped doing it.

What are some of the ways you Overfunction in your relationship? Write them down.

Overfunctioning can be about wanting to be appreciated, wanting attention and
respect. But does it work? Do we get appreciation? No. It doesn’t work because attention,
appreciation and respect are what the masculine energy wants – and as long as your
husband or boyfriend wants to be the masculine-energy partner in the relationship, you’re
not going to get appreciation and respect for what you do inside the relationship.

So stop. Just stop.

Instead, step back and start being cherished for who you are, not for what you’re doing.
This is what your husband or boyfriend wants – to adore you for who and what you are.

Write down some thoughts about how you want to be appreciated…

...

...

Overfunctioning can be about not appreciating yourself enough to have reasonable
boundaries. It’s the classic self-esteem issue of feeling you can only be loved if you earn it. By
serving, by being nice and good. And we can pass this on to our daughters. We think we’re
passing on good knowledge about how to get along.

The truth is that the best role model for our daughters is a mother who knows her worth as
a woman and is comfortable with it. A mother who does not tolerate sub-par treatment and
sub-par loving from men.

How are you not appreciating yourself?

What are you tolerating that isn’t good for you or that you don’t like or don’t want?

Exercise: Identifying Your Overfunctioning

The best way to begin the process of ending your Overfunctioning is to sit down, make
a list of all the things you’re doing, and prioritize.

Obviously, someone has to get the kids to school and soccer practice. In dating,
someone has to make the dinner reservation. Someone has to plan the trip, make the
date, figure out what to do on the date, figure out what time the date should start.

But somewhere on that list you’ll find a cutoff line – where the world won’t fall apart
if you stop doing stuff. It may get a little messy, but it won’t collapse.

And when you stop doing stuff – the reality of what really needs to be done and who

needs to do it most often becomes crystal clear in a completely easy, different way
than we’re used to. And it’s never what we thought.

Write that list now. Write down everything you feel responsible for doing and getting
done and making happen in your relationship, or relationships you’ve had in the past
and in your household. Number them by priority:

1. Really important and usually urgent

2. Somewhat important, can slide sometimes

3. You know, I’m not sure I really have to be in charge of this one all the time

4. What in the world am I doing spending my energy on this all the time
The Overfunctioning List

Ask yourself What do I need to say “no” to?

...

...

What would I like to say “yes” to?

...

...
When you begin saying “no” and stop Overfunctioning, you may get initial grumbling from
your man, and from everyone in your household.
In time, however, once your man begins to take over some of the accomplishing, doing,
managing of the relationship and the logistics of daily life, he’ll feel better because he’ll be
doing what makes him feel masculine and appreciated. And you’ll feel less resentful and
critical because you’ll feel adored for who you are, not for what you’re doing for everyone.

Here’s how to stop Overfunctioning:

1. Continue to express your feelings as they come up.

2. Don’t give in to the Nasty Voice and start explaining or defending yourself.

3. Don’t demand anything from yourself or anyone else.

4. Trust your partner (or the man you want to BECOME your partner) and your family.

5. Appreciate what your partner – or your date – does to pick up the slack.

6. Tolerate imperfection.

7. Practice expecting to be adored, and you will be.

Saying no to Overfunctioning will make an amazing difference – not only in the

relationship, but in the way you feel about yourself.

You’ll begin to see that some of your resentment and anger isn’t about him at all. You may
be jealous of some freedom or flexibility he has. As soon as you get that your feelings are
about you not taking care of yourself, your resentment will fade.

As a relationship coach, part of my job is to hold you accountable for accomplishing the
goals you set for yourself. You may want to create a buddy system with a friend who’d like to
work on her own Overfunctioning. It works like this:

Each of you chooses three things to say “no” to from your lists, and then you hold each
other accountable for actually not doing those three things. With every other woman around
you despairing that there’s not enough time to do everything that needs doing, your small
support system will be the antidote to Overfunctioning.

Just keep remembering this: What we’re about here is getting you the big-ticket items –
Affection, Great Sex, Fun, Respect, Romance, Excitement, Pleasure, Harmony, Emotional
Safety and Support, a framework for negotiating what you want – and a Soul-mate
Connection with the man you have or the man you’re about to meet.

This is not about finding better, cleverer ways to get him to do what you want him to do
and to behave the way you want him to behave. It’s not about managing and controlling him
better, so that he doesn’t feel like you’re managing and controlling him.

It’s not about tricks – it’s about Letting Go to get what you want. It’s about giving up all
forms of control and man-management in order to have your dream relationship. It’s about
treating your man as though you trust and respect him even if you’re not there yet.

Tool: Giving Up Control

I want to illustrate giving up control physically in the form of a Tool you can do
anywhere and anytime.

Practicing this Tool in a physical way will instantly help you discover how you’re
relating to a man right now in this moment and experience how that feels to you and
to him.

Here’s how it goes:

Hold out your hands and tighten your fists like you’re holding onto something.
Imagine your man, or your date, is standing right in front of you – and what you’re
holding onto with your clenched fists is him. You have his shirt in your hands. Don’t
let go.

What do you imagine it’s like for him? What’s he thinking, what’s he doing? Is he
squirming, trying to get away? If you’re married, he won’t leave. He doesn’t want
to leave. He’ll just stand there, or sometimes he’ll bat or push you away. Does that

sound familiar?

And what does it feel like for you? How does it feel to be grabbing onto his shirt like
that? Tension in your stomach? Okay, now look at your hands. It feels like you’re
grabbing on, right? But look at where your knuckles are – the part of your hand that’s
closest to him. You’re really pushing him away with your fists! So you’re both grabbing
on and pushing away at the same time.

How does that feel? Are you afraid of what will happen if you let go? Don’t let go.

All right, now let go. Release and relax your hands. Now turn your hands, effortlessly
now, palms up and out. What does that feel like?

Okay. Clench your fists again, hold on again. This is control. Open your hands, palms
up. This is surrender. Clench them again. This is control – wanting, trying to get, trying
to keep, arranging, managing. Now open them and turn them up and outward. This is
receiving, allowing, being open. This is feminine energy.

A month from now, it will be great to revisit what you’ve written here and add to it
all the changes that have happened since you began practicing this Tool on a regular
basis, or when you needed it.

Start now – write about how it feels to clench your fists and pull and push your man.
Write what it feels like to want to control him and the relationship.

Now open your hands and let the palms face up and outward again. Write what it
feels like to let go of the clenched fist and receive. Let both the good-feeling feelings
and the bad-feeling feelings about it come up and onto the paper.

We clench our fists and try to control so much because we’re afraid of what will
happen if we don’t. So whatever you think or feel, write it down.

When you feel tense, upset or a need to “make something happen” with a man, do this
Tool. It will connect you to how awful it really feels to a man when you feel compelled to be
in control.

It will allow you to choose to be in your feminine energy and let go of control, which will
then allow you to relax more and love yourself more and move into your more magnetic
feminine energy for your masculine man.

Chapter 7

Allow Him To Take The Lead

“A masculine man can’t fall in love when he receives, only when he gives.” (Dr. Patricia Allen)

I know how frustrating it is to sit back and let a man row the boat and take the lead.

We want a man to know we’re interested in him and we want to make it easy for him to
ask us out again, so we inadvertently chase
him.

We want to be nurturing while at the same
time move our life and relationship goals
forward through action and checklists, so we
row the boat.

We want to give as much as we want to
receive, and sometimes we give too much and
we Overfunction BECAUSE we want to receive.

But in any relationship, whether you’re
just dating or you’ve been married for a long
time, when you act like the masculine-energy
partner and prod and pursue and give, you
don’t give him the chance to show you how he
really feels about you.

And my experience has shown that the only way to really be sure of where his heart is at is
by creating the space he needs to give to you, or to pursue your affections.

When you “do” things for a man, or for the relationship, or take charge of things and
manage things – you not only don’t give him a chance to pursue you, you don’t give him a
chance to “step up.”

You don’t give him a chance to DO. You don’t give him a chance to act like a man, be a man,
do like a man, and get the respect due a man.

You take away from him.

In the most extreme case, you’re effectively emasculating him.

He just wants to do for you and give to you and love you – and he wants to be appreciated
for all of that.

Stepping back and allowing a man to DO this for you is huge. It creates a tremendous
feeling of attraction for him, and pumps him up to step up even more.

Attract Him By Letting Him Please You

For a man to feel like he wants to get closer to you, he needs to feel good around you. And
the way he feels good around you is when he pleases you.

As long as you seem happy to see him and tell him how much you enjoy his company,
almost any man will feel his attraction and affection for you grow, and keep coming back for
more.

Stay in your feminine energy by being receptive and open to his
attention.

If you’re dating, he sees that you’re a woman who’s secure in herself and doesn’t need to
pursue him, and he’ll be encouraged to step up his game so another man doesn’t beat him
to the chase.

If you’re in a committed relationship, letting him take the lead and continuing to be
receptive to him and respecting his thoughts will fuel his passion for you.

He’ll adore you and appreciate you, and you’ll be able to relax in the knowledge that you’re
a desirable creature he’d be a fool to take for granted.

Allowing a man to please us, as opposed to trying to be giving, perfect and “doing” for him
is almost a complete turnaround from everything we women have been taught and are so
used to doing. And that’s why it works to quickly transform relationships.

Masculine Men Are Not Threatened By Successful Women

A big mistake women make is believing that we’re too successful and that our success
“threatens” a man.

That being lawyers and doctors is what’s keeping the love from our lives, that men can’t
handle it.

I believe just the opposite. Part of being “satisfactory” is that your man feels basically
adequate. He’s essentially confident enough to be proud of what you do in the world, and
he’s proud that you – a terrific woman – chose him.

I believe he’s thrilled to have a crackerjack, smart, beautiful woman as his partner.

BUT – what a masculine-energy man can’t handle, can’t stand, and didn’t buy at your
wedding or when he started seriously dating you, is to be sleeping, eating, driving with, and

playing with another man in women’s clothing.

What you do out in the world is completely different from how you are with him when
you’re alone together.

He wants a woman who’s very interested in him – in both his mind and his body. A woman
who accepts and loves and respects him, just as he is. A woman who can share her emotions
and body with him. Confusing that kind of woman with a “bimbo” is a big mistake.

As the feminine-energy partner, you’re agreeing that you’ll primarily carry the feelings in
the relationship, and that he’ll primarily carry the thinking aspects of the relationship. You
feel, and he thinks.

This doesn’t mean you never think, or have opinions, or do a great many things more
competently and efficiently than he can simply because of your abilities.

It means that making decisions, using his brainpower – even if it means delegating tasks to
you as the more able partner – is what he wants respect for. It means he takes your feelings
into consideration, but he’s the accepted leader of the team.

If your ideal relationship is more of a free-form dance – with masculine and feminine
energies moving and changing fluidly rather than a traditional dance with the man leading
– you can work toward that. That kind of fluidity comes as men and women mature, and as
a result of an environment of trust and ease.

The complimentary energies of the masculine and feminine create romantic and sexual
fire and emotional intimacy that allow both of you to feel safe, loved and supported.

Chapter 8

The Rori Raye Mantra

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have
built against it.” (Rumi)

Control usually shows up when we fear the unknown, or aren’t sure of where we’re
headed in love. It stops us from being truly open and receptive to all the wonderful things
that can happen when you let go and take a
leap of faith – when you allow yourself to be
surprised.

I’ve summed up these leaps of faith in
a “Mantra.” It’s a poem you can use as a
meditation, as a reminder, as a jolt when
you’re confused or tightening up with anxiety.
It goes like this:

Trust your Boundaries

Follow Your Feelings

Choose Your Words

Be Surprised

Trusting your boundaries means you believe in your ability to take care of yourself, to
treat yourself well regardless of how you’re feeling about yourself, and to insist that you be
treated well, no matter what your man or the conflicting voices in your head may be saying
to you.

Following your feelings means you focus on your feelings. It means that, rather than trying
to think your way through a conflict or something that’s bothering you, you look inside for
feelings and sensations that are real in the moment.

Choosing your words means you stifle the automatic responses you find most comforting.
You respect the power of words by either saying only what you feel in your own body –
without so much as referring to your man or his actions – or not speaking at all. Taking a

breath before you speak, respond, and react in the same old ways gives you a moment to
find a new, better way to respond, or sometimes, to do nothing.

You’ll learn more about how to choose words and express your feminine in Key #5.

Being surprised sums up the whole experience of giving up control. Instead of using your
energy, intellect and emotional resources to predict and determine the outcome of every
moment of your relationship, you let it go. You allow yourself to be surprised!

No matter how hard you’re wishing for change, when it comes, you’ll be surprised. Most
of us don’t take well to surprises. We like everything spelled out in advance, we like to be
prepared.

No one can be prepared for the surprises of love. For the way your heart feels, the way
your body tingles, the way making a decision to be with someone for all of your life feels,
and the way it feels in the middle of that decision, when things aren’t going the way you’d
dreamed.

If everything always turned out the way we expected, if every turn in the road led to
where we thought it would, life would be pretty dismal. Not only would we know about the
good stuff, we’d know about the bad stuff. If we knew everything in advance, there’d be no
anticipation. Fear about the uncertainty of the future would be replaced with dread. Life
would be a board game with no dice.

Even if we could know the future, we couldn’t have it both ways – know what we want to
know and not know what we don’t want to know. How could we decide whether we wanted
to know something without first finding out what it is?

So we’re pretty much stuck with not knowing anything, really. We have no way of knowing
how anything will turn out, so we can’t even know if we should even want it at all! We have
to make our best guess. We have to make choices.

And yet, most of us do our best day in and day out to gain, maintain, regain, exert,
demonstrate control over something in our life. We want to control the outcome of events
and the behavior of other people.

On a deep level, we know we can’t have that kind of control – it’s wishful thinking. But we
still want to. And we still try. And that effort makes us tense. And worse, it makes us closed
to the possibilities of synchronicity. It makes us closed to the outstretched hearts of real, live
men.

The need for control comes from fear – fear that we’ll be hurt. And the way out of fear is to
open up, baby-step-by-baby-step, to love.

Key 4

Receive Love From The Masculine

A good man wants, more than anything, to make you happy. But by
controlling, managing and criticizing, we women make it difficult for men to
give us the love we deserve. Key #4 will show you how to support the team,
let go of false beliefs about men, communicate more effectively, resolve anger,
and make it easy for a man to adore us unconditionally.

Chapter 9

Support The Team

“Lots of people want to ride with you in the limo, but what you want is someone who will take the bus with
you when the limo breaks down.” (Oprah Winfrey)

Instead of trying to control every aspect of our relationship, we need to take control over
something we do control: Our choices!

There is power in choice. By not believing
we have a choice in any situation in which we
find ourselves, we get confused, feel dread,
step in and out of commitments, get angry,
disappointed, and create drama and conflict
enough to distract us from the fact that we are
afraid to choose.

You can choose the relationship you’re
in. You can choose to leave your current
relationship and be alone. You can choose to
find someone new to love.

But if you consider your man, and believe
that he is a man who is worthy of your time,
energy and love, and you like who he is as a
person, than you need to choose relationship
and give up control.

Choice is completely different from control. Control is pretty much trying to change
something or someone else. Most of us live our lives believing that this change we want to
make will make us happier.

We also believe that what we have in mind for the other person or situation is good for
them, too, and that it’s truly what we want. And we often do try with all our power, our
might, our wits – any way we can – to get our way.

Love and relationship is supposed to be about going into the unknown places of our heart,
not about controlling every outcome. We’re supposed to expand ourselves – the sum of the
two of us together is greater than just two. We’re supposed to take each other, accompany
each other, support each other through the darkness – not hold each other back.

We’re supposed to be partners. We’re supposed to be a team. And a relationship is a team
of three members. There’s you, there’s him, and then there’s the relationship.

As a couple, you create a brand new organism, with requirements and needs of its own.
Some relationship problems can be solved simply by both of you considering the needs of
the relationship.

You both agree to give up a large part of the freedom of a single life in order to enter into
a marriage or relationship team. You both give up romance with anyone else, you give up all
kinds of small behaviors your partner can’t live with – smoking, or not bathing – you give up
thinking only of yourself, you give up having no responsibility to anyone else.

You give up complete independence for interdependence. Relationship makes you deal
with emotional traumas from the past, with bad, learned habits and with instincts you’d
rather not deal with – the urge to be dependent, to always have your way…

Supporting the Team is about honoring the cornerstone of relationship – friendship.

Getting To Know The Real Man

Charlie Brown in the Peanuts cartoons says it best: “A friend is someone who likes you.”

So – how much do you LIKE a man – not feel gushy-gushy about him, or sigh when you
think of him, but LIKE him? As a person?

In fact – what do you even KNOW about him?

We often think we know a man by what he does. Or what he “says” he thinks. It isn’t until
we’ve lived with him for a while that we discover his fears and curious habits. It often isn’t
until the rough times happen that we even discover what he may have been thinking and
feeling all along.

So, to start your relationship off right, or turn it around if it’s gotten stiff, distant, cold, tired
or even angry, it makes sense to get to know a man on a much deeper level as quickly as you
can.

We think that by asking questions about the things that are important to us in a man, we’re
going to find out more about him. But that isn’t so.

For example, getting a man to “open up” is the situation I’m most asked about. Usually,
when we think of getting a man to open up, we mean to open up about how he feels about
US – but we’ll never get that far until we can get him to open up about what he likes for
breakfast.

The thing is – he may not even KNOW what he likes for breakfast. Or what colors he likes
you to wear. But I guarantee you there are things he cares about that he knows just enough
about that a great conversation with you will open him up and make him feel amazing.

Like you’re the woman he’s waited for all his life. Like you’re the woman who “gets” him.
Finally.

What Being A Team Member Is About

And here’s the most important thing about being a team and how you get a man to open
up and be a true life partner for you:

If you try to hold onto some sense of control – in the conversation, in your own feminine
ability to be vulnerable, in who does what on the date or in the marriage – you’ll shut him
down fast.

Being a team member means giving up being right. It means giving up being the one who
knows what’s going on. It’s giving up being the explainer, or the teacher, or the reasonable
one, or the one with the answers.

It’s giving up being in charge of anything. This is about creating a team from the get-go:

• It’s about asking the right questions, and finding out what you’ve been paying attention
to where he’s concerned.

• It’s about putting the team ahead of any of your individual concerns.

• It’s about discovering what’s most important for the thriving of the team, and focusing
both your attentions on that.

• It’s about discovering, as a team, who needs the most support, when – and putting both
your energies into making that happen.

• It’s about working through disagreements, working through disappointments, working
through not getting your way, working through resentments and anger and discomfort
and getting emotionally triggered.

Because when you put your energy into discovering what’s important to the relationship,
then you automatically stop controlling, and you begin to pay attention to what’s really
needed. You change your “vibe” from needing to have things your way to a vibe of
acceptance and support. This new vibe is much more attractive to a man.

Working through all of this as a team is what makes chemistry fire up and makes love
bloom – in your heart and body and in his.

Chapter 10

The Truth About Men

I felt it shelter to speak to you.” (Emily Dickinson)

Once you’ve surrendered control , and stopped criticizing your man, you’ll want to start
appreciating him for his strengths and his good qualities instead. This will begin to turn your
relationship around almost overnight.

Before you can focus on a man’s good
qualities, however, you need to be able to
become aware of – and NOT focus on – the
judgments and false beliefs you have about
men in general.

These opinions, thoughts and judgments
(you may have called them “negative
thoughts” before reading this book) carry a
feeling of “ickyness” with them. And they
tend to unfairly bring MORE icky-feeling
experiences into our lives when we focus our
attention on them.

In fact, if we’re “feeding” an “icky-feeling”
thought, or a simple opinion or judgment
about any man – we can be pretty sure that somewhere, deep in that subconscious part of
ourselves we “don’t know” – we’re judging ourselves right along with him.

If we have an opinion about him – we logically also have an opinion about us.

It’s a habit of thinking that most of us have down so well, we don’t even notice we’re doing
it.

When we expect a man to behave a certain way, he usually lives up to expectations, both
good and bad, because that’s how synchronicity works.

To start, we should banish the myths about men that cause us to view reality through a
false lens:

• There’s the myth that all men are cads and all they want is one thing, and they leave once
they get it.

• There’s the myth that men don’t want to be in a committed relationship.

• There’s the myth that men are lazy when it comes to love.

I believe women have made them all up to avoid some basic truths:

The truth is – men are loyal, brave and strong. Men have a tremendous capacity to love,
commit, nurture, cherish, understand, support and be there for us.

If they want to.

And that’s it. Men, unlike us, tend to do what they want. They tend to do what they know
gets them what they want.

When they commit to us, what they want is love, respect, sex, intimacy and romance. And
they believe in their hearts, groins and spirits that we are the women to give it to them.

We do not have to do anything to make them feel this way. No matter how hard we try, we
cannot make them love us, care for us and be there for us if they don’t want to.

What we can succeed in doing – and most of us do this really well – is in making them not
feel this way. We can make them not want to love us, care for us and be there for us.

Men Want To Stay

Men don’t leave. They do the best they can to stay with the woman they’ve chosen, and
only leave when they can’t get what they need.

So what do men need?

They need what women need: Love, companionship, all the good stuff you dream of in a
relationship. With one difference: Men respond to a woman on a simple and basic level. And
then they do something about it.

They don’t stop to think whether you’d make a good mother for their children or a great
companion when they get older, or whether you have enough power and prestige in the
world or make a great living. As I mentioned earlier, they trust themselves. They trust their
instincts.

They believe in their abilities to know when you’re the “one,” and once they’ve found
you, it’s difficult to talk them out of it. Once they’ve committed to you, they’ll tolerate a
whole hell of a lot to stay with you.

Women, on the other hand, tend to make decisions about men. We check them out, are
attracted to things about them other than our response to them and how we feel about
ourselves in their presence, and then talk ourselves into and out of relationships.

Men Don’t Fear Intimacy, Women Do

Much has been made of men’s so-called “Fear of Intimacy” issues. I, for one, don’t believe
that “Fear of Intimacy” has ever stopped a man from committing himself to a woman he
really wants. The nature of a man is to “go for it,” and he knows what “it” involves – the
whole kit and caboodle of relationship. He’s ready and willing to give his whole heart to the
woman he wants.

Women, on the other hand, make relationship decisions based on many factors other than
their deep connection to the man. They judge a man’s potential, and suitability, and use their
heads a lot more than men do. When we women marry, we’ve thought it all out, envisioned
the relationship far into the future, and commit ourselves on many levels, but “Fear of
Intimacy” keeps us from really committing with our hearts.

I believe that women, more than men, fear losing autonomy and independence – that
we guard our opinions, and in most cases, the full extent of our personalities and soul from
being seen, and in many ways prevent the relationship from going deeper as time goes on.

Men, believing that women know the way, will follow our lead in the relationship. Then,
we either lead them further into the heart of relationship (the feminine), or keep it in the
comfortable holding pattern of the head (the masculine). It’s only when we embrace our
feminine energy and respect his masculine that we BOTH get what we want: Real, juicy,
ecstatic intimacy.

Chapter 11

Respect The Masculine

“Relationships – of all kinds – are like sand held in your hand. Held loosely, with an open hand, the sand
remains where it is. The minute you close your hand and squeeze tightly to hold on, the sand trickles
through your fingers. You may hold onto some of it, but most will be spilled. A relationship is like that. Held
loosely, with respect and freedom for the other person, it is likely to remain intact. But hold too tightly, too
possessively, and the relationship slips away and is lost.” (Kaleel Jamison)

You understand the need to relinquish control and you appreciate the fact that most men
are in fact strong, decent and capable of deep love. But I’m now asking you to take things
one step further and actually respect the
masculine energy of your partner.

Respecting the masculine will reduce
conflict, end drama, create new and authentic
communication, ignite his pursuit of you, and
ultimately lead to you getting what you want
out of the relationship.

Despite the benefits, this element of
respecting the masculine is challenging. In
fact, women have told me they can’t do it.
They won’t do it. Even though they know it
would help their relationship, they say they
just don’t want to.

I ask you in advance to please keep an open
mind and imagine how this might help you.

A friend who’d called to ask for help with her marriage told me she didn’t want to do this
crucial element. She had an entire argument against it, saying the whole idea was not in her
nature.

“Okay,” I said.

Then, the next day, she called again.

“I think it’s working,” she said, her voice low.

It works that quickly! How do you do this? How do you respect the masculine and
therefore create the space for the man to give you love and respect in return?

The fastest way to see immediate change in your relationship and respect the masculine
partner is to follow four simple rules:

The 4 Rules For Respecting The Masculine Partner

Rule #1: Don’t try to control your partner.

Rule #2: Don’t try to control the outcome.

Rule #3: Stop yourself before you criticize, judge, advise, warn, coax, suggest, ask
the “innocent question” or try to change him.

Rule #4: Learn to take “no” for an answer.

It makes no difference what the particular issues are between you and your partner –
sticking to these Four Rules will change your relationship. It will eliminate so many of your
conflicts that there will be space for new, better, happier, more authentic communication.

You will see results almost immediately.

Okay, let’s talk about this. How does this work? Remember a recent conflict. Let’s see how
using these rules would alter the conversation.

1. Don’t try to control your partner.

If you live with a man, trying to control him might include saying things like, Please take
the garbage out now. Or, I need you to change the light bulb, or pick up after yourself, or do
what you said you’d do.

Or, if you’re dating someone, saying things like, Please call me more often, or You said you’d
call yesterday, or I need you to do this or that, or I need to know this or that…

If you’re single and ready to begin a great relationship, this would include approaching a
man in any way (Hi, haven’t we met?), inviting a man anywhere, offering your phone number
before he asks, looking for a pen or paper to write your number on, driving him or meeting
him anywhere, or in any way dampening his pursuit of you by doing it yourself.

2. Don’t try to control the outcome.

An example of trying to do this might be: You want to go on vacation to Alaska. And no
matter what the discussion, you have brochures, you’re fighting for Alaska.

Or, if you’re dating: Offering to pay for anything, plan anything, get anything, do anything
except lean over and unlock his car door after he’s opened the door for you. This is
also about all that stuff that goes on in our heads involving the question Where is this
relationship going?

3. Stop yourself before you:

Criticize – Why are you doing this?

Judge – You always do this,

Advise – You really should do that,

Warn – You shouldn’t do that,

Coax – Oh, come on, do that,

Suggest – Let’s do that,

Ask the Innocent Question – How come you’re wearing that shirt and not the one I bought
you? with a sweet smile on your face. This is almost the worst of all, because it’s really an
attack dressed up as if it isn’t – which is totally disrespectful just for being so obviously
phony,

or

Try to change him.

4. Learn to take “no” for an answer.

This means not responding to “no’s” with demands for explanations or re-considerations,
like:

What do you mean you won’t come to dinner with me and my mother?

But you …

Why do you have to work?

Look, you said…But it’s a good idea…

You can see that the Four Rules will absolutely end almost all the “drama” in your
relationship. It cleans up the communication so you can start over.

In fact, it may clean it up so well that you’ll begin experiencing a lot of silence. You’ll also
notice less tension in the air. Your man will smile more. He’ll breathe easier. His heart will
open.

All of this will happen because while you’re expressing your natural feminine energy,
he’s free to express his natural masculine energy, and that means being respected for his
thoughts and allowing him to take the lead.

That doesn’t mean that you have no say in the relationship. You actually have tremendous
power in how you express what you want and don’t want, and I’ll be covering that in Key #5.
You’ll learn how to choose your words in a way that puts him less on the defensive and gives
you the power to express exactly what you want and don’t want, without making him feel
managed, controlled or criticized.

Remember that a good man really does want to please you and make you happy. When
you can respect what he wants and communicate what you want in a way that he can

actually hear, he’ll once again feel compelled to wrap you up in his arms and shower you
with affection.

Chapter 12

Why We Should Appreciate Instead of Criticize

“The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own
image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.” (Thomas Merton)

Respecting the masculine sounds like it could work, but what if your man can’t seem to
do anything right by you? What then? Are you supposed to tolerate bad behavior just for the
sake of “respecting the masculine”?

At one point or another, we’ve all sat
around complaining about our husbands or
boyfriends. There are things about men in
general we don’t like, and things about our
men in particular we find frustrating. And
we also need to talk to our friends about our
problems and get help.

But chipping away at our partners either in
our own heads or out in public undermines
our sense of relationship as a team. What
we have to do is change our notions about
men and the labels we give them. We need
to begin to turn our energies toward our
partners, instead of away.

I so know men can be frustrating. We’re frustrated because men aren’t built emotionally,
ethically, spiritually – any way at all – like we are.

They see things differently, they prioritize differently, they interpret differently. They’re
about action, and we’re about feeling.

And yet, as managers, we feel far superior to most men (and especially to the men in our
lives) on so many levels. We KNOW we can do things better than he can (and most often –
we can.)

So, how am I supposed to stop telling him what he’s doing wrong? What am I supposed to
do with my righteous frustration when he doesn’t follow through, do what he says he would
do, and when he doesn’t listen or think before he acts?

You’re supposed to love him and appreciate him anyway.

If this isn’t something you think you can do – then perhaps relationship with a man (or
even a masculine-energy woman) is not right for you. I’ve had comments and letters from
many women who take intense issue with this, call it going backwards and undoing what we
gained with feminism, and really – it’s not about anything but love.

Love and romance and sex and attraction are all emotional, heart, gut things. No matter
what his brain tells a man, his heart and gut and dick win.

A man needs to be appreciated for what he does (because, to a man, what he does is
who he IS) and he cannot tolerate being thought of as “wrong.”

Yeah, he’ll get through some mistakes okay – if we don’t lean on them too much – but if
it becomes a chronic situation where he can’t seem to do anything right, that’s pretty much
the end of the relationship.

He may still love you – but he’ll withdraw from you. You can’t talk him out of it. He knows
what he feels. He either feels safe, loved, accepted and appreciated – or he doesn’t.

In fact – any man who would be happy with you being “right” all the time and telling him
when he’s wrong all the time is a “toxic man” that you wouldn’t want. You’d be completely
“icked” out by his “puppy-dog-ness.”

If you want to be with a good man – and if you want, especially, to be with a masculine-
energy man – you have to give up being right. And you have to learn to think differently
about men in general and your man in particular.

The first step here is to discover and acknowledge the things we can truly appreciate (no
matter how small they are) about a man.

Here’s a Tool to help you:

Tool: Turn Around Your Anger And Appreciate Him

Many women are stuck with a view of their husbands and boyfriends and dates that
won’t allow him to change into Prince Charming.

Whenever you hear yourself criticizing and running down a man to yourself or a
friend, STOP. Absolutely stop, and replace the judging, labeling, criticizing thing you
were about to say with something you really do like about him.

So we’re going to find some of these things you like about him.

Right now, you may not care at all about your husband or boyfriend or date as a person.
You may be too angry or disappointed to care.

For most of us, the huge well of anger is the most challenging to get at. Where men are
more comfortable with anger than pain, we tend to be more comfortable with tears than

anger. We can barely even acknowledge it. And it’s a fact that depression is merely anger
turned inwards – to yourself. But the day-to-day anger we do know about – when we’re
upset or frustrated or disappointed – we even suppress that.

Suppressing and repressing anger can make us physically sick. Being nice and good when
we’re feeling angry is enraging to our inner selves. Taking care of this part of ourselves is
our first duty to our total health – whether it’s soothing and calming it with some TLC, or
shouting at it to be quiet for a moment while we get our wits about us.

We know about much of the anger we feel toward our husbands, our boyfriends, all men.
Sometimes we know we’re angry when we’re angry – but few of us have any idea of the
magnitude of rage that lives in that space we don’t know about. And most of it has nothing
at all to do with our husbands, our boyfriends, or all men. But it has everything to do with
how willing we are to love and to let love in.

For now, let’s skip over all the anger – there’s enough to fill up every hour of every day if
you let it cycle in and out of your thoughts. Just tell your anger you’ll get to it, but now you’ll
just focus on how wonderful a man actually is. You may be surprised at what you come up
with.

This next exercise is the beginning of seeing not what you imagine, not what you dream,
but what you actually do like about what actually is. We’re moving from imaginary to real.
We’re going to be moving back and forth between these realms so that reality becomes rich
with your imagination and what you can imagine becomes real.

Exercise: Finding Appreciation

To start, this will help re-awaken your interest in a man (even one you’ve just met),
and help you recapture (or simply discover) some affection and admiration for him.

What do you like, appreciate, think is cool about men in general? (write it down.)

How does it feel to focus on this list, what you do like about men? Do you notice a
difference in how you feel inside when you focus on this rather than what you don’t
like?

Whenever you think of referring to or find yourself picturing your husband or
boyfriend or date as – insert disparaging adjective here – STOP. Take yourself back to
the good list.

The first step to receiving love from the masculine is to reframe your opinion, or
“perspective” of men in general. Now let’s look at your own man:

Write down at least three things or qualities about your partner that you do like and
respect – that actually perk up your interest in him when you think about them. Let’s keep it

in the present.

If this is hard, think about even the smallest thing that you like about him. Perhaps he’s
a good father. Perhaps there are small, sweet things he does – the way he is with the kids,
or with your relatives, even something he does in the mirror. Perhaps you like his sense of
humor, or think he’s smart about something. Perhaps he’s honest, he works hard.

Now we’re going to bring these feelings of appreciation out, so your man can hear them.

This can be very challenging. It may feel unnatural, because we’re so used to not
appreciating what he does. Here’s an example: He takes his dinner dish into the kitchen.

In the past, you may have been hung up on the obvious question – Why doesn’t he just
rinse the dish and put it in the dishwasher? – and said as much to him, and gotten nowhere.
So this time, you’re going to forget about that and just honestly appreciate the very small
thing: Wow. He brought his dish into the kitchen. And you say – “Thank you.”

What are some small things this man already does that you take for granted, or think
are too puny to be acknowledged? Actions like changing the light bulb, or running the
disposal, or putting gas in the car? Or picking a good restaurant, or opening the door
for you, or not sitting down until you do, or asking you what you want to do…?

(Write down your own.)

What can you say to acknowledge these small things that feels genuine to you?

(Write them down.)

If you’ve been with a man awhile, at first he may be suspicious – but I promise you that
small thing will get to be a lot of small things, and then a lot of big things if you’ll just
approach it from this small, truly appreciative way.

An important note: This can’t be fake. This isn’t dog training, or man training, because
that wouldn’t be respectful. Actually, you’re not training him – you’re training yourself.
You’re training yourself to respond when he does something you like – no matter how
small.

“Love comes when manipulation stops; when you think more about the other person than about his
reactions to you. When you dare to reveal yourself fully, when you dare to be vulnerable.”
(Dr. Joyce Brothers)

What are some more things from your lists that you can turn into honest expressions
of appreciation, or something you like – perhaps his hair, or his suit, or how handsome
he looks?

Remember a moment when you felt affectionate and fond. What was he doing? How
did it feel?

What about a time when you felt admiration? What was he doing? What did it feel
like?

What would it be like if you could feel that for him now?

Practice this tool for at least a week, practicing saying “thank you” and really appreciating
all the things that you admire and like about your man. Then notice how his demeanor shifts
around you and how he becomes more responsive, listens better, and takes a greater interest
in making you happy.

Respecting a man’s masculine energy and expressing that respect through appreciation and
surrendering control will result in more trust and affection in your relationship. He will begin
to appreciate you for your feminine, receiving, feeling, creative energy when you appreciate
him for his thinking, doing, analyzing, managing energy. This dance of opposite energies will
allow love – and passion – to flow through the relationship freely.

Chapter 13

Listening To Him Changes Everything

“Put love first.” (Mary Manin Morrissey)

Listening to someone and then feeling heard by them is an unbelievable experience – and
it’s very rare.

Most of us listen in a way that
communicates, “It’s all about me.” We wait for
the next pause so we can share our response
and our own experience. We don’t really listen
to what the other person is saying.

One great way to receive love and show
respect to a man (to anyone, really), is to
listen in a way that communicates “It’s all
about you.”

And in order for a man to actually
experience you as listening to him, you have to
FEEL like “It’s all about him” in that moment.

This will instantly help you relate to a man in
a much deeper way.

The difference between these two “modes” of listening is all about where you’re putting
your attention – what exactly you’re listening to – and so I’m calling these two totally
different ways to be with a man “Listening To Him” and “Listening To Myself.”

I’ve made this into a Tool – “Listening To Him” – that works almost instantly with almost
anyone, and you’ll be amazed at how quickly your relationship with a man will shift once you
get the hang of it.

The Difference Between “Listening To Myself” And “Listening To Him”

Most of us are Listening To Myself all the time. Most of the time, we aren’t really listening,
we’re thinking about ourselves – what we’re going to say next, what we think about the
other person, that our pants are too tight, that we have a pimple on our chin – anything but
the person right in front of us.

When we’re in a conversation with someone, and we’re thinking about how what that
person is saying relates to us, we’re in Listening To Myself mode. I may be sitting or standing
here talking with you, but actually I’m all in my own head about me. Oh, that happened to
me too! Or I wonder if he likes my hair or I wonder if he’ll ask me out. There’s nothing wrong
with being in Listening To Myself mode – except that it limits our ability to really relate to
others.

Listening To Him is the complete reverse of Listening to Myself. Imagine how, when you’re
utterly in love with someone, all you can see is their face, all you can hear is their voice, all
you can smell is their breath and cologne. Their words and the feelings they express are, in
that moment, the most important things in the world to you. In fact, the only things in the
world.

When you listen to a man – your man or any man - really focus your attention on Listening
To Him. Dial yourself to the Listening To Him channel, and practice just “being there” so
other thoughts that pass through your mind do just that: Pass through your mind without
sticking. You will change your relationship. And as a result, he will change.

The change in him is often instantaneous. All of a sudden he feels heard and safe, and he
opens up to you emotionally. If you keep listening – moment by moment, day by day – the
change quickly becomes permanent. Years and years of shutting you out can turn around
almost overnight.

How And Why This Kind Of “Passive” Listening Works With A Man

We’ve all been taught to “participate” in conversations. That’s led to us being unable to
listen to anyone talk about anything without our thinking about how it applies to US.

If they’re talking about a movie they saw, we want to jump in with our own impression of
the movie. If they’re talking about a trip – we want to share ours. If they’re talking about
their dog, we barely register it – we’re getting ready to share our experiences about OUR
dog.

To make it all worse, we’ve been taught to do something called “active listening” – where
we “feed back” what the person says to us, to let him know we heard him.

This makes it so we’re ALWAYS – 100% of the time listening like an interpreter, with our
mind whirring and grinding, churning out our replies, our feedback, our thoughts, our
interpretations.

It’s exhausting for everyone.

Listening To Him is the equivalent of 100 Tools around “being present.” It forces you to
“be here now.” It forces you to just – be.

And that’s what being a girl is all about – just being.

As you practice just being there with a man, looking at him, listening, letting pictures of
what he’s saying form in your mind as they will, relaxing your whole body as much as you
can to allow it to be present instead of on guard – that’s when you connect with him.

Connection gets made when you just... let him in. And when you let him in – without
DOING anything – you get more information! And, essentially, that’s what connection is all
about – letting information flow between you.

A man you think you’re not attracted to might suddenly open up and become really
attractive to you once you find out about him.

The man you’re in relationship with will feel understood and “heard” in a way he may not
have before, and he’ll begin to share some of his deeper thoughts and feelings with you.
He’ll feel that you’re making space for the relationship and supporting the Team, simply
because you’re listening deeply to his needs as well as expressing your own.

Let’s practice Listening To Him right now.

Exercise: Listening To Him

I use this exercise in my live seminars, and it’s incredibly effective at helping bring you
and your man (or anyone you communicate with, really) closer together so you both
feel heard in a powerful way. Here’s how we do it in the seminar with partners (this
is perfect for you and a girlfriend to buddy-up and practice together – and I’ll give the
instructions as though you’re listening to a man so you can also use it with him right
away):

• Turn your chairs toward one another. Decide who goes first – try using your names in
alphabetical order (there’s no emotional charge on the alphabet). Raise your hand if
you’re going first.

• Okay, if your hand’s in the air, you’ll be talking first. Talk at absolute Listening
To Myself mode, meaning, “It’s all about me.” Talk about what you did today, or
something that’s on your mind – anything – but talk to the other person as though
your only job is to focus on yourself, and their only job is to focus on you.

• If you’re the listener, all you have to do is listen. Get comfortable. Lean back if you
can. Relax completely and be “over there” with him. Look at your partner. Look at
his face, his eyes. Try to stay focused on his words. Let yourself go as though you no
longer exist. Really give yourself over to him completely. You’re in Listening To Him
mode, on the Listening To Him channel, which is all about him. Your thoughts are just
passing through – you’re over there.

If you notice your mind wandering back to – Oh, that happened to me too, or Yeah, I
agree – which is on the Listening To Myself channel – shift back to him.

When you’re really Listening To Him, you’ll be completely immersed in hearing and

taking in what he’s saying – WITHOUT trying to make sense of it in your mind, or
interpret it.

You’re just hearing and taking in, just “there,” and you’re doing nothing but maybe
nodding your head, grunting, smiling, saying “wow,” or “cool,” or whatever comes
naturally to your body when you’re paying attention in a relaxed way.

• All right, now let’s reverse it. Listeners, talk about yourself, or something that
happened to you, or something you’re thinking about, and pay absolutely no
attention to what your partner is doing or thinking. Talkers, now it’s your turn to
completely reverse the energy. Focus your complete attention over there, on your
partner.

• Okay – what did it feel like to listen like that? And what did it feel like to be listened
to like that? Could you tell the difference between Listening To Myself and Listening
To Him when you were doing it? Could you tell the difference when your partner was
doing it? Could you feel a difference in the way you were listening and being listened
to?

Exercise: Practice Listening To Him On Your Own

1. Put yourself in front of a mirror. Imagine that you, in the mirror, are going to hang
on every word you, in front of the mirror, say. Your mirror image will follow wherever
your thoughts go, giving you total attention.

2. Go ahead and talk about your day. Tell your image everything that happened to you
today – the emotion of it, the detail of it, what was important about it. Laugh, cry,
say whatever comes to mind. Pay little or no attention to your mirror image.

3. Now, when you finish up, think about how it felt to completely unload your mind
and heart while your mirror image did nothing but listen. She did not interject, offer
advice, even go uh-huh.

If you imagine that you in the mirror were listening intently and compassionately, you
may feel as heard, as light and unburdened as you would practicing with a partner.

Now, in order to reverse it, we’ll do without words altogether.

4. Look at yourself in the mirror, and become completely absorbed in your image’s
eyes, hair, nose, mouth, smile – with this important agreement: You must pretend
that this mirror image is someone else. In this way, you can look at the mirror
image’s hair and notice that it has gray in it, or curl, or a highlight, without thinking
about it.

In other words, as soon as you say to yourself Oh, I have to color my roots, you’ve
moved back to the Listening To Myself channel.

5. Your job is to observe with attention and compassion the qualities of the face in
front of you, and to commune instinctively with the emotions conveyed by the face
and the person in front of you. You are to forget that the image in the mirror is you.

Try this for a few minutes and see what it feels like. It may feel like a mental vacation.
A moment to observe and feel without thinking. Without bringing your observations
back to yourself.

Now take what you’ve experienced and practice it out in the world.

I encourage you to practice, practice, practice. Practice with your date, your boyfriend or
your husband, your children, your friends, your relatives, and total strangers.

Practice and notice when you go back to Listening To Myself mode. The more you practice,
the more you catch yourself on the Listening To Myself channel and switch over, the more
natural it will become to Listen To HIM. You’ll be amazed at how a man responds and begins
to feel attracted to being around you.

Key 5

Express The Feminine

Your emotions are the most alluring thing about you to nearly any man.
They’re your biggest asset when it comes to attracting a man and making him
fall for you.

Emotions make you irresistible and powerful.
In this key, you’ll learn how to identify your emotions, how to put them
into words, how to request and negotiate, and how to express yourself in a
way that connects with his heart.

Chapter 14

Getting Your Needs Met

“You make me want to be a better man.” (Jack Nicholson, from As Good As It Gets)

Respecting and receiving love from the masculine inspires a man to want to treat you like
his queen. Now that you’ve stopped trying to control and manage him, and you’re no longer
being critical but instead you’re appreciating
him for all his good qualities, a shift occurs.

He begins to feel confident about his ability
to make you happy, and he wants to be
the man who can make your dreams come
true. He feels good about your relationship
because you’re Supporting the Team. He sees
you making the needs of the relationship a
priority.

You’ve stopped steering the boat and
Overfunctioning, and he’s able to step up and
be the man that he wants to be for you, deep
down. He no longer feels like a child because
you’re no longer doing everything for him and
telling him what to do. Because you spend
a great deal of time in Listening To HIM mode, he feels heard and is wanting to share even
more of himself with you.

But does he know what you want and need in order to be happy?

I’ve already demonstrated how NOT to communicate your needs. After working with the
first Key, you’re perhaps no longer anchored in a place of complaint, judgment, negativity
and criticism, and you’ve learned how to practice loving yourself completely and letting go of
limiting beliefs – about love and about him.

In this Key #5, you’ll learn a way to express your needs, dislikes and desires so that he
feels compelled to give you everything you want. You’ll learn how to express yourself in a
completely feminine-energy way, which is magnetic to a man. Rather than shutting down
or becoming defensive, or withdrawing, a man will feel curious about you and want to get
closer. He’ll want to know what it is you’re feeling and he’ll want to make sure that he can do
what it takes to be your hero.

This is the power of expressing the feminine. It connects with his heart in a way that is
natural, authentic and without pretense or drama. You simply get in touch with what you’re
feeling and what you need, you express it in a way that compels him instead of pushing him
away, and he’ll move mountains to honor and love you.

This is the Key that brings it all home and gets you the relationship you’ve always wanted –
full of adoration, affection, honesty, authenticity and respect.

But first, you have to know what it is you’re feeling and know what it is you want – in order
to express yourself to him.

How To Know What You Really Feel

The feminine is all about feelings. Expressing the feminine is about expressing feelings in
order to get your needs met. It’s not about doing, or controlling, or managing. It’s simply
about expressing how you feel at any given time and compelling a man to treat you well
because you’ve communicated what you want and what you don’t want, in a feminine
feeling-based way.

The first step to expressing feelings is to know what it is you’re feeling.

Finding authentic feelings sounds simple, but it’s not. Most of what we think of as feelings
are just learned, habitual patterns of covering up our real feelings. Sometimes we think we’re
mad, when really we’re hurt. Or we’re embarrassed, but covering it up.

Sometimes we think we feel hurt and we really want to tell our husbands and boyfriends
we’re hurt, when actually we’re simply frustrated at our inability to control our men’s
behavior and the course of the relationship.

We think we feel one way, but the reality is that we’re masking what we really feel. We
think we’re angry, but the real feeling is one of disappointment. We think we feel insulted,
but if we stop to admit it to ourselves we’re really very sad. Annoyance may be annoyance,
or it may be that we’re feeling anxious about an outcome.

He’s late for a date again and we lash out with sarcasm or tell ourselves we’ve “had it” with
his flippant treatment of us. We think we’re angry, but if we dig deeper we find that we’re
really scared – scared of being rejected, of being unloved and of being alone.

This distraction from the truth of what we’re experiencing and what we need is something
we’re working and practicing to stop by staying in touch with our real feelings. Not only do
we need to learn to discover and unearth our real feelings, we need to learn to express them
in ways our husbands and boyfriends can hear.

Tool: Finding The Feelings

We’re going to start small. Let’s try this simple technique right now for getting in
touch with feelings:

1. Shake out your arms and legs.

2. Now stand or sit still. Settle yourself down into yourself. You can keep your eyes
open or closed.

3. Breathe – when you exhale, let sound come out. Imagine the chatter in your
head dropping down into your body. Imagine it dissolving as the energy from all
the noise in your head comes down, into your neck, into your heart, into your
stomach, into your pelvis.

4. Breathe into your body as low as you can, and let the breath fill the space of
your body more and more. Feel yourself expand to accommodate the energy and
let it fill the space more and more. Thank your body for expanding.

5. Ask yourself for a feeling. Keep asking, until you get an answer that’s an emotion
or a sensation – the basic emotions are: Mad, sad, glad and afraid. And then
there’s terror, anguish, joy, sexual excitement, silliness, embarrassment – anything
that has to do with you and no one else. A sensation could be “My stomach feels
tight. My body feels cold. My chest feels in knots.”

Did you locate a feeling or a sensation? Keep practicing this at different times when
you’re feeling different emotions.

Chapter 15

Expressing Your Feelings

“Every criticism, judgment, diagnosis, and expression of anger is the tragic expression of an unmet need.”
(Marshall Rosenberg, author of Non-Violent Communication)

Most of us are just fine stuffing down our feelings. Until we can’t be silent anymore and
finally try to give voice to the feelings.

What we’re feeling comes out all haywire.
We try to express ourselves and say how we
feel, but instead we accuse, complain, whine
and create drama. Our husbands, boyfriends
and dates are unprepared to deal with our
lashing out. They feel criticized, belittled, and
helpless.

Instead of wanting to address our needs,
they get defensive and back away. Then we
get angry because we don’t feel heard.

The truth is, often, we can’t be heard
because we’re not really expressing a feeling.

Instead, what we’re expressing is an opinion,
a need, a request for help. And often we’re
telling them exactly what would solve our frustration and discontent. In effect, we’re telling
them to do something. We’re again managing and controlling. And they can’t hear that.

We believe this is helpful information for them. We believe we’re expressing ourselves, but
we’re actually either attacking them or telling them what to do. Either way, what your mate
or date will most likely do is shut down.

If your man is shutting down during discussions, he’s becoming flooded with emotion.
He’s overwhelmed by it. Believe it or not, he is much more sensitive than you are to
emotion, and past a certain point, he shuts down. It’s not his fault. It’s the way men are
built.

But men can learn to handle your feelings. Instinctively, they want to cherish your feelings.
They’re constitutionally able to love it when you express your feelings. They can even handle
you crying or screaming. It’s all about the language you use, and the authenticity with which

you use it.

Men can hear real feelings – they can hear you cry, and say ouch, they can hear that you’re
really angry. They want to know what’s going on inside us, because that’s their connection to
the expression of feeling – through intimacy with us – and they want us to be happy.

Synchronicity Between Feelings And Body Language

It’s important to men that what we say and the expression on our faces match our real
feelings. If you’ve ever seen anyone smile when they’re really angry, you know how difficult
that is to understand and relate to.

You can’t fake how you’re feeling on the inside by the way you’re holding your body
language. That FEELS fake to a man, and it puts him on edge. Your shoulders are tense and
your lips are pursed, but you’re telling him that “you’re fine” and you feel relaxed. When
your shoulders are tense and you tell him that you’re feeling angry, that makes sense to
him and his curiosity is piqued. Instead of pulling away, he asks to know more: Why are you
angry?

It may have nothing to do with him, but if you shrug off your feeling and your body
betrays what’s really going on inside you, he won’t know that. He’ll take it personally, and
it will completely mess up the vibe between you.

Don’t pretend or try to be nice – if you’re feeling angry or hurt, express it. He can tell that
you’re upset. Smiling and pretending you feel fine isn’t just inauthentic, and therefore not
intimate – it’s confusing. He can tell your insides and outside don’t match. What you want
is congruency – matching up your words, your feelings, your expression and your body-
language – so there’s no doubt where you’re coming from.

It’s also important for us to get our feelings out as they come up – not just for
communication’s sake, but for our own health. Bottled-up feelings make us sick.

If your interactions are ending with you becoming upset and your man shutting down and
withdrawing – over and over again – it’s a sign that you’re not expressing your feelings, or
you’re not doing it in a way he can hear. If you express yourself in a productive way, which
you’ll learn about in the next section, you’ll experience a complete turnaround in how he
responds to you.

Making It About You, Not Him

One of the common mistakes that most of us women make when beginning this process of
expressing our feelings is that instead of putting words to the basic feeling, we take whatever
is happening and make it about the man. We make a judgment call about something he did
or didn’t do. The words are meant as an attack instead of an expression of our feelings.

For example, you may say, “I can’t stand it when you show up late. What are you thinking?
It’s like you don’t care!”

Even if you’re infuriated and enraged with something he did, talk only about you – your
feelings and sensations.

You may want to say instead, “I’ve been sitting here alone for an hour. I am feeling enraged
right now. And I feel humiliated.”

This is the same situation, and the same basic feelings are behind what transpired, but in
the first example you’re making it about him and criticizing him, and in the second you’re
only expressing what you’re feeling without referring to him or his behavior at all. It’s all
about YOU – what you’re feeling and experiencing.

In this way, you’ve stopped all forms of control and criticism, and instead you’re embodying
the feelings you’re experiencing and expressing them. This is accessing and using your
feminine energy instead of the thinking, judging and managing qualities of masculine energy.

By not criticizing or making it about him, you’re allowing him to hear you. When you
express yourself in a blaming and critical way, you put him on the defensive by making him
wrong – so he withdraws, shuts you out, and often acts as if he hasn’t heard a word you
said.

I want to encourage you to practice trusting that he can hear you. I promise you that over
time, he will. As you learn to express feelings as they come up, there will be less and less
anger stored up and less and less venting in the relationship.

Tool: Feeling Messages

Now I’m going to ask you to begin expressing your feelings in Feeling Messages. Try
beginning with “I feel…” or “I like the way this feels,” or “I don’t like the way this
feels.” These are very helpful starter words. Write down what comes to you.

I feel…

...

...

Most of the time, this is all you want and need to do – express feelings in words.

I know that sounds unbelievable, but it’s true. You express your feelings, and give him a
chance to respond.

But sometimes you actually want something – maybe more of what you already have, or
you’re not content and want something different. Sometimes you want your husband or
boyfriend to do something for you. And most important – sometimes you just don’t want
something.

Getting What You Need

A big mistake we women make is in answering the question What do you want? with
something along the lines of I wish he would… You can fill in the blank with a lot of things
– pay more attention to me, take out the garbage, listen to me, take better care of himself,
be a better lover, stop watching sports on TV, tell me he loves me, tell me how he sees our
relationship… and on and on.

Wanting someone else to change and do something is controlling energy. It’s masculine
energy. You learned in previous Keys how this kind of energy has a destructive impact on
your relationship because it’s an absolute turn-off to a man.

Instead of telling a man how you want him to behave or what you want him to do or stop
doing, you want to share instead what you want or don’t for yourself.

If you want affection, say I want affection, not I want you to be more affectionate. One is
about your needs and the other is telling him what you want him to do. When you state your
needs simply, you give him the chance to step up and fulfill your needs.

Remember, he wants to please you. It makes him feel good about himself. He just
doesn’t want to be managed into it. He wants to have the choice and space to figure it out
for himself.

Express your needs simply:

I want more rest, I want sex, I want peace of mind, I want to be married, I want kids, I want
to feel good.

Or – even more important for communication – it could be a “don’t want”: I don’t want to
worry about money, I don’t want to clean the house, or type letters, or wash dishes by myself,
or be alone night after night, I don’t want to wait for you, I don’t have sex unless I’m in an
exclusive relationship…

This is very powerful – saying “no” to what you don’t want. I use this more than anything
in my household. It makes me feel empowered, and yet is completely about me. There’s
no confrontation, no bad feelings, no attacking. I’m not saying You’re terrible with money,
you don’t help around the house, you don’t do the dishes, you’re away too much, you’re just
interested in sex.

I’m just saying “no.”

Do you see the difference?

The Importance Of Saying “No”

The challenge for most of us in saying “no” to anyone – our children, salespeople, our
friends, our boss, our men – is the fear and guilt we have about disappointing anyone.
Anyone at all.

We’re afraid they won’t like us anymore. Afraid they’ll leave us. Afraid they’ll be angry.
Many of us cannot stand any kind of conflict. We cannot tolerate anyone else’s discomfort,
especially on our behalf. We must learn to say “no” in a simple, straightforward and
respectful way – one baby step at a time. One small “no” at a time.

If this book can help you to say, in simple, direct words, and with simple, authentic feeling,
what you do not want to do and what you do not want in your life – your life will change
completely, inside and out, without any major conflicts, upsets, or dramatic confrontations. I
know it’s possible. I’ve done it myself.

Learning to say “no” is one of the clearest messages of self-esteem and self-love a
woman can express. It’s one of the most attractive qualities any woman can possess. A
woman who can say “no” is a woman a man can trust.

The essence of feminine energy in a relationship is vulnerability and authenticity. Allowing
yourself to be seen exactly as you are.

Tool: Saying What You Don’t Want

Even if you believe you have self-esteem issues, even if you’re really angry, you can
start small by expressing a small authentic feeling or sensation. This will make you
feel braver for the next time, and pretty soon you’ve built a new habit. And your self-
esteem will go up.

You can see that this is way more profound than wanting your husband or boyfriend
to take the garbage out.

And though it may seem to you easier to just ask, over and over again, for him to take
the garbage out, the truth is – that doesn’t work.

Take some feelings you’ve written down from the first exercise and turn them into
expressions of Don’t Wants:

I feel...

...

...

I don’t want...

...

...

I feel...

...

...
I don’t want...

...

...
Now we’re going to learn how to put the skills of discovering your feelings, expressing
them and saying “no,” to specific ways of communicating your needs and getting them met.

Chapter 16

Getting Your Needs Met Through Negotiation

“It is better to break one’s heart than to do nothing with it.” (Margaret Kennedy)

How can feelings be used to bring you closer to a man and get you what you want?

Through the art of negotiation.

Negotiation in this context is not about
conducting a business meeting where two
parties come to the table with conflicting
agendas. The way I define negotiation is
simply communicating to a man what you feel,
what you want and don’t want, and allowing
him to make the decision about what to do
about it.

Negotiating in this context puts the impetus
for a solution on him. It does not require you
to come up with the solutions and alternatives
for him. It makes the space for him to do the
planning, thinking and doing in response to
your feelings and desires.

The key to negotiating is to know that you can’t make someone else do what you want
them to do. You can’t control anyone else, and trying to do so just creates conflict and
tension.

Respecting your partner by not trying to manipulate him into giving you what you want is
crucial to setting the relationship right. It takes a lot of self-control to keep from doing every
clever thing you can think of to get your way.

As soon as your partner starts getting that you are not going to try to bully or manipulate
him, he’ll surprise you by beginning to act in a more caring way – more like a man.

***A note: Even if what you’re expressing is a simple desire – “I want to go mountain
climbing,” “I want to go to Paris,” “I want a big house,” the first thing his mind may go to is
that you’re not happy.

And he wants you to be happy. He may instantly try to talk you out of your desire. Perhaps
because he’s used to being on the defensive.

Let’s look at the elements of a negotiation for a woman who chooses to be the feminine-
energy partner:

1. Timing

One of the biggest mistakes women make is picking a bad time to talk. If you’re not sure –
ask. Make an appointment. I would love to speak with you about something. Is now a good
time?

Men have a difficult time multi-tasking. If you catch them at a time when they’re focused
on work or another project, it may be counterproductive to try getting him to “switch gears”
and listen to you. He needs to finish what he’s doing and be able to focus on you completely.

2. Start with a feeling

Take a breath and express your feelings and your “want” or “don’t want.” This will put him
less on the defensive and compel him to want to listen to you.

Remember this is an expression of feeling – which is totally different from an accusation, or
a statement of how disappointed you are in him.

3. Ask him what he thinks

“Thinking” is masculine energy, and it is what masculine-energy men love doing naturally.
They’re problem solvers and thinkers, and being able to tell you what he thinks makes him
feel empowered. It gives him the chance to be your hero, because now he can do what he’s
good at in order to please you. He isn’t feeling defensive or criticized, because you’re simply
telling him how you’re feeling and asking him for his opinion on how to make things better.

Here’s the script:

I feel…... What do you think?

I don’t want… What do you think?

I don’t like….What do you think we should do?

This is the way all these kinds of interactions should go. You express, and ask what he
thinks. Sooner or later he’ll catch on, he’ll step up to the plate by being pro-active and
interested in fulfilling your needs. He’ll feel like a “real man” because he’ll have the chance
to meet your needs using his masculine, thinking, doing energy, which will boost his self-
esteem. And he’ll adore you for it!

Putting words to your feelings, “wants,” and “don’t wants” will help him know what to do
to please you. Keep in mind – he may be so used to being told about his shortcomings that
he’s built a wall to keep himself from hearing you at all.

Be prepared by committing to communicating as simply and authentically as possible.
If you can, try starting with very small “don’t wants” – about everyday movies and dinner
destinations. Save the big discussions for when you’ve built some experience, trust and ease

into the negotiating process.

Remember that men are easily overloaded. They get flooded and shut down when they
can’t handle all the emotional input. So take it slow. Start easy. Start small.

Masculine energy wants results. Feminine energy is not about results. You are about
expressing. You’re going to have to have faith that the results you really want and need will
happen – but for now, forget all about having a goal in mind. I know this is the opposite of
everything you’ve ever heard. Forget goal setting. Forget results. Just express.

4. Listening To Him

You’ve asked him what he thinks. He answers. Listen to him in Listening To Him mode.

5. Resolving

Sometimes there’s a plan you can agree to, sometimes it’s left hanging. Learn to live with
lack of closure. If you learn to accept uncertainty and the fact that not everything will always
be buttoned down and handled just when you want it to be, you’ll open yourself up to some
wonderful surprises.

6. Saying “No”

Sometimes the plan he’s come up with, even after consulting and considering your feelings,
isn’t what you want, and you have to say “no.” For the feminine-energy partner, saying “no”
is the balance to the masculine-energy partner’s decision making.

Don’t say “no” lightly. But if you have to, stick to your guns. Don’t be wishy-washy because
you’re afraid of angering your husband or boyfriend or date or of making him unhappy. It
is not your responsibility as the feminine-energy partner to concern yourself with whether
your man is happy when you express your feelings. It’s the masculine-energy partner’s job to
care about your feelings.

What If He’s Making Decisions Without Considering Your Feelings?

If your man is not consulting and considering your feelings before making decisions, you
must negotiate this!

This can happen whether you’re just dating or if you’re married. An example may be that
he assumes you are available and interested in attending a party or social function to which
he’s received an invitation. He doesn’t consult you first before responding for both of you.
You feel put upon and disregarded. It’s not that you don’t want to go, it’s that you want your
time and needs to be considered before he makes decisions that concern you. You want to
tell him how you feel and negotiate the situation so that he honors your feelings.

Start with finding out if it’s a good time to talk. If it is, you might say, “I’m feeling
uncomfortable. Something’s really bothering me, and it’s something that’s important to me.
I want to be a part of the process when you’re making a decision that concerns both of us. I

don’t want to be left out. What do you think we should do?”

Negotiations are at the heart of your relationship. It’s what “good communication” is all
about, and much of the time a tiny little addition to your communication skill set can make a
huge difference.

Now it’s time to practice what you’ve just learned about negotiation.

Exercise: Negotiating Conflict

Imagine a common conflict between you and a man. Imagine how it might play out
using these negotiation tools. Write down the conversation.

If you’re not happy how the imagined conversation goes, try a different approach with
the I feel, I want, I don’t want… what do you think? script. Practicing the negotiation
steps, even if just on paper, will help you keep a cool head and communicate your
feelings clearly when sticky situations come up with your man in real life.

Knowing what to say to a man and when – and practicing speaking the truth to him
without frills or explanations – can spark romance where you thought it was gone, turn on
love where you thought you’d lost it, and fire up a beginning relationship.

Talking to a man may not seem like the “sexiest thing” – and it actually can be that.

Talking can create a sense of safety in a man that excites him to open himself up to you in
emotional places he’s kept shut down his whole life.

Knowing how to express your feelings and needs in this way can make the difference
between arguing together and laughing together.

In the next chapter, we’ll learn more about scripting, and how it can create a pathway for
anger – so it becomes a force for good in your relationship instead of a destroyer of it.

Chapter 17

How To Choose Words

Speak from your heart to his heart instead of from your mind to his mind. (Rori Raye)

Learning how to express your feelings in a way a man can hear and respond to means
replacing certain habitual words and phrases with ones that put the emphasis on your
needs, not his shortcomings.

So far, you’ve learned how to access what
you’re really feeling, and you’ve come to
understand that communicating in a way
that tries to control a man’s behavior is not
an effective way of getting what you want.
You now know the power that comes with
expressing feelings, negotiating your needs,
and giving a man the opportunity to step up
and be the man he really wants to be for you.

You may not know all the ways you’re
still engaging in what I call Control Speak
with a man. Control Speak is based on
words and phrases that are actually ways
of manipulating, controlling or making
suggestions to a man about what he should do. Control Speak is masculine energy!

The chart in this chapter will help you change the words you use when you talk to men,
and it will help you change the thoughts you think. Re-read it often and practice with
everyone you talk to, and see how fast it becomes easy and automatic.

Whenever you hear yourself being concerned with something in column one – Control
Speak – pull your thoughts down from your head and into your body. Breathe. Try to focus
on what you’re feeling in the pit of your stomach.

Use the words in column two – Surrender Speak – to verbalize what you feel. Even if it’s as
basic as mad, sad, glad or afraid – getting the words out will clear the air between you and
any man. And even more important: Releasing the energy of pent-up emotions will allow you
to feel more relaxed, more in tune with yourself, your body and your spirit.

Translating Your Thoughts Into Words

Control Speak Surrender Speak

This column is about him – so it’s his business This is about me – so it’s
only; my business;
it’s not my business, it’s about being vulnerable and real;
and it’s off limits to me it’s the way to go
Why is he doing that?
I feel mad, sad, glad, afraid, scared, angry, happy,
What is he doing? disconnected, confused, shaky, uncomfortable,
What is he feeling? weird, upset, lonely, tired, exhausted
What are you feeling?
What do you mean? “
I’ll bet I know why he’s depressed, angry, tired,
quiet, etc. “
Oh, he’s just…..
Oh, men are just like that “
There’s so much tension between us… He must
be… mad, upset, having childhood memories, etc. “
Why does he always have to do that?
You never listen to me! “
I need you to do this or that
What if we (you) did that? Can we (you) please do “
that?
“
Why didn’t you call me?
What’s going on with our relationship? “

Not noticing when he does something nice “

“

I don’t want to do this, what do you think?

I don’t want to go there, do that, see that, feel
this, feel that, listen to this, be there, be here,
stand here, tolerate this, have this, worry about
this, think about this, take charge of this, plan this
–what do you think?

Nothing

I don’t want that kind of relationship, what do
you think?

Thank you. I like that tie, I like how you look, I
love this restaurant, I feel so good here, I feel so
good with you, that feels so good, etc.

I want you to pick me up, open my door, etc. I’m old-fashioned. I don’t feel comfortable
Add your own here… meeting men, calling men, planning dates, etc.

Chapter 18

Vulnerability

“I only know the answer doesn’t lie in learning how to protect yourself from life. It lies in learning how to
strengthen yourself so you can let a bit more of it in.” (Merle Shain)

Now we’re moving to the part where it gets really scary and really exciting. Once you set
boundaries, once you stop controlling and start appreciating and expressing your feelings,
you’re going to feel exposed and vulnerable.

That’s how it’s supposed to be.

And that’s what’s at the bottom of all that
controlling.

We’re so terrified of being vulnerable and
exposed, so terrified of being intimate, of
being committed and close, that we run in the
other direction. We feel compelled to control
everything in the relationship.

That’s why we pick losers, or men we’re not
really attracted to, or men who don’t want us,
or are not ready for a relationship, or no men
at all – or push away the men we have who’ve
already demonstrated their commitment to us
by marrying us.

If having boundaries means standing up for yourself in a simple, straightforward and
respectful way, Surrender is about melting.

If you’re dating, it’s even scarier because you have no way of knowing what’s going
to happen. You have no way of knowing whether you have a future with this man. By
surrendering, you’re saying you can’t control the outcome and you’re not going to try.

Exercise: Surrendering In Practice

Here are some powerful questions for you to think about and write about: