Men, Logic, and Emotions

Due to the way men and women are raised differently in society, men are often taught to think more and feel less.

This does not mean men don’t experience emotions. It simply means that our ability to recognize and process our feelings is significantly underdeveloped.

It's like a child who stopped learning a subject early in life, and therefore their knowledge and understanding of that subject did not progress. Even though that child is now a 30-something-year-old adult, their knowledge of the subject has remained frozen in time.

As a result, men rely far more on logic to process events in their lives, in others, and in the world. This is the natural outcome - if you use the same tool repeatedly, that tool will become stronger. In men, this manifests as an overtrained logical center.

Here is how a man, a perfectly logical man, might respond when hurt by a friend’s teasing comment: “Your haircut makes you look like poop”.

He might react with anger, frustration, irritation, passive aggressiveness, or even outright aggression by saying words like “How dare you say that!"

I believe true north can only be found by incorporating all our senses.

Let me illustrate with an example. To have the greatest meal of our lives, we would take in the dish visually, smell the ingredients, take a sip and let the flavour set in, hear the sound of utensils clanking in the background maybe in your home, or the loud whispers of people around you in a crowded restaurant. We soak in every element possible, and that’s how we have the greatest meal of our lives.

In the same way, to navigate life's experiences - to truly flow like water in a river, moving around the rocks, winding through  bends, between mountains, and sometimes even through them - we must embrace all our senses.

Both logic and emotion.

Here’s how a man, one who has embraced and trained both his logic and emotions, would respond to an unkind remark from a friend:

Hey man, I really like this haircut. It makes me feel good when I look at myself in the mirror.. And you’re a really good friend of mine, someone I look up to. So when you say something like that, it really hurts. It makes me feel upset, like I’m a fool or like I’m not respected by you. I know deep in your heart that you do like me and respect me. That’s why I’m telling you this, so you understand how your words made me feel. Because I know that you don’t actually want to hurt me.

I want to be this man.