Pre-Guy Panel Thoughts.

We're having our second Guy Panel next week. This happens at a Wow meeting. The ladies meet for potluck and then the guys show up and I ask them questions that the ladies have given to me ahead of time. It's a time for us to learn about each other, both the ladies learning about men and the guys learning about the ladies.

I wonder if I'll ever understand men. I like to think that all humans must think with the same reasoning, but it just doesn't seem to be this way with men and women. It's like we're looking at things in life from different angles or using words that have different meaning or something, I don't know. I remember hearing someone say that women have to feel close to a man to want to have sex and that guys use sex to feel close, so actually that's quite the opposite reasoning. It's difficult to have healthy relationships with the oppositive sex if we don't understand each other so I spend a lot of time trying to figure it all out.

From what I've heard, the guys are not so sure they understand women either. There are guys out there who want to do nice things for their women, like opening doors and buying them gifts, but some of the women don't like that, like they want to feel powerful themselves and having someone make these gestures for them makes them feel submissive or something. Some of us ladies have taken seminars and read books about men and dating and try to practice what we've been taught, like not making the first move or waiting for the guy to start a conversation or not calling a guy that they like, and the guys don't know what to make of this behavior. Men think of rejection as the end of the world, so they're even less inclined to make a move toward a women they find attractive nowadays if they think she turn them down or make it tough for them. So we do what we think we should do to attract and keep a man and it works the opposite way for us.

So the Guy Panel is an attempt to understand each other and maybe break down some of the things that keep us apart. I remember the first Guy Panel and that the result was finding out that the guys just really want to have a nice woman in their lives so they can love and be loved. It's really so simple that I wonder if all the seminars and self-help books have complicated the whole thing. Maybe if we go back to just being ourselves, treating each other respectfully and with kindness, we can make better and deep connections and spend our time loving each other, rather than trying to play games that we hope will work and don't.

OK, if you have questions for the Guy Panel, something about men that you'd like the guys to discuss, send them to me. Either click comment at the end of this post and write them there or email them to me at wowthatellen@yahoo.com. I promise to post the answers after the meeting. Even if I don't understand them.....