Secrets About Men Every Woman Should Know

THE SOLUTION: HOW TO STOP COVERING UP YOUR COMPETENCE

1. Make a list of all of your talents, abilities, honors, accomplishments, and good qualities, and share this list with your partner. I’ve given this assignment to women in my seminars, and have heard some amazing stories about the results it produced. Many women report that just writing out their good qualities, abilities, and successes reminded them of things they’d completely forgotten and certainly never talked about with their partners. And the men report that they are surprised and delighted to discover more characteristics about their women to love.

2. Catch yourself not accepting compliments, putting yourself down, or minimizing your achievements, and practice CELEBRATING YOUR MAGNIFICENCE. You’ll be surprised to notice how often you make Mistake #4, and how much of an unconscious habit it’s become. Catch yourself in the act, and shift from covering up your excellence to celebrating yourself. The next time someone compliments you, take a deep breath and simply say, “Thank you!” Throw your false modesty out the window.

3. Look for a man who wants to let you shine. We all know there are men out there who, for a variety of reasons, don’t want to be with a woman who appears powerful or confident. It’s hard to celebrate yourself around someone who isn’t interested in seeing you shine. Make sure your partner supports you in becoming the magnificent woman you’re meant to be.

MISTAKE 5

Women Give Up Their Power to Men

I’m sad to say that the phrase “women give up their power to men” is, for many of us, redundant. As we’ve seen so far, throughout history a woman’s role has been to give her power away to a man, so it’s been more of an unfortunate fact of life than a mistake. I can tell you from experience that discovering how you give your power away to the men in your life, and learning how to stop doing it, will be one of the most important steps you can take toward creating healthy, loving relationships.

I have a name for those of us who give our power away to men, hoping they will love us more because of it: Love Martyrs. A martyr is a person who decides to make a personal sacrifice for a cause. In the case of women, we often sacrifice our self-respect, our sense of personal dignity and integrity, and our self-esteem in order to get a man to love us.

ARE YOU A LOVE MARTYR?

Here’s a quiz that will help you determine how serious a Love Martyr you are. It contains ten warning signs of a Love Martyr. You can take this quiz based on the relationship you are in now, one from the past, or your relationships with men in general. Grade yourself on each statement according to how frequently that statement applies to you.

Answer as honestly as you can. You may not like admitting some of this to yourself, but facing it is the first step toward changing it.

The Ten Warning Signs of a Love Martyr

1 You feel like you have to tiptoe around your partner to avoid upsetting or displeasing him.

2 You feel that your partner doesn’t always treat you with respect.

3 You act like a more confident, powerful person at work or with friends than you do around your partner.

4 You don’t feel safe or comfortable giving negative feedback to your partner.

5 You’re hesitant to ask your partner for what you want and need, and sometimes wonder if you are too “needy” or “insecure” anyway.

6 You feel that your partner treats you worse than you treat him.

7 When your partner isn’t behaving lovingly toward you, you tend to become more loving toward him in hopes of winning him over.

8 You feel you have to work to convince your partner of your rights for love, affection, equality, freedom, etc.

9 You often defend or make excuses, to yourself or others, for your partner’s behavior or your life situation.

10 You often feel angry at yourself for acting like a “wimp” around a man, but even though you vow never to do it again, you continue to allow yourself to be treated less lovingly than you deserve.

Now, total up your points.

80–100 points: Congratulations! You own your power around the men in your life, and usually don’t sacrifice who you are in order to be loved. To avoid future problems, work on those areas in which you had a lower score.

60–79 points: You’re not a full-blown Love Martyr, but you are giving up your power too often in certain areas of your relationships with men. Notice how you are letting fear of loss or disapproval keep you from asking for what you deserve from your partner. Work on loving yourself more and compromising less.

40–59 points: WARNING! Whether you want to admit it or not, you are a wimp when it comes to your relationships with men. You allow yourself to be treated badly, and don’t stick up for yourself. You’re such an expert at sacrificing for love that you’ve forgotten how it feels to be relaxed around a man. Follow the instructions in this chapter carefully, and start giving yourself some of the love you give so easily to men.

0–39 points: EMERGENCY! YOU’RE A PROFESSIONAL LOVE MARTYR. You probably have little or no self-respect left, considering how terribly you’re treated by the men in your life. Don’t expect to be loved until you start loving yourself. It’s time to get off the floor and act like a woman, and not a doormat! You need to take action NOW! Use the suggestions in this book, seek some personal counseling for extra support, stop sacrificing and start living with dignity again.

HOW WE DON’T MAINTAIN OUR DIGNITY AS WOMEN

All of these warning signs add up to the same thing: not maintaining your dignity as a woman. That means:

EACH TIME YOU GIVE YOUR POWER AWAY TO A MAN BY ALLOWING HIM TO TREAT YOU DISRESPECTFULLY OR UNLOVINGLY, YOU LOSE RESPECT AND LOVE FOR YOURSELF

This creates what I call a Negative Self-Esteem Cycle. Here’s how it works: You allow a man to get away with mistreating you – maybe he calls you names, or refuses to comfort you when you’re upset, or acts like an angry child when you try to talk about the relationship, or is insensitive to your feelings in some way. You don’t stick up for yourself, and this results in your feeling upset, depressed, and bad about yourself. When you feel bad about yourself, your self-confidence decreases. And when your self-confidence is low, the next time that man mistreats you, you will have even less courage to stand up for yourself, and the cycle repeats itself over and over.

The Negative Self-Esteem Cycle

There is only one way to break this endless cycle: Stand up for yourself and maintain your dignity; do not allow yourself to be treated with less love and respect than you know you deserve. When you do this, you feel good about yourself, and in turn, your self-confidence increases. The next time you aren’t treated well, you will own your power rather than giving it away.

ARE YOU COMFORTABLE WITH BEING MISTREATED BY MEN?

Have you ever bought a new car, driven it for the first time, and suddenly realized how difficult your old car was to drive?

Have you ever moved from one apartment or home to another, more spacious one, and suddenly realized how cramped your old place was?

Have you ever put on a new, comfortable pair of shoes and suddenly realized how uncomfortable the old pair was?

Whether you know it or not, you may be giving your power away to men and allowing yourself to be treated poorly in relationships because you are used to being treated that way As human beings we tend to become comfortable where we are, and often don’t realize the shortcomings of our situation until we are in a new one. All at once, we feel the contrast between the two pairs of shoes, or apartments, or cars, or relationships, and then we can admit to ourselves that we were uncomfortable before.

AS WOMEN WE ARE SO ACCUSTOMED TO NOT

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