Selective Listening: Husbands sometimes seem distracted or not fully attentive during conversations.

Yeah. 100%.

Sorry.

We only have so much bandwidth. We can only listen for so long.

I have this whole clip (1 minute) on TikTok about “Meadow Reports” and what's her point?

Masculine listens for “what's the point, what's the problem, what's the data, what's the transaction, what's the packet that's being communicated?”

Not:

“here's the context of what I feel and what I think and what I need and what I want and what I desire and what I dream. And here's where I'm at so you know where we are and we have consensus. Hey, thanks for listening.”

And can be a 10-minute conversation and he stopped listening after four because he's like, “Okay, what's the problem? What's the point?”

Well, we went to this place (data point)
and did this thing (data point)
with these people (data point)
and there was this food involved (data point)
And then it made you think (data point)
of that one time in college (data point)
when you, with your friend and… (data point)

And he’s attempting to catalogue:

She’s talking about this place

No, this thing

No, these people

No, food

No, all of that made her think, about what?

OH, that one time in college, which time?

Oh, no – the one with her, her friend, and…

And he's fried yo.

You just nested so seven different things in one sentence, to START the conversation and he’s just done!

So have mercy! Please!

We’re bears of little brains! (bonus points if you catch that reference).

Tell us what you need from us, and we’ll dial it in. “Hey babe, I need you to listen for five minutes.”

Or, “I need you to listen for 10 minutes. I got this thing I just wanna tell you. And at the end of it, I want you to say, wow, that's a lot. You're amazing.”

If you do that for him, he can listen to you longer, he can listen tighter.

Guys need to understand that feminine communication is typically about communicating context, gaining consensus, informing of feelings, dreams, desires, nice to haves, want to haves, ways to enhance experienced, make things better…

But a lot of times, especially masculine in kingdom building mode (aka Prince), he loves you and his data banks are full and he's brain dead, and he doesn't even realize he's brain dead.

And sometimes you're gonna have to, “Honey, oh – you’re not full dialed in. Got it. I’ve lost you. I'll come back and do this at a better time.”

And when you call it out, he’ll possibly get upset – mostly at himself, thinking “Ah, shit, I failed with her. I meant to be more available.”

So ask for his availability, ask him to make time for you as a priority: “Hey, I need, I need 10 minutes of your time. I’ve got something I need to vent about, when are you available? Or when would you be available?”

And then give him a moment to answer, and he will.

Just please allow that his “moment” and your “moment” are a bit different.

He’s got to go to his mental well, lower the bucket, consider what all is going on and do his very best to give you THE best answer, just not “any answer to fill the space” – if you ask him a question, then he doesn’t answer fast enough so you throw out a multiple choice – he’s got to process your options against what he was thinking of, and it slows down his answer.

So, give him a moment and that way, when he says he can clear his calendar, clear his heart and mind – he’ll be 100% present for you, and nothing else will exist as he listens to you, fully. Maybe the two of you can go for a short walk together, hold hands and talk about whatever's going on.

Masculine needs to chunk and compartmentalize because that's how we operate.

It's, it's the thing I gotta go kill and until it's dead, it's still gonna be weighing on my heart or weighing on my mind until I’ve killed it. And he doesn’t WANT to make you a think that has to be addressed in a similar way, so working with him makes everything easier.

Selective Listening

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