Serenity
Moderator
Women don't want weak men, they also don't want men who are emotionally closed off.
To show emotion is to expose vulnerability, it can be used to hurt you because it matters to you. If you never show vulnerability then it seems like you can't be hurt, right? True, but why is this a bad thing? It also means you don't have emotion, that you don't care about anything, including her. If you have no heart, if there is no good in you, then she's not safe.
Strength is important, but it seemingly collides with being vulnerable, exposing one's own weakness. That is one perspective, but another is that the entire point of strength is to protect what you care about from anything that seeks to destroy it.
There are guys out there who are plenty strong both in mind and body, but have no heart. There are also plenty guys out there with heart, but with little to protect it. Then there's the guys who shamelessly shows the world who they are while also standing up for themselves and others.
Women want the man who is able to care, but also capable of protecting what he cares about.
I see far too often ways of thinking where one attribute comes at the expense of the other. Being a strong cold-hearted badass or being a softie that will bend to anyone. Like with many things in life, the answer is somewhere in the middle of the extremes.
The entire purpose of strength is to protect if you're anywhere on the good side of the moral spectrum. If you're on the bad side it's obviously to conquer, but even then the woman needs to feel like she's cared for, that the strength applied isn't used against her.
Being vulnerable is hard, harder than many things. It actually takes a type of strength to expose it willingly, emotional strength. Being capable of dealing with the bad outcomes of sharing vulnerable information about oneself in ways where it doesn't cause harm, or at least minimal harm.
Women see enough physically strong guys, they also see plenty of intellectually strong guys, but the emotionally strong guy is actually a bit rare. The guy who can be vulnerable without letting anyone break him by trying to use his vulnerabilities against him.
Ultimately strength and vulnerability aren't two opposing attributes, they're independent and both can be increased without one being at the expense of the other.
To show emotion is to expose vulnerability, it can be used to hurt you because it matters to you. If you never show vulnerability then it seems like you can't be hurt, right? True, but why is this a bad thing? It also means you don't have emotion, that you don't care about anything, including her. If you have no heart, if there is no good in you, then she's not safe.
Strength is important, but it seemingly collides with being vulnerable, exposing one's own weakness. That is one perspective, but another is that the entire point of strength is to protect what you care about from anything that seeks to destroy it.
There are guys out there who are plenty strong both in mind and body, but have no heart. There are also plenty guys out there with heart, but with little to protect it. Then there's the guys who shamelessly shows the world who they are while also standing up for themselves and others.
Women want the man who is able to care, but also capable of protecting what he cares about.
I see far too often ways of thinking where one attribute comes at the expense of the other. Being a strong cold-hearted badass or being a softie that will bend to anyone. Like with many things in life, the answer is somewhere in the middle of the extremes.
The entire purpose of strength is to protect if you're anywhere on the good side of the moral spectrum. If you're on the bad side it's obviously to conquer, but even then the woman needs to feel like she's cared for, that the strength applied isn't used against her.
Being vulnerable is hard, harder than many things. It actually takes a type of strength to expose it willingly, emotional strength. Being capable of dealing with the bad outcomes of sharing vulnerable information about oneself in ways where it doesn't cause harm, or at least minimal harm.
Women see enough physically strong guys, they also see plenty of intellectually strong guys, but the emotionally strong guy is actually a bit rare. The guy who can be vulnerable without letting anyone break him by trying to use his vulnerabilities against him.
Ultimately strength and vulnerability aren't two opposing attributes, they're independent and both can be increased without one being at the expense of the other.