Doing Things For Others

"Hi my problem is that my boyfriend always thinks he needs to do stuff for his women friends.I have men friends and i don't do anything for then because i don't want to disrepect him in anyway possible"

Our mothers tried to raise us to be that way, the way THEY think men should be toward women. Society also influences us to be helpful to women. Come to think of it, all the self-improvement books I've read tell us we should do things for other people with no expectation of anything in return if we want to be happy.

If you want to be happy, go ahead and do helpful things for other men you know. I don't think it's disrespectful toward your boyfriend and if he thinks it is, then that's HIS problem.

I'm in a 12 step program and one thing I learned both there and in some pretty good self-improvement books is if I get upset about something someone else says or does, I'M the one at fault. It's what's going on inside ME, not them, that causes my discomfort. It's my reaction to the world around me, not the world around me, that makes me uncomfortable.

I'm re-reading a fun little book someone gave me years ago, back in a time when I wasn't ready to accept anything anyone else said unless they agreed with me. And I thought all this stuff about how to be happy was a bunch of caca. Well, NOW I find the book enjoyable and enlightening. It's called simply: "Being Happy" by Andrew Mathews. Andrew is a cartoonist, along with being a writer and speaker, so the book has some cute cartoons in it to illustrate his points. If you can find it, buy it!

I'm going to pass on something I've read more than once, this comment regarding the message quoted above that started this post. Notice how this lady ("anonymous" was the only name on her comment) doesn't capitalize "i" except when it's beginning a sentence? I've been told by experts that's a sign of low self-esteem or self-respect. Like when a person does that it's because they don't think they're worthy of a capital "I". I always thought it was just that the person is too lazy to hit the shift key! Maybe it's a combination: the person doesn't consider him/herself worth his/her OWN effort!

Comments welcome. Or email me at coach@man2woman.net