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59 - Why “Just Tell Me What You Need” Can Make Her More Frustrated · Masculine Containment

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In my last solo episode, I talked about what happens and the dynamic around a wife saying, I feel like I have to do everything around here.
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Um...
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And there's a response that so many of us have as men that I had in my relationship that I think is important to talk about and actually break out of that conversation because this has come up in so many discussions that I've had with friends, with men in the brotherhood, with guys who are actually really legitimately trying to move their relationship forward, you know?
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God, there's this reflection online that I get over and over again about how men don't care and men are checked out and men use manipulation and control and they're used to getting their way and all these other things.
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And the reality is in so many cases.
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In all the cases I've spoken to, I've never met a man who's like, Alex, I'm trying to manipulate my wife.
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Or I'm just going to stay in this place of control.
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Or I'm just going to use these tactics to make her feel like she needs to do everything for me.
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Not once have I even encountered a man who is even close to that.
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I'm sure they're out there.
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I know there is.
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Just like when people tell me women are hysterical, manipulative, and all these other things.
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I'm sure there's women out there like that, but I haven't met a lot of them either.
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And...
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What I do see is people in relationships having challenges and trying to do everything they can to fix it.
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And often we get stuck around something like the issue that I'm going to talk about today.
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There's this dynamic that happens where often a partner, usually the woman, will say something like, I feel like I have to do everything around here.
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And as a man, we have this response that feels reasonable.
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It feels right.
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It feels like the right thing to do.
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We say, okay, just tell me what you need.
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And what that means to us, you know, and what that has meant to the men who share it with me is like, I'm listening.
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I'm willing.
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I'm not refusing to help.
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I'm here for you.
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I want to help you.
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I want to make things better.
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Tell me what needs to happen and I'll do it.
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And sometimes that's the right question.
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But sometimes what happened to me and what's happened to other guys that I've spoken with is that she gets even more irritated and more frustrated and upset with you and says things like, never mind, I'll just handle it or a lot worse things.
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And...
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you're thinking, are you effing kidding me?
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You're telling me you need help.
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I'm asking what you need.
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I'm here.
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I want to help you.
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And you're angry because I asked a question.
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And it starts feeling like there's no answer you can give that's right.
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And it also starts feeling like there's nothing you can do right.
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And so many couples get stuck right here.
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They get stuck in this place where this conflict happens.
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I feel like I'm doing everything.
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Tell me how I can help you.
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It escalates.
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It turns into a rupture.
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She's like frustrated with him.
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And then he's like, I'm not going to stay in this.
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So he withdraws from the situation, walks away.
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And there's this tension that is there sometimes for a little while, sometimes for hours, sometimes for days.
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I've had men and women tell me sometimes for weeks and sometimes for months, like after a while, these things really drive a relationship apart.
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I did an interview with Steve Anders.
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He was in a place where there was no intimacy, no connection in his relationship for months at a time.
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They walked around like roommates.
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It's issues like this that get us to that place where there's no connection for months at a time.
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And that's why I'm calling this out.
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That's why I'm bringing this out.
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Because...
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If you start feeling like there's no answer you can give right and there's nothing you can do that's going to fix it, it feels hopeless.
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And as men, we withdraw and we protect ourselves emotionally and we protect ourselves from the conflict and we just don't want to be in it.
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So we'll go do something else.
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And, you know, I've been there.
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I've been in that place of withdrawing.
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You know, anything else you're doing, you're thinking about what just happened.
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Or you're trying not to think about it, which means you're thinking about it anyway.
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And so with this specific issue of her getting frustrated around you asking how you can help, I want to unpack this and give you some strategies and help you understand why this happens.
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what I came to understand, not just in my relationship, but in those that I've been privileged to understand.
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And I want you to understand why this happens and what you can do about it and how you can see this a totally different way.
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Because what if her frustration is really not about what you asked, but what if it's about that she still has to carry
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the solution in order to answer your question and she doesn't feel like she's being met she doesn't feel like she's actually being supported and i know that sounds like contradictory but
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Here's what we need to understand as men is sometimes just tell me what you need feels supportive, but sometimes it feels like one more decision she has to make, one more thing she has to do.
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Here she's overwhelmed, and then it's tell me how to fix your overwhelm, and it just makes things worse.
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And I know.
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I know this doesn't feel fair and it doesn't feel right and it feels like I'm trying to help you, but let me see if I can help you so that if you're in this place where you've heard this or it's happened more than once or this is a pattern in your relationship, you can start solving it once in forever.
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And here's what I want to make very clear from the beginning
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is your wife is responsible for communicating with you.
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You're not supposed to read her mind.
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There's countless things you can't reasonably know unless she tells you.
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Her preferences, her emotional experiences, what's really happening with her, something that she wants right now, something that hurt her or frustrated her, upset her, something she has to change her mind about,
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or something she has changed her mind about, something happening internally that's invisible to you, asking questions is healthy.
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So this episode is not men should stop asking women what they need, and it certainly isn't men should start trying to read their wife's minds because here's what happens to so many guys when they're in this situation.
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It's so...
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challenging man I was there and when I talked to other men who are in this situation it's so so frustrating because here's what happens they start trying to do everything they start trying to fix everything do everything walk on eggshells make sure they're not misstepping make sure they're not doing anything wrong it's like I'm doing everything right I'm trying to do it all perfectly I'm trying to do everything I'm trying and that doesn't work as well and I'm
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So this is not about you not asking her what she needs.
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It's when the asking becomes the default response to things that are already visible around her, predictable, recurring, or should be mutually owned.
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So here's some examples.
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Like...
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She might be overwhelmed because the kids need dinner every night, because the laundry needs to be done.
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The kitchen continuously needs to be cleaned.
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The dogs need feeding and walking.
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School forms have to be filled out by deadlines.
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You're leaving for a vacation.
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You've got a big event coming up.
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Guests are arriving tomorrow.
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These aren't secret information that's just in her head.
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These are things that...
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You both are experiencing as part of your shared life.
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And if one person has to continuously recognize all the realities and then assign the other person a role like what's happening in my relationship, they still feel like they're carrying this like management and administrative layer.
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And that increases frustration and increases overwhelm.
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It actually increases overwhelm and increases decision making fatigue.
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I have to tell you one more thing.
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And so you're not supposed to read her mind, not at all.
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But she should not have to write the operating manual for the life that both of you share.
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And so one of the things for us to understand as men is there's a big difference between communication versus delegation.
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Here's the distinction.
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Communication might sound like, here's something you could not reasonably know because I need to tell you, or here's what's happening for me, or here's something I want, or here's something that isn't working for me.
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That's communication.
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Delegation is where she's managing you.
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And...
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where it's command and control, where she's saying, here's what needs to happen.
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Here's how to do it.
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Here's what needs to happen next.
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Here's what comes after that.
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I'll remind you if you forget.
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I'll check with you afterwards to make sure it happened.
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Those are very different.
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And
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Man, even as I say this, I remember the difference in our relationship where I would handle things, but Katie would always have to tell me like simple shit that I should have like been more present with.
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Like in our house, the garbage gets picked up every Friday and recycling is every other week.
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And I was responsible for the garbage.
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But nine out of 10 times on Thursday or Friday morning, Katie would have to say, hey, did the trash go out?
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And literally over half the time, I'm like, crap, you're right.
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I need to go get it out right now.
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And so I handled it, but I wasn't really handling it.
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I wasn't really taking care of it.
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I wasn't really taking ownership of it.
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You know, now it's not an issue.
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I have alarms on my phone that remind me to take out the trash, and a lot of times before the alarms are even going off, my body's now in a rhythm where, hey, it's like, it's Thursday afternoon, late afternoon, I'm emptying all the trash in the kitchen, getting out to the sidewalk, taking care of it, and I'm not looking for anybody to notice.
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I'm just getting it done.
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It's actually easier that way.
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really don't like to have to be reminded of stuff.
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I don't like to be corrected on stuff.
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And so this was something that was really present in my relationship.
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Like I handled things, but I was being managed and, and,
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The way to stop being managed is to just take it over fully and totally and not have to be reminded anymore.
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And it doesn't mean you're not going to miss.
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There's times where, hey, I've got a lot going on on Thursday and I forget.
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And maybe Katie will have to remind me on a Friday morning.
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But they are so few and so far between.
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In fact, the last time I had to be remembered of the trash or reminded of the trash, my neighbor Larry actually texted me and said, hey, man, I don't see your trash cans out there.
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And I know how difficult it is when you don't get it out to the sidewalk.
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So...
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I had a phone a friend moment or a friend phone me moment to remind me.
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So it wasn't Katie because she was out of the rhythm of reminding me of it.
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And I didn't let her know that Larry reminded me.
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And so imagine your wife says, I'm overwhelmed with everything I'm doing around here.
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And your answer is just make me a list.
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From my perspective as a guy, I'm like, yes, give me the jobs.
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I'll knock them out.
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But from her perspective, if she's already at a point of overwhelm, if she's already treading water, it feels like I have to identify everything, prioritize it, decide what you should do, decide what I should do, explain enough so that you can do it and possibly follow up afterwards and make sure it got done.
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And so you may have taken like activity off her plate, but you're not taking management off of her plate.
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Communication is not the same thing as delegation.
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There's a difference between asking your partner what she needs and requiring her to manage your participation.
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And this is important.
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If she has to notice it, decide what needs to happen, ask you, explain it, remind you, and follow up, you may have done the task like I was, but she's still managing it and that is keeping her in overwhelm.
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And we can argue about this.
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We can argue she shouldn't be overwhelmed.
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You can try.
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But that doesn't work.
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If she's overwhelmed, the thing you do to get that out of the way is you get her to stop being overwhelmed and you avoid how this becomes a loop.
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And this connects directly to what I shared about Katie in the last episode, because there's another side to this.
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Sometimes,
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The man has learned to ask because taking initiative has not gone particularly well.
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Maybe she already has a specific picture of how she wants it to happen, when it should happen, how it should be done.
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He tries something.
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She changes it.
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He handles something.
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She redoes it.
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He makes a decision.
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She remakes it and tells him he's wrong.
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And then he feels wrong.
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Eventually, his nervous system learns, before I do anything, I need to ask.
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was there in so many ways.
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And so I would ask, what do you want?
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What should I do?
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How do you want it done?
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When should I do it?
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And I felt like I was actually helping her so that she didn't have to correct me in the future and we didn't have to have a conflict over it.
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And I wouldn't be told I was doing it wrong and she wouldn't have to jump in and do it a different way.
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But what she was experiencing was, why do I have to tell you everything?
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And so, again, we get into these loops.
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She becomes more controlling because she experiences me as not taking as much initiative.
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And I asked for more direction because I was experiencing her as controlling and managing the outcome.
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And I decreased dependence or dependence on direction convinces her she really need does need to manage everything.
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My my increase, like dependence on her telling me what to do, convince her she needs to manage things more.
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And her increased management convinces him she shouldn't he shouldn't ask what act without asking.
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This is what happened to us.
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And so if every attempt at initiative gets corrected, eventually asking permission can feel safer than taking ownership.
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That's where I was.
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And again, like neither person gets a free pass here.
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She can have a certain way of doing things.
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That doesn't mean that you check out.
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You just do it your way and get it done.
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And if you're a woman listening to this, which I know I'm getting more and more women listeners, which is super encouraging.
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If you genuinely want him, genuinely want your partner to own something,
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He may need room to do it differently than you would.
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He may need room to learn.
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He may need room to make some reasonable mistakes and figure it out.
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Shared ownership requires that both people release part of this pattern.
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So you release some control and he releases the need to be told exactly what to do and actually take things over and it changes things.
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Now here's a secret for you, brother.
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Something I wish I knew earlier in my marriage, it would have avoided so many challenges and it really makes things easier for us.
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Like here's what makes things easier for us.
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There's a difference between mind reading and noticing what needs to be done.
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Such a major difference between these two things.
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This is where I think we get generally frustrated with the conversation.
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I know I was, you know, what I heard was stop asking me what I need.
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And I'm like, how do I magically need to know?
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Or how do I magically know what you need?
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So like, Hey, how do we fix this?
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And so I,
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There's a huge difference between noticing what needs to be done and mind reading.
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And noticing what needs to be done changed our relationship permanently.
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It's so much easier now.
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And honestly...
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Being managed is a pain in the ass and it's actually easier now that I've started noticing.
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But first, let's talk about what most of us try and do.
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It's like mind reading.
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When we say, how can I help you?
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And she says, I can't believe I need to tell you.
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We split into this trying to understand, like knowing exactly how she feels without asking and knowing an unspoken preference and knowing what she wants.
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um, for us to do and knowing what she wants emotionally in a completely new situation and knowing something happening internally that she's never communicated to us, you know, we're trying to read her mind.
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And in these cases, what we need to do is step into masculine containment.
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I'm going to talk more in depth about this in a moment, but it's like asking questions and being curious and communicating, not mind reading, not trying to figure all that out, but noticing is different.
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And here's what happened in my life.
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I started noticing that Katie really had a hard time every single week getting the laundry done.
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And I would often end up without clothes.
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And now I'm bugging her about the laundry and I'm putting more mental load on her.
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I'm actually making her feel like she's failing.
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So I noticed that and I took over the laundry.
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And you know what?
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It was actually pretty easy.
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It took Katie a long time.
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And I'm not saying that...
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She was doing it wrong or not doing it well, but I started timing it and loading up the laundry for the two of us every week, one load each.
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Took a few minutes.
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Flipping it into the dryer on a timer, going back, took a few minutes.
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Getting it out of there and throwing it together and folding it.
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It took like 10 or 15 minutes.
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The whole thing together was not that big a deal.
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And so I started noticing places where Katie had a hard time and noticing places where things weren't done.
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Like the sink is full.
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Like this is easy.
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The sink is full.
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Maybe dinner's not made.
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The kid needs to go somewhere.
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The trash is overflowing.
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You're leaving tomorrow's nobody's packed.
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Your wife's been managing the kids all day.
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Guests are arriving.
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The dog needs walking.
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The house is upside down after a pretty busy weekend or having people over.
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You don't need telepathy to see those things.
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You just walk in and start noticing, what can I do here to help the situation and move things in the right direction?
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It's not to become psychic.
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The goal is to become observant.
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Initiative is not mind reading.
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Initiative is intention plus ownership, like stepping in and doing things.
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And here's what masculine containment looks like in this situation.
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And this is how being present.
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and grounded, and regulated, and in your body, dramatically changes things if this dynamic is present in your relationship.
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I don't want to just replace, tell me what you need with some other relationship script out there.
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You know what I'm talking about.
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Like, the script of, she brings up an issue, and you say, do you want me to listen, or solve this, or just hold space for you?
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Okay.
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If you can say that without feeling goofy and weird, good for you.
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Because I can't.
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Every time I tried to use a script like that, it felt completely lame.
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And actually, Katie would have reactions to them.
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And it didn't feel genuine.
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And it felt just weird.
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It's not what masculine containment is.
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Masculine containment isn't learning a new script, a new dialogue, a new strategy, a new process.
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What masculine containment is, it's not the perfect sentence.
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It's regulating yourself enough to be present with what's happening.
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So if she's got a lot going on and she's overwhelmed, the way that you can help in the moment is to stay in your body.
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slow things down.
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Slow is fast and fast is slow.
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Listen, pay attention.
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Notice your own impulses to fix and defend and explain and withdraw and make the discomfort stop.
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Notice them.
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When she starts saying she's overwhelmed, when she starts saying she has too much to do, breathe into your body and feel in your body.
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Where's that stuff coming up for you?
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As I think about it, I'd get tension in my chest and tension in my shoulders, and my neck would feel hot, my face would feel hot.
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Sometimes I'd feel like energy rising up through my body and I'd feel like I needed to do something with it.
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And that's where I would react.
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That's where I would explain or defend or withdraw or do something to make the problem stop.
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But when I learned how to feel those feelings in my body, how to move the story aside, the, you know, you're failing, you're doing something wrong, this is your fault, all those things that I used to hear, I heard them.
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And they were like kind of nuts sometimes.
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You know, sometimes the story would be, you're a failure, I don't love you, I can't stand you, I'm frustrated with you, I don't want to be around you.
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She didn't say any of that.
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She said, hey, I'm overwhelmed and I need help.
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And...
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So when it gets there, if you don't genuinely understand something and you can actually stay regulated and not reacted, you can say, tell me more about what's going on.
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What's happening for you?
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What feels important about this?
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These aren't magic phrases.
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These are just curious questions leading with curiosity.
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There are natural questions that come from genuinely wanting to understand, slowing down and saying, I really want to understand what's going on here.
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Let the interaction tell you what's happening rather than trying to identify which communication technique to use.
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Masculine containment is not having the right script.
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It's being present enough to know you don't need one.
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Presence gives you more information than a communication formula ever will.
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Staying curious will help you understand what's happening way better than some strategy or some script or dialogue.
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And when the need is practical, look before you ask her.
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Take that presence and apply it to your practical life together.
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If your wife looks completely overwhelmed and you can feel her energy is overwhelmed, then you can see her overwhelmed before immediately reacting like, oh, shit, she's overwhelmed again.
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And getting frustrated in your body and then asking, what do you need me to do with like a sense of urgency like I would?
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I know I did that.
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Take a breath, look around, what's happening?
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And can you see anything you can do without needing her to tell you?
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Maybe you just say, hey, I've got dinner tonight.
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Or hey, I'll handle the dishes or the kitchen.
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Hey, it looks like you've got a lot going on.
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Let me take the kids for a couple hours and give you some space.
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I notice the car needs servicing.
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Let me take it in.
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I'm taking care of it tomorrow.
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I'll get everything handled and ready for the event we have, the trip we have, or whatever it is.
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and let her know you're doing it not because you're rescuing her not because you're trying to get credit or approval not because you want to earn something from her because it's your house too your children to your family to your life too there's something that genuinely requires her knowledge or input ask her but if it's something that you don't need her to tell you how to do
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just go do it and let her know you're doing it so that she has pressure taken off of her.
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She feels better.
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Knowing what you can responsibly own without being asked and staying present enough to understand the things that actually require communication will change things in your life.
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If you're stuck in that habit of asking permission for everything you do, start breaking that habit.
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Start just doing and letting her know and showing her that you're helping her when she's in those places of overwhelm when there's too much going on.
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Shared ownership means there's no part of our life that I can see and carry without waiting to be assigned.
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So what that means is that shared ownership means,
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creates parts of our life where I can see, where I can move in, where I can step up, and I don't have to wait for them to be assigned to me.
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I just step in and help.
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It's shared ownership.
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It's not her managing and you responding.
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So this is important, and it will change the dynamic in relationship.
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And if this keeps happening, if this, you know, her getting overwhelmed and needing to tell you and getting better at delegating keeps happening,
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It's going to cause challenges in your life.
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And the long-term solution is not her getting better at delegation.
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It's clear ownership.
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Some recurring areas of your life should not have to be negotiated every time they occur.
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So like I said in the last episode, sit down and get clear on who owns what.
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You know, one person could own vehicle maintenance.
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One person could own certain school logistics.
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One person could own meal planning.
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One person could own certain financial responsibilities.
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That's what you do to set up a system in your life where everything works and where you understand what you're doing.
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And these aren't rigid gender roles.
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Heck, I'm responsible for a lot of the meals.
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It makes it easier for me.
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I actually like to cook.
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It's calming.
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And my wife's responsible for finances.
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You look at a lot of like relationship courses and they'll tell you we're totally screwing it up and it works for us like crazy.
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And so every couple can decide what works for them.
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But ownership means I notice it.
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I plan it.
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I execute it.
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I follow through.
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You don't have to worry about it.
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My partner doesn't have to like keep this background diligence just in case I forgot.
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And knowing what you each own is healthy, permanent project management on the part of either partner is excruciating and exhausting.
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And so there's a big difference between being willing to help your partner and becoming someone your partner can actually share ownership with.
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Willingness matters.
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Communication matters.
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Asking matters.
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There's always things that you cannot possibly know unless your wife tells you, unless you ask her, unless you hear from her.
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And she's responsible for communicating those things.
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And you can help things by asking about them.
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But over time in a relationship, we also learn about each other.
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We learn our home, our children, the rhythms of our lives, the needs of our lives.
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We learn to notice what needs attention if we're looking for it.
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And sometimes we become capable of looking at something and saying, hey, I've got this.
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Like, feel the resonance, the difference in this.
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Hey, tell me what you need or I've got this.
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The second changes things.
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The second creates clarity.
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The second creates a feeling of calm.
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It creates a feeling of connection.
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It creates a feeling of confidence.
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It creates a feeling of like, I'm held and I'm okay here.
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Not because she assigned it.
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Not because you're earning points.
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Not because you're looking for approval.
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Not because you're hoping that being a better husband is going to result in sex later.
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But because this is your shared life and you're participating too.
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The goal is not for the two of you to need each other less.
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It's to stop making one person responsible for managing how the other person participates.
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Sometimes love asks, what do you need?
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And sometimes being supportive, being helpful, showing love, looks around the room and says, I've got this.
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And brother, I know you've got it.
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Thanks for being here with me today.
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I appreciate you being here for another episode.
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If you're a guy who's walking this path and you have challenges in your relationship and you can feel it slipping away, you feel you have maybe the challenges I talked about today or there's other things going on, I'd be honored to walk this path with you and show you the martial art discipline of martial art-like discipline, really is a martial art, called masculine containment.
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Whereas men, we learn to be curious.
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and present and grounded and lead any situation in our relationship to a positive conclusion so there's more connection, joy, love, and support in our marriage, way more intimacy and way more excitement because that's what we really want in a relationship.
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Go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com.
25:44
I'd love to meet you in person and I'm looking forward to seeing you.
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And do me a favor, subscribe and leave a comment or like this video.
25:52
I would really appreciate it.
25:53
I read every one of them myself and think about who's somebody you could share this with.
25:58
Thanks again.
25:58
Go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com.
26:00
I look forward to seeing you soon.