Why Mars and Venus Collide: Improve Your Relationships by Understanding How Men and Women Cope Differently with Stress

Accepting our differences can immediately lighten up our relationships. Many couples feel a heaviness in their lives, because they believe they have to sacrifice themselves to please their partners. This attitude needs to change.

Certainly every relationship requires making adjustments, compromises, and sacrifices, but we do not have to give up ourselves. Instead, we can arrive at a reasonable and fair compromise. Life is not about having everything our own way whenever we want it. We experience the opening of our hearts when we share.

When a plane takes off and flies on automatic pilot, it will arrive at its destination. Though the course seems perfect, it is not. At every point on its route, a plane’s course varies due to changing wind speeds and plane resistance. It is never perfectly on target, but it is generally moving in the right direction. A plane on automatic pilot constantly makes small adjustments to correct the direction.

Relationships are the same way. No one is ever perfect, but your partner can be the perfect person for you. If we continue to correct and adjust ourselves, we can create a lifetime of love. When we can own our mistakes and adjust our actions, we can reduce the tension in our relationships.

Without an understanding of our different needs, men and women are adjusting their actions and reactions to no avail. Our actions may be pointed in the wrong direction. My aim in Why Mars and Venus Collide is to give you the understanding and the techniques you will need to counter the disruptive effects of stress and to steer a true course to a lifetime of love.

We’ll begin by examining the dramatic new source of stress in our lives brought on by the shift in the roles of men and women. The increased pressure on women to work outside the home and the diminished potential of men to earn enough to be sole providers has shaken the foundations of our society. The complex mosaic of traditional roles and expectations for men and women, fashioned and refined for thousands of years, has been shattered, and we are still picking up the pieces.

Never before in history have we witnessed so much social change in such a short period of time. With equal rights, higher education, sexual liberation, and greater financial independence, women today have more choices to create a better life than ever before, but we are all more stressed at home. Never in history have women been expected to do so much, and that can be overwhelming on Venus. Of course, that stress is immediately transmitted to Mars and ends in misunderstanding, friction, and a sense of helplessness.

After looking at the change in the expectations in our relationships, we will review groundbreaking scientific research that supports the gender differences I have described anecdotally in all of my books. There are physiological reasons that women find comfort in talking about their problems and men prefer to retreat, or why women can multitask and remember everything while men focus on one thing at a time, forgetting everything else. I will give you an overview of the scientific research in easy-to-understand terms to show you how the brains and hormones of men and women are hardwired to respond differently to stress.

By examining how we behave differently in stressful situations, a woman’s never-ending to-do list, for example, I hope to give you new insights into how our diverse responses to stress cause us to clash. You will see how men and women really are different throughout Why Mars and Venus Collide.

Remembering and understanding our differences are only half the battle. The other half is about action—learning to cope more effectively with stress. This book aims to help you discover new ways to lower your own stress and help to lower your partner’s. Whether you are in a relationship or single, you will discover a variety of new and practical ways to improve your communication, uplift your mood, increase your energy, elevate levels of attraction in your relationship, create harmony with your partner, and enjoy a lifetime of love and romance. You will learn why communication breaks down or why your relationships have failed in the past, and what you can do now to ensure success in the future.

I will guide you through the anatomy of a fight and give you fail-safe techniques to stop a fight before it becomes hurtful and advice on how to make up. Even more important, I will teach you how to prevent fights from even starting by making Venus Talks a ritual in your lives that will relax Venetians and give Martians a sense of accomplishment with a minimum of effort.

Finally, I will suggest a variety of ways you can reduce stress in relationships by engaging in the world and reaching out to enrich your life. When you learn to cope more effectively with stress and remember the gender differences that are hardwired into our brains, you will blame stress, rather than your partner, for your problems. Instead of waiting for your partner to change, you will learn how to lower your own stress levels. When your stress is reduced, you will be freed from the compulsion to blame or change your partner. Instead, you will remember and experience the pleasure of loving and accepting your partner just the way he or she is, as you did when you first fell in love. Mars and Venus orbit around the sun on their own paths in harmony, just as men and women must do to create lasting love.

For additional support, join millions of others who visit me each week at my Web site, www.marsvenus.com (http://www.marsvenus.com). You can reinforce your new understanding of our differences by watching my free Internet TV show or listening to my radio show. On a regular basis, I answer your online questions on relationships and the biochemisty of health and happiness. In addition, to get extra relationship support regarding your personal situation at any time or place, either planned or when a crisis occurs, you can talk online or by phone with a Mars Venus relationship coach. You can also listen to our regular conference calls, in which I explore many strategies and resources to improve communication, lower stress, and enjoy better health, happiness, and loving relationships.

In addition, I invite you to join the Mars Venus Wellness Community on my Web site, where I give gender-specific advice for healthy nutrition and the cellular cleansing of your body. Just as adjustments in your behavior can make a big difference in lowering your stress levels, small but significant changes in what you eat and how you exercise can make a substantial difference as well.

As you read Why Mars and Venus Collide, I hope you share my enthusiasm and begin to talk about these new insights and resources with everyone you know. Together we can create a better world, one relationship at a time.

—John Gray, Ph.D., April 2007

CHAPTER ONE

WHY MARS AND VENUS COLLIDE

Here is a scenario that plays out every night, everywhere:

Susan balances her laptop and the grocery bags she is carrying as she opens the door to the condo she shares with her husband, Marc.

“Hi, sorry I’m late. What a day!” she calls out over the sound of the TV coming from the den.

“Hi, hon,” he responds. “I’ll be there in a sec. Just want to watch this play.”

Susan drops the bags on the counter and begins to sort through the mail Marc left there. She pulls a bottle of water from the refrigerator. “I picked up some salad makings to go with the leftover turkey chili,” she calls to Marc, who saunters into the kitchen.

“Oh, I finished the chili when you called to say you’d be late. I was starving.” He leans in to give her a kiss. “Are you ready for your presentation?”

“I was looking forward to having it for dinner, before I do more work on the PowerPoint. I don’t feel it’s as good as it could be. My supervisor is really counting on me. I’m so anxious about this.”

“I’m sure it’s great! You’re overthinking it,” he says, trying to reassure her. “You’re such a perfectionist.”

“Not really. I just don’t feel it’s right yet. This is really important.”

“Maybe we should go out for a bite—it will relax you. I can skip the game.”

“Are you kidding? I have too much on my mind, and I want to get a good night’s rest.”

“Well, we could order in—”

“I’m trying to eat healthy food—pizza won’t do it. I’ll make scrambled eggs or an omelet and toast. I could use some comfort food.”

“Whatever …”

“By the way, did you remember to pick up my black pantsuit?”

When she sees Marc’s expression, her blood boils. “I can’t believe you forgot. I planned to wear that suit tomorrow.”

“You have a walk-in closet packed with clothes—”

“That’s not the point—I even reminded you.”

“Well, I’ll get up early and be there when the dry cleaner’s opens in the morning—I was too tired to do another thing.”

“Just forget it. I want to leave early.”

“I’m really sorry, Susan—it slipped my mind.”

“Right. Thanks a lot. All I wanted was a little help so I can be prepared for an important day tomorrow.”

It is clear from this exchange that the evening ahead will not be relaxing for Susan and Marc, who are headed for a fight. At the very best, they will certainly not be in the mood for romance. What happened between Susan and Marc demonstrates friction points that are common in relationships today. Susan’s high-pressure job, her expectations regarding her husband’s contribution around the house, his forgetfulness, his dismissal of her anxiety, and his attempt to offer solutions to her problems make for an explosive situation.

As you read Why Mars and Venus Collide, you will learn to recognize the assumptions we make every day that fail to take into account how different men and women really are.

We need to challenge our assumptions about how men and women should be and begin to appreciate in practical terms who we are, what we can offer each other, and how we can team up to solve the new problems we face today. We can create a new blueprint for male and female roles that can bring us closer together harmoniously.

Our biggest problem at home is that women expect men to react and behave the way women do, while men continue to misunderstand what women really need. Without a correct and positive understanding of these differences, most couples gradually begin to feel they are on their own rather than relying on the support they felt at the beginning of their relationship.

Women mistakenly expect men to react and behave the way women do, while men continue to misunderstand what women really need.

Men love to solve problems, but when their efforts are misdirected and go unappreciated, they lose interest over time. When this challenge is correctly understood, men become much more skillful in helping women cope with the burden of increasing stress in their lives. This book helps to explain this dilemma in a way that most men can understand and appreciate. Even if a woman’s partner doesn’t read this book, there is still hope. Why Mars and Venus Collide is not just about men understanding women. It is also about women understanding themselves and learning how to ask effectively for the support they need. Women will learn new ways to communicate their needs, but more important, women readers will learn how to avoid pushing away the support men already want to give.

Here’s another scenario:

Joan is cleaning up the remains of the children’s dinner when she hears Steve’s car pull into the garage. He comes through the mudroom, having an urgent conversation on his cell phone.

“I can’t believe they did that. The papers were supposed to be filed at the end of next week. How are we supposed to pull it together by this Friday? Think we can get an extension until Monday? Do your best. Let me know.”

He drops his briefcase and slouches against the counter, ready to check his BlackBerry messages.