I flew out Thursday morning to do a women’s night out event at a church in McAllen, Texas last night and it was a really sweet group of people. They had a full dinner and it was one of those great events that I love so much were the men of the church serve the dinner for the women of the church and give their wives a fun, relaxing time. The other thing that I always find really amusing about those scenarios is that, while I’m standing up on stage talking to the girls about what’s going on in the lives of their men, you can see the heads of the men peeping over the windows and the doors to the kitchen or peering around the sides of the room or standing in the back of the room just happening to take a long time to clear dishes just because they want to hear.
Last night, I was standing on stage sharing some of these issues and I noticed that there seem to be more men than normal filtering into the room when I just happened to be talking about the ‘sex’ subject, so that was kind of funny. I’m struck honestly as I see that dynamic happen over and over, I really am struck by how delighted men are to feel like their inner selves are being understood. I was talking to one of the women at my table, a delight full lady who was one of the leaders of the group and an author herself, and she was telling me that when she first read ‘For Women Only’ she asked her husband if what I was saying was true. She said that her husband was actually fairly cautious about discussing these things, hesitant to answer, and he finally confessed what I’ve not heard from many men which is that in some ways they feel like it is an uncomfortable feeling at first to have somebody really peering in to their heart of hearts and really understanding certain things. But, at the same time how much they, even as a strong confident man, how much they want, deeply want their wife to be able to understand these things and what a relief it is, honestly, once they feel like their wife does understands at least a little bit some of things that have been hidden in their heart for years.
The other thing that was fun about this event was that I got to spend a little bit of time with the daughter and fiancé of the organizer who are getting married in three weeks. The young woman was probably in her mid 20s and so was her groom, and it was so cool to see her just soaking in some of the surprises. She said that she went around to some of the other women at the table and asked some of the older women who had been married a long time, is this true? Did you hear this? Did you know this stuff before? She was so shocked when some women who have been married 30 or 40 years said that they learned something new, and I think it was a good, sort of, eye opener for her that just because you’ve been married for a number of years doesn’t automatically mean you know everything about men. But, it is a good idea to learn some of these things.
Her husband to be was fascinated by some of the things that I was saying and felt like it validated him as a man in some areas that he may not have been able to articulate before. All of which I think is very valuable whether it is a young couple about to get married or people who’ve been married for 40 or 50 years. I am just continuously amazed that how it happened and I ended up being able to do this amazing thing of sharing some of these facts with people.
So, that was Texas. I flew home this afternoon. I’m driving towards my home as we speak to go hug my kids who just got out of school and spend time with them, have dinner, go to my kids sports practices, and then tomorrow morning have to go drive to the airport and get back on an airplane for a long scheduled trip to Arizona. It might have made more sense to go straight from Texas to Arizona from a professional standpoint, but, from the personal standpoint there wasn’t even a question. My kids need to see their mommy and I need to see them, and Jeff.