Men struggle with things that some will never understand, and they struggle more than other genders do. Whether it's the struggle with relationship success, school, getting further in life, or just plain being a man, there seems to be less attention on why men can or cannot feel a certain way. Here are 5 reasons why men have it tougher than women do.
1. We can't even raise our voice.
When we try to get our point across, sometimes we have to yell it out just to be understood. We don't want to yell at you. This is why: We know that you deserve way better than to be getting yelled at for not understanding us. When we raise our voice even the slightest bit, we're called 'aggressive', when we're actually being 'assertive'. Aggression is physically putting your hands on someone and following it up by throwing them across a room, or just taking control of them where they're defenseless without consent. We try to assert ourselves since we want to be strong, and show that we're strong. In God's image, we're strong, but we have a hard time living up to that. When we give our opinions, we say them because we want to be heard with respect to what we feel. Our feelings are what God listens to. When something doesn't feel right, we try to be as real as possible with you and when the truth comes out, it sends a clear message that we shouldn't have to make any more clear. In some cases, we're then told (once we speak the truth) that we should "shut up" or "keep our mouths shut" where we're given a stupid ultimatum that we ultimately fall for, like "if you shut the [bleep] up and let me do my thing, we'll be fine". God doesn't tell us to keep quiet, yet we do, because God doesn't tell us to pop off. But we do, and the result isn't pretty. The next point explains why.
2. We get taken advantage of more.
We're asked to hide how we feel much more than any other gender. We're told to do or not do certain things. When we try to say something that shows us that we keep things real with God and ourselves and we're shut down, and we follow the ultimatum that ultimately is a sweet nothing, we're the ones who get blamed for [bleep] we didn't do. We end up getting [bleep]ed over. We're also taught to be "nicer" and we're supposed to be "friendly". When we are nicer to people, as God asks us to be, we give the good sides of ourselves to people who really don't deserve it. We don't have quite the same guidance that the girls have. God reminds us to give, but we trust in our hearts that every person we give anything to is the right person in which to give, and boy are we wrong. That's where trust is broken, and we are taken advantage of. Conversely, when trust isn't broken, nobody is taken advantage of. We continue to forgive because both God and societal logic say we can't tell someone they're in the wrong even when they apologize to us for being hurtful with their actions. Both God and societal logic say we should forgive and forget. When we do, we pay the price as if we're the Lord and the people who apologize to us are the Pharisees who continue to rebel.
3. We take more punishment.
It doesn't matter whether we're right or wrong. We can try to stand up for ourselves all we want, but our backs are still against the wall. Our backs are against the wall in the first place since we can't stand up for ourselves since that's considered being aggressive. People are so in denial in these situations that they're stubborn. They don't listen. When we do something wrong in the presence of a stubborn person, we are still blamed even though the stubborn person is more at fault for not changing his or her ways. Also, we have more of our people working in areas like construction, automotive repair, or athletics, and we physically get beat up from it. We're asked to do the 'tougher' things since we're bigger and when we make the effort, sometimes it doesn't work and we end up getting ourselves into trouble. "Suck it up and try again" is the common saying, but there comes a time when we keep trying again after the fact and we just don't have anything left. We need help in times like this, maybe more than others do, but we just don't receive it.
4. We take failure harder and we fail much more.
Think about a guy who puts himself out there, whether it's for a job he wants, a girl he likes, or to achieve a certain goal. When he gets rejected more than a handful of times after having the confidence to pursue what he wants, it takes a toll on him, where he's being punished for others being more qualified than him. When he fails to reach a goal he wants to, he faces adversity such as injury or external pressure, and he can't seem to get that out of his mind. He thinks that he needs to change himself to become better, and when he feels like he's improved and pursues it again, he gets shut down again. He wanted to become better for the girl, and she failed to see that in him, so it made him feel like he's not worth it for anyone. The way he feels makes him want to give up. It adds pressure for him. He doesn't want to hear the consoling words like "There is someone out there for you, and that someone is better than her. You just haven't found that someone yet" or "Remember how much love you have to give, and keep on being you" because he's empty. He knows himself better than anyone else does, so he also doesn't want to hear, "Don't try to get the girl just because you don't want to be alone" since he's really into her. He gave it all he had and he has almost nothing left to give. What he does have isn't enough, he feels. He feels broken. He's been taken advantage of for making the effort. It's an oxymoron that those who are the happiest don't put in the most effort. The same goes for the jobs he had interest in. When he gets turned down for them, he feels like no one wants him, even though he knows in himself that he has everything they look for.
We're supposed to let God take our burdens and our sin, but we fail in God's standard more than any other standard there is. It's harder than it appears, folks. We pray for things to work out for us, since we ask God to be there and to make it work in our favor. There is never an instance where all our prayers get answered. Maybe that's okay in the long run, but in the short-term, we're absolutely distraught by it. We even feel, in that moment, that God is against us, even though he never is.
5. We are assumed to want one thing even though what we really want is different.
Many people think that all we want is sex, when it really isn't. We want emotional connection, and we want to feel like we're a part of something that isn't just ourselves. We need our friendships too - there's no wonder that girls are more emotionally in control since they always have their girls to go to, and they go together in bunches, whether it's to the bathroom, the bar, the party, whatever it is. We feel more alone than the girls do because of this. This the exact reason we've ever felt that the girls in the church dislike us. I'm sure that there's proof to contradict that but we're seeing more of it the more time we spend in church to grow in our faith.
On that note, there are hardly any online articles about strong men compared to strong women. As a result of that, when we read things on the internet, there's less for us to actually relate to, which is why we have a harder time finding emotional connection. We're upset more because of it, and we don't have all the same options that the girls have. People sometimes want us so they can use us. It's bull[bleep]. That's why we explode so often. We're more emotionally drained because we put in more effort in larger spurts so we run out of energy more quickly. It's also harder to replenish it.
