Tag Archives: Leadership

Developing Respect

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japanese-garden

“Respect is a carefully tended garden”

Emotional Contagions and the Power of the Negative

Emotional contagion is the human tendency to synchronize and converge to emotional states and behavioral attitudes that are associated with those of others. Two simple observations of this are the susceptibility to catching and patterning other people’s yawns or a change of mood associated with a given venue or crowd. This observation and study goes back to 400 B.C., when Hippocrates, the founder of modern medicine, observed that “hysteria” was transferred from some women to others. Modern research and study into the subject confirms that negative emotions have a disproportionate impact to people’s emotional and behavioral states as compared to the power of the positive. In fact, negative emotions typically are four times contagious than positive emotions, which gives rise to the principal to offset a negative emotion, positive experiences have to be increased four times, just to break even to a neutral state. Research also confers indications that to change a negative to a clear positive requires eight or more incidents of positive experiences. This is one of the reasons why good managers initially remove negatives out of situations they are managing rather than trying to add a positive element and if we are attempting to foster respect with our partners we need to be clearly in a position not to damage, demean, or dismiss the respect we’ve already gain from our partners. We have the power to build respect in the manner in which we conduct our life or ruin it faster than it take to build it. Just as Hippocrates established the medical oath to first do no harm, so too shall we, in our attempts to foster respect, do no harm to the respect we’ve already been given and earned by carrying ourselves and behaving in a manner that displays our sense of self-respect, worth and dignity to others, by telling the truth, honoring our commitments and exemplifying in our actions the values we profess to hold.

Projecting Emotional Contagions

Research into the study of emotional contagions indicate that the process is a deeply rooted, primitive, automatic and unconscious behavior with the emotional trait of empathy being central to the receiver’s ability to emotional converge with the sender’s expressions. Women who tend to be more empathic are thus more likely to be susceptible to emotional contagions whether they are unconsciously delivered or consciously intended. As such there is no better case group for deliberately transferring emotional contagions to and gives rise in general to this notion of Western Karma; ‘that which you put out, will be returned’. Simply put, if we are attempting to foster respect, giving respect to others will be the initial step we take after internalizing it ourselves. Furthermore, an individual who encompasses expressive and dramatic personal qualities tend to send strong signals and if that personality is grounded in high self-esteem, self-worth and self-respect, an empathetic observer is vastly more likely to pick up and emulate those emotional displays and overt acts of respect given to them. By deliberately linking congruent subconscious actions with overt conscious actions we are creating an emotional resonance that is greater than the individual action summation with the recipient.

Recognize their Worth

In my previous post I noted that each of us have accomplished something monumental in the sheer act of coming into existence and that we should honor ourselves in acknowledgement and acceptance of that fact. I will double down with that notion and further expand it to recognizing at a grand level we are in fact the results of 4 billion years of evolutionary success and as such we should approach others in recognition and acknowledgement of that fact. On the surface we take for granted in an extreme way our acknowledgement of others. Modifying that approach in each interaction with others is an incredible step in fostering respect through validating their existence by seeing and recognizing their existence as having value to us.

Recognize their Abilities

As we explore who they are through our engagement with them, we need to become focused upon their accomplishments, contributions and achievements that have occurred and mattered in their lives and how that relates to their sense of pride of achievement and being. We need to be cognizant of not only the benchmarks or milestones of achievements, but also of their life skills and abilities, as they choose to display them. Recognizing their ability to be self-reliant, cope, exercise initiative and think their way through life’s circumstances are the low-hanging fruit of expressing respect to others in transcending their self-doubt, insecurities and defensiveness when it comes to interacting with us and fostering an emotional connection. It is through a combination of validating, empathic listening and providing praise in seeing them for who they are, what they’ve done and what they’ve learned that we show them individual respect.

Recognizing their Authentic Self

Too often our public persona is a result of external pressures and influences to conform to something and someone we’re not through a series of beliefs, obligations, servitude and social tact. It can be on a grand or minor scale, but our internalized private self tends to differ from who we are in public or who we want the public to believe us to be. In our attempts to develop and foster respect, discovering, understanding and accepting people for who they truly are, their authentic self is an immense transformational element for doing so. It is then that true and deep mutual respect can begin to arise. In relationships we will be exposed to and become aware of our partner’s authentic self. It is only within healthy relationships is this authentic self freely given and embraced. It’s called emotional intimacy. In unhealthy and emotionally toxic relationships do the public facades stay up shielding us from our partners.

Manage your Boundaries

People with a strong sense of self, their values and beliefs tend to have as a consequence strong boundaries and personal power. As a result they tend not to be victims of circumstances over which they have little or no control. They do not invite others through their own lack of behavior to take control of their choices and thus their life. They are explicit and assertive in their informing others as to how to be treated, respected and loved. It is through this display of boundary management and self leadership that others can develop a deeper sense of respect for us than just who we are and what we have to offer in return.

Showcasing Excellence as a Habit

Aristotle stated that “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore is not an act, but a habit”. While we can achieve acts of excellence and garner respect in the process, we want to be an embodiment of it, therefore, our acts of excellence must be a habitual process of behavior. One of the most important ways in which we are valued and respected as men by culture, society and women are our abilities to master, command and showcase hypergamous dimorphisms. It is the basic reason why women want, need and desire to be in relationships with us. If we are to be respected, we need to do more than just the minimum in displaying and embodying these traits.

Sexual dimorphism of our physical being with the markers being fitness, physical prowess, athletic ability and our raw naked physic. We also need to take pride in the manner in which we care for, sustain and maintain our bodies. We need to learn and develop skill sets that display these characteristics and make them accessible to our partners on a regular basis.

Social dimorphism of behavioral traits associated with masculine behaviors such as assertiveness, dominance, risk-taking, self-reliance, self-confidence, to include manner of stance, body language, speech and dress. In today’s age we need to take these traits further and into the interpersonal social roles of relationship skills, management and maintenance. Blogs that focus on such areas, such as Manning Up Smart are great sources for insight and investigation of these.

Status dimorphism of cultural and societal achievement associated with social standing, wealth generation, power accumulation and fame acquisition. We need to fire up our ambition, plan and chart our way to our life’s objectives and have a legitimate manner and means of achieving them. Only then can we truly ask a woman is this a journey she’d like to take with us.

Communication Management

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Relationship conversation

“The biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”

When lines of communications are not open or are not clear it is common for misunderstanding to become exaggerated and overly hostile, developing distrust, fear and anxiety within the relationship. There’s a certain amount of inertia that then must be overcome to start communication which was already difficult to begin with and issues are then addressed at the damage stage, rather than an informative or awareness stage. We simply don’t start to communicate until damage is actually done and resentment has built to the point where avoidance is no longer an option.

So too when we start to evade issues and topics from our partner, when we speak in half-truths or hold back in being honest, open and sincere, we start to drift into a soft form of dishonesty and are shutting down a channel of communication that is critical for the health and welfare of any relationship.

We need to have more than just an ‘open door’ policy with our partners. We need to have already shown and exhibited a forum and willingness to talk about issues of the day, as well as the operations of our relationships, prior to when we actually have a real issue, problem or challenge to overcome.

Nature of Management

Management is about doing systemized methods of time-tested and proven behaviors repetitively over time to get desired results and maintain relationships. Often they tend to be boring and mundane, until the time that they’re not, which is when they are most needed and become so valuable. Communication management is about insuring that interpersonal coordination and interaction with your partner is taking place to resolve issues, stresses, tensions or challenges that the relationship is currently facing, to make sure that the relationship is working effectively and efficiently.

You need to Lead

As a man, it will be up to you to initiate, lead and to manage this line of communication (amongst several others). While we can recognize and appreciate the fact of gender equity between the sexes and should thus come to expect women to be equal partners in managing the lines of communication, a simple fact of biology remains in opposition to this; Hypergamy… and when social conventions and biology clash, biology surely is to win out (nature always wins). Specifically a woman’s sexual attraction trigger of social dimorphism the behavioral traits associated with masculine behaviors of leadership, assertiveness and assuredness, will prevail over her social conventions and desire to be co-equal partners in managing the relationship. She will expect you to lead and will be naturally attracted to men who do. Do not lose out on establishing and maintaining this critical point of attraction within a relationship.

SHE IS YOUR TEAM!

It is critical of any manager to know and understand their team and staff. Make no bones about it, your partner is your team! Let me say it again; SHE IS YOUR TEAM. If she isn’t, if she isn’t someone you would go into business with, someone you trust to represent you, to speak for the relationship and to conduct the business of your relationship in public, you’ve chosen poorly, very poorly and need to reinvestigate your actions leading up to that decision. If she is, you need to acknowledge and validate that by treating her as though she is an essential asset and part of your life, by making time to hear and understand what is going on with her and her world as it relates to her and that she means more to us than being a life accessory in our lives.

Weekly Staff Meetings

One of the most important things a manager will do during the course of the week is to meet directly with their staff and team conducting the planning, organizing, managing, monitoring and decision-making that is required to run the operations of a business, as well as the personal interactions that makes your team feel connected and informed. As a business manager it is incredibly important to go beyond this and make a direct connection and develop a personal rapport with your team members individually. We have to go beyond the basic awareness of someone’s life, to really having a personal understanding and investment with our staff, before we can expect them to truly have one with us. As such there is an amazing difference between asking a co-worker about their weekend and asking them how specifically how ‘Johnny or Jane’ did in their specific after school activities, or whatever it is that is really important to them. We have to know and relate to what is important to them before they will relate with us. We lead by example.

Weekly One-on-Ones

Relationships are no different, except we get the methodologies backwards… we typically know to spend quality time with our partners, talking, sharing, listening and validating them, but rarely do we take a businesslike approach to the business management portion of our lives and the relationship by planning, organizing, managing, monitoring and making decision that needs to take place within the relationship to run smoothly. It is important that we do so and conduct both, separately. Do not mix one with the other, as it is too easy to mistake one emphasis for the other. Quality time is quality time. Business time is for business. Part of management is knowing when to share, bring up or discuss what, at what times and places. It is for these reasons that I believe it is important to set aside regular time each week to solely have a business relationship one-on-one with your relationship partner.

Reservoir of Goodwill

By holding and conducting regular one-on-ones with your partner you’ll develop a reservoir of goodwill, understanding and sound connection prior to needing it. When it’s needed is no time to start figuring out the dynamics of interpersonal communication nor to foster the good will required to sustain it. If you don’t, you are establishing a relationship culture to managing through crisis and conflict management… that’s poor management on your part and likely to be highly unsuccessful methodology, as most failed relationships will attest.

Present, Tested, Vested

Lines of communication must already be present, tested and vested… Those early established communication efforts are a proven commodity, building trust, respect and confidence in future communication needs and requirements, such as time when we need to give feedback or as importantly when our partners need to express a measure of it. Who would you rather talk to a serious issue about with; a partner you’ve never had a serious discussion with, or one who has been open and receptive to a variety of relationship type discussions over time with you?

Pattern of Behavior

Doing so establishes patterns of behavior… regular one-on-ones develop that pattern, provide that opportunity for communication, and can be relied upon to exist in the near future (because our partners can’t always rely on our powers of perception). Small issues can be discussed early, before they swell up into larger issues, due to neglect, ignorance and the age-old issue that problems tend to multiply if left unaddressed. By holding regular one-on-one our partners know there is an open forum for them to bring a topic up in the very near future, relieving the potential for built up tension, frustrations and anger that will ultimately result in a critical confrontation, one which will likely go very poorly if she doesn’t have the skills to hold a minor confrontation, let alone a critical one.

First Step

Opening lines of communications is also an amazing important first step in de-escalating conflict. Just by establishing communications many misunderstandings can be cleared up, understood, corrected and avoided. Trust and respect can be preserved, which should be the cornerstones of any healthy relationship.

Silent Treatment-Word of Warning

Along those lines couples should never give the other the ‘silent treatment’. This will only hinder and deteriorate the relationship by blatantly showing disrespect and invalidating your partner. In a healthy relationship, partners should be able to come together in good times, and bad… We may be angry, upset, & hurt, but our partner should be our emotional safe place to go to. If not, the relationship is in serious trouble and ill-health.

It Works…

While it may seem obtuse, overly simplistic and incredibly boring to make regular time to sit down to lead and discuss the business management of our romantic lives, it does provide the incredibly important frame-work and forum needed to accomplish our relationship goals, to help it move more smoothly and effectively through the rigors of life. Is she not, is the relationship not, are we not worth having a five-minute discussion to clear the air and to manage the life we want?

Managing Gender Expectations in Relationships

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Unattended Helm

“What we do not manage, we get manage by…”

The Information Age

Unlike the Industrial Age or to a lesser extent the Post Industrial Age, the Information Age has brought about and given rise to an increased demand for soft skills, the cluster of personality traits, social graces, methods of communication, and personal habits centering around enhanced relationships with other people, rather than just tasks and objective completion. While these demands are most acutely felt within the business/economic domain, they are spilling over and being absorb within the cultural and social domains as well. Simply put, highly socially skilled individuals tend to outperform, rise higher and go further within business organizations than those that are less skilled in those areas. Likewise, sole proprietors who are highly socially skilled make, have and maintain social/business relationships that ultimately make them more successful than those who are not.

Dual Gender Specialization

At the crux of the Information Age is social specialization, and in particular, dual gender specialization. Whereas the social shift involved in the Industrial Revolution was primarily a male dominated specialization shift, the social shift in the Information Age is hallmarked by the massive inclusion and rising parity of women in the work place environment and the rise of feminism within our business and social fabric. Feminism has forged some incredible benefits and opportunities for both men and women, as well as creating immense complexities socially that have yet to sort themselves out. Where they have not been resolved socially we feel a tremendous amount of friction. Nowhere is this more apparent than in today’s dating environment.

Responding to Hierarchy of Needs

Regardless of the fact that society is becoming increasingly feminine driven and in many ways women have surpassed the equality mark with regards to men, women are still not inclined to transition into gender equity with regards to dating and courtship accountability (gender equitable roles). While on the surface of it women seem to loathe to relinquish a courtship system in which the opposite gender (males) take all or at least commonly the majority of the risk of rejection, in initiating the courtship, unjustly shouldering the financial burden of the costs associated with such courtship and having to already achieved a measure of societal success, as displayed by ones’ place in society (commonly defined by one’s career/job), which is a connotation of the hypergamous status dimorphous marker of status, wealth, power and fame. The expectations transcend the initial dating rituals as well, as women typically still expect men to take the leadership role and be accountable for the health, direction and vitality of the relationship. Furthermore your failure to act upon your gender assigned role of leadership, will and quite openly will be judged as a fitness test to your worth and viability not only as a mate choice, but that of your maturity and worth as a man. What we’re witnessing here is a direct confrontation between rational cultural and social thought and biological drivers and demands. To argue against this we’re simply railing against a base biological drive and need here. No amount of rationalization, propagandization or wishful thinking will usurp the reality that women are naturally choosing biological base needs over social and cultural conventions, such as feminism, as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs dictates. Maslow’s Theory of Human Motivation speaks to this with a clearly defined order of ascension of psychological needs and when clustered, biological and psychological needs always trump social conventions of esteem and self-actualization. (take a moment to familiarize yourself with the hierarchy of needs chart). What all this is telling us, again and again and again, despite the rise and acceptance of feminism, women want us to be men, need us to be men and desire us to be men.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

 

Station Break:

Please pardon this interruption as we take a momentary station break to let this news set in… This moment brought to you by Eckhart Tolle:

“It seems that most people need to experience a great deal of suffering before they will relinquish resistance and accept reality.”

“It is incredibly painful to stand in opposite of what is…” (resisting reality)

“You can’t argue with what is. If you choose to try you will suffer.”

We now return to our regular scheduled program…

Managing Masculinity and Social Dominance

Repeated social studies have demonstrated and reaffirmed the common observation of the consistent erotic appeal of male dominance as sexual cues of attraction and desire for women, whether those are the hypergamous triggers of physical, social or status cues of dominance or ‘alpha’ traits. These base traits of desire do not diminish over time, nor are they usurped by elements making up relationship equity, such as the longevity of the relationship, emotional investment committed, resources committed such as time, energy or finances, nor the nostalgia of memories and times cherished and shared. It even usurps the common good of her offspring, the emotional wellbeing, development and security of her children. At a woman’s base biological need is a desire to be with an unapologetic masculine male- a Man. Social dominance plays such an important role in feminine attraction that manipulating this single variable socially has repeatedly shown and proven dramatic improvements in a man’s sexual market value- the degree to which he is sexually valued by women in the dating market environment.

Answer the phone…

Common sense, everyday observation and intuition regarding a man’s role in claiming his biological heritage of providing leadership, accountability and stewardship within a relationship has been backed up in virtually every scientific and social study conducted upon it and echoed by countless women when they say honestly that they “want to be treated like a lady.” That statement is an enticement, a call out for you, a longing wish for you, to be the man that fills and guides her life and her life with you. For you to simply be the man (the masculine role figure) in the relationship. Whether the analogies are being the pack leader, or Captain and First Officer or the great Silver Back male gorilla in the mist etc, etc, your gender expectation is to assume command of leadership responsibilities within that relationship and with her.

Screening & Filtering

If she fights you for this role, you shouldn’t put up with it or stand for it. Plain and simple. If she fight you for leadership control, she’s announcing her inability to appropriately partner. It’s unattractive, unfeminine and a proven detriment to the healthy wellbeing and happiness of any relationship, as proven by divorce statistics and relationship satisfaction studies, which clearly indicates an unease in the household when women wear the pants in the family. While fiscal issues a generation ago used to dominate the ‘cause’ for divorce, currently now unhinged from the requirement of ‘cause’ in ‘no-fault-divorce’, the most cited reason for instigating a dissolvement of a marriage is the wife’s unhappiness within it. Want to insulate yourself from the +50% marriage failure, with women doing +70% of the filing? Screen and filter your partner for a woman who recognizes the value of biologically driven sexual roles in a relationship and who actively supports and reaffirms those roles. Stunning concept I know… women who value, support and reaffirm ‘traditional’ values in relationships tend not to divorce.  If we want to entice and promote feminine behaviors (feminine arts) in our partners, we have to fill the leadership role first, or like any social creature, she will, and as pointed out, to everyone’s determent, if she becomes synonymous with that role.

Case of Feminist Economics

The sad reality is as our society becomes more and more feminized, and feminism becomes the defacto cultural monopoly governing our society, masculine men are becoming a scarce commodity… and more valuable because of it. Oddly that’s a plus to a man’s sexual market value, now and more so in the future. The alarm here isn’t that masculine men will create higher value and demand for relationships, but that by acting through their very nature (male), and having the leverage to do so, masculine men will chose polygamy lifestyle with younger, more attractive and fitter partners than women his age or peer group. While this has always been the case in the apex of male society, it is now becoming a staple and attainable for the common man. This is exactly what much of the men’s community and the pick-up community are promoting and celebrating. And with good cause. Furthermore women can embrace a feminist social standing, as long as their base psychological needs are fulfilled, not called into question or put into jeopardy, but once they are, and in particular within the realm of ‘safety’, their effeminate hipster/emo boyfriends and partners may become woefully inadequate, whether that threat is physical, financial, economical, or child rearing and family development side of security, her feminist leanings openly condition, support and promote partnership dissolution… often the masculine surrogate they ultimately turn to is a societal one– government. One they ultimately cannot divorce themselves from.

Ultimate Gender Expectation

Our gender schemas are deeply embedded within the cognitive and social frameworks regarding what defines masculine and feminine. While there is a multitude of socializing agents that work to formalize, instruct and guide these roles, what is apparent is the consequences of those socialized function have on our relationship structures and our relationships health and wellbeing when coupled with the very unchanging biological nature of our being. Ultimately it is an individual’s choice and obligation to take the helm of their life. To make the decision they choose fit to guide and direct it. To do so otherwise is to sail the seas of circumstances with an helm unmanned.