Emotional Closeness

One concept within the friendship chapter that got me thinking was how men and women create emotional closeness.  It is something that I believe most people understand, but never really stop to think about. Women create emotional closeness through dialogue, and men create closeness through doing things together.  What I loved about these ideas was how truthful they were. When I heard this I instantly started to recall how my Father and I get emotionally closer, and then equally how my Mother and I get emotionally closer, to in large part test the validity of the ideas.  The answers matched up perfectly.  My Dad and I love to go out, see a movie, go to Barnes & Noble and read..ect. We love to get out and do things together, that is how we spend most of our time. And when we go out, we do talk, but not a great deal, we talk about what we may see or find interesting in something we read, mostly beneficial talk.  Now I do go out with my mom, but the first thing I do when I see her, is sit down and talk about anything that is going on.  When my mother, and I go out and do something we talk the entire trip.  Lunch is not simply an activity to eat, but its another personally opportunity to dialogue.  My mother and I will talk about nearly everything under the sun, but we spend a great deal of time simply talking about life.  With my Dad, it seems like we have a time that we set aside to talk about life, and other things.  Its not that we do not talk, but its in large part about what the matter at hand is, our dialogue is mostly purposeful, and is used to get a job done, rather then enjoyment. What is interesting is I enjoy both aspects of these relationships, and I feel it shows just how much a child needs both a Father, and Mother to fulfill the necessary aspects of his/her growth.

I found a YouTube video that I felt visually explained how men and women differ in emotional closeness. The video shows a man and a wife, they are out on the River fishing.  The video is a short commercial, but it shows both sides of the sexes emotional closeness needs.  On one hand the man is being fulfilled because he is out doing something with his wife, and on the other hand the wife is being fulfilled because she is chatting while she is fishing with her husband. Check out the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Eq5VQAD5-s