Bryan Reeves learned the hard way that money can’t buy harmony with a woman’s heart.
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Twice in my life, I have made a lot of money only to adventure it all away.
At 26, I had built up substantial savings as a young US Air Force Officer. I had a sweet pad by the Atlantic Ocean, a Sebring convertible and the means to properly entertain my Canadian girlfriend whenever and however I wanted.
But as I slipped deeper into a secret depression, I left the military desperate to save my own life. Like that movie Legends of The Fall, I broke my girlfriend’s heart and spent the next three years traveling the world, chasing dark shadows and seductive sirens, throwing myself into awful situations over and over until I was kicked out of France at age 29 by a future ex-wife.
During that brief misadventure, I gave my French wife money, took her on trips, paid the rent and bought her jewelry and cigarettes. Still, she booted me out less than a year after we started, fed up with the man she married. When I landed hard back in the USA, all I had left was a freshly broken heart, a few stories you wouldn’t believe, a few bucks in my bank account and no obvious future.
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We’re living through a pivotal moment in history when women are achieving social and economic equality with men. They no longer need us for access to resources – security, money, sustenance, social influence.
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I went to heal in Miami at my dad’s place. I spent the next few years helping him grow a $50 million business from zero, accumulating another small fortune for myself.
With newly deep pockets, I moved in with a beautiful woman from Chile. I was able to offer her most anything money could buy. We had a nice home, a cat, money to travel and play with. We had all the makings of a good life. Unfortunately, my bank account refused to fund our happiness. If anything, it just poured miracle grow on our dysfunction.
At 34, I walked away from that company and its big paychecks. I left that passionate Latin woman, too, to tour and manage an independent music band. I had money and time, so I worked purely for the love of an otherworldly music that had infected me.
A few years and countless adventures later, I was 38, living in Los Angeles, and near broke. The band had split up and I had once again spent all my scratch. I was couch surfing through friends’ homes, hustling for work with Los Angeles’ vast world of artists and dreamers for often little or no money.
I was single and starting over for the third time.
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I’m now a published author, a well-read blogger and a impassioned coach to men and women. I’m still working to create a new fortune to provide for myself and a good woman.
I don’t have that fortune yet. Or that woman.
But I do have an invaluable lesson carved from the failures of my relationships passed.
What she needs is my full, embodied masculine presence. She needs to know I’m actually here, that I see and feel her deeply, and that I’m not going anywhere.
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It’s this: A modern woman doesn’t need me for my money or my resources. What she needs is my full, embodied masculine presence. She needs to know I’m actually here, that I see and feel her deeply, and that I’m not going anywhere.
Women don’t need men like they used to. We’re living through a pivotal moment in history when women are achieving social and economic equality with men. They no longer need us for access to resources – security, money, sustenance, social influence, etc.
Which is great! For humanity to thrive, women must have equal influence and access throughout society.
Still, it’s a disorienting time for many of us, particularly in intimate relationships.
There remains an inordinate amount of social pressure on men to be capable of providing tangible resources in exchange for a woman’s company. The ability to make things happen in the world is easily measured by dollars and cars and houses and things, which in turn remains presumed evidence of a man’s masculine prowess and vitality.
But none of that is a measure of his heart.
Most any modern woman—even one who energizes a lot of masculine energy in her life—yearns to know her partner cherishes her and will always show up for her. She wants to know he won’t check out and leave, which many men do even when we stay in the room.
Can he remain present when the relationship is strained? When she acts irrational and difficult, unknowingly presenting herself as an apparent problem he cannot solve, can he love her fully, anyway?
This is the true measure of a man’s heart.
A woman with a strong internal feminine essence aches to relax into her masculine partner’s strength and care. She wants to know she can trust him, that he genuinely cherishes her and will step up and do what must be done to ensure the safety of her world. That’s why access to resources has long been a measure of his worthiness as a man.
It’s an outdated measure.
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I have seen this over and over in coaching men and women.
When a man is able to show up and be fully present with her—heart, mind and body—she knows she can relax and she will follow that man most anywhere, even if she has to ride the bus with him to get there. If he can’t show up for her (or doesn’t know how), even with all the money in the world she’ll ache for a man who can. She’ll either try to pull it out of the man she’s with, or she’ll switch off her heart (and body)—and she’ll look for that masculine presence elsewhere, in her kids, at work, in her own being.
That’s what I was doing when I was young, moneyed, and ignorant. I thought my partners would be happy there was money and entertainment. I got confused and resentful when they weren’t satisfied with the world I thought they wanted. I didn’t get that what they really wanted was to feel the full commitment of my love far more than mere access to my wallet and a nice home.
A nice home and money to pay the bills is important in the modern world, but so many of us men still focus primarily on pursuing material resources to make ourselves worthy of a woman’s love. In doing so, we overlook her deeper yearning.
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Sure, a nice home and money to pay the bills is important in the modern world, but so many of us men still focus primarily on pursuing material resources to make ourselves worthy of a woman’s love. In doing so, we overlook her deeper yearning. Even many women aren’t aware of this yearning in their hearts.
Not long ago, I pursued a woman when my resources were stressed. I knew I couldn’t (yet) provide things for her that other men could. She was a woman of means, anyway; she didn’t need mine. I decided instead that I could give her the gift of my incessantly curious mind, my laughter and playfulness, my relentless optimism, my kindness and my listening.
I knew I could show her that she is completely safe in my presence, and that I was a man who could fully cherish her feminine heart. By the endlessly beaming smile on her face in my presence, I knew I was onto something.
I can offer all that to any woman, anytime, no matter my cash flow. My painful past has proven that loving presence is far more valuable, anyway.
Any man can offer his loving presence to his partner. His money might affect where he lives or vacations, but it can never define his worth as a Man.
It also can’t buy him harmony in an intimate relationship.
I will create another fortune, though I can’t know how long it will take. In the meantime, I’ll just keep fully showing up for whatever woman I am choosing, and who is also choosing me. Sometimes in life, that’s all I can do.
Fortunately, it’s what most modern women these days are deeply aching for.
—For enquiries into working privately with Bryan, visit www.BryanReeves.com
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“It’s this: A modern woman doesn’t need me for my money or my resources. What she needs is my full, embodied masculine presence. She needs to know I’m actually here, that I see and feel her deeply, and that I’m not going anywhere.”
You get it! *high five! I have an amazing relationship and I have no clue how much money he has in his bank account. Things I do know: He’s present, I know his intentions, he can hold an intelligent conversation, and he has his own hobbies and interests.
Can he remain present when the relationship is strained? When she acts irrational and difficult, unknowingly presenting herself as an apparent problem he cannot solve, can he love her fully, anyway? This is the true measure of a man’s heart. I so appreciate this article. In my life this has been very true. I am a working executive and what I need in my man is a true partner- someone who can deal with me on those crazy days when I’m leading meetings and juggling employees’ needs and the demands of a job I love. What does that mean? That… Read more »
Presence. In my experience its exactly the truth. However no one of us can be perfectly present all the time, and relationships go through cycles.
It also works both ways. Bkth partners must be present.
However, both partners must also not give up when their other is not present and know how to communicate it.
The far is that we all have cycles. If you don’t have the commitment to sticking it out or you think you are not happy and want to move on because of it, your relationships will always be doomed.
Too bad Heather Mills didn’t feel that way. Or Robin Williams wife or ex-wives.
Don’t know anything about Robin Williams wife or ex wives….but come on, Paul McCartney married someone significantly younger than him. Maybe he should have found a wife closer to his own age. She was 30 something married to a 60+ year old.
Please tell me how someone can call themselves a Feminist and be in favor of alimony.
I wonder what role resources play for women at a biological level. We always talk about certain male biological predisposition. Women have more financial options then they use to. I do think a good woman will value the man before the money and things. But isn’t there still an element of the biological at play where women do infact still desire partners who are good “providers”, men that are infact willing to share their resources with her?
A man that can be present and be there for me and have time for me, Is like the unicorn in a relationship. Yeah I have met man who when they see me (sporadicly) spend a lot of money on a fancy dinner, getting me gifts and offering to fix things for me, but when it come to be present in the relationship and be really intimate (not talking about just sex) they are MIA. Kinda frustrating and one reason I just decided to go solo in life.
What I learned from dating men who replaced time with money/gifts is that I’d rather have the quality time than the millions.
I agree, so true but I am not giving up! You shouldn’t either.
I stopped reading after he left the Latin American woman, for no obvious reason. I think this person needs psychological help. I don’t think he should be couching people…I think he needs help himself. He doesn’t sound sane.
He didn’t leave her for no reason, he said there was dysfunction and money didn’t help.
Maybe at the end of the say, we leave people because its the right thing for both of us, just because he doesn’t elaborate why he left the Latin woman …. doesn’t mean there weren’t reasons that are valid or that he didn’t ponder it for a length of time and try to work it out.
That’s kinda rough. Bryan seems to bring a lot of honesty to the table. Bashing him for not making something as clear as you like may not be the best approach.
No one should want someone who wants their money more than quality time. Breaking a person’s heart has an after effect on both the heartbroken and the heartbreaker. Sometimes it can’t be avoided but most times, people know they will hurt their partner. Usually anything less than honesty and integrity will do it every time.