Have you encountered the man (or been that man) who emphatically claims, “I don’t want drama!”?
Swipe right … or left … I don’t know … whichever way you swipe to pass on someone you don’t want to date, because pass on this man you must.
“I don’t want drama” is what the perpetually confused and frustrated man puts on his dating profile – or repeats in conversation and often with a fair amount of drama in his voice – who is nonetheless irresistibly drawn to women with whom he will co-create “drama” until he is one day finally willing to learn how to EMBRACE the fullness of a woman, or the fullness of life itself!
Because when a man says “I don’t want drama,” he is essentially saying, “I am terrified of feeling out of control, and I cannot be with anyone who feels feelings or acts in ways that are beyond my current capacity to feel or simply outside my tiny stress-free comfort zone.”
Which means he will inevitably reject any woman who feels more than he does or who acts in ways that aren’t easy for him to be with, which is pretty much every woman, and certainly the women he will be drawn to.
That’s the nature of life itself!
For every man, in his deepest heart, ACHES to be held accountable to showing up fully in his life, and fully for love. So actually, a man requires an intimate partner who challenges and inspires him to grow everyday more into his masterful self.
And yes, every man yearns for an intimate partner who loves him profoundly despite his imperfections, one who can consistently see through his human flaws to the very best of him.
But no man genuinely wants an intimate partner who will just let him get away with living and loving small, with playing safe where nothing is at stake.
Which is why a man will often stop choosing a woman who stops challenging him by not being true to herself.
In other words, no man truly wants to live anything less than his full potential as a deep-souled human being who is every day committed to giving his greatest gifts to the planet, to his community, to his family, and to his intimate partner.
Whether or not he is conscious of it, a man needs a partner who will challenge him, because challenge is the only thing that inspires a strong, masculine-identified man to rise into becoming his best self every day.
I’m not saying every man responds so well to a challenging partner. Of course not! Many men clearly don’t.
Many men choose a perfectly challenging partner and then soon lament their choice. He’ll even blame her for making his life more difficult, all the while ignorant of or just in outright denial of the fact that he is choosing this experience!
But only because no one teaches us men why we would actually choose – can ONLY choose – a woman who challenges us.
And I want to clarify, there are countless unskillful ways that women challenge adult men that will only cause even the most self-aware of us men to drive that “no drama” stake deeper into the ground!
So I encourage anyone who wishes to partner with a strong man to learn skillful ways of offering him the more wild and unruly passions of your authentic heart … in other words, you can learn how to challenge him with love, with respect, rather than merely mirror his “no-drama” neediness with your “emotional-connection-at-any-cost” neediness.
Always remember this:
Until a man can just embrace that a partner who lovingly challenges him is what he REQUIRES to help him live into his mastery as a truly powerful, authentic, heart-centered man, he will continue his futile quest for that mythical woman who is BOTH mysterious and alluring enough that he wants to have sex with her AND who will somehow give him “no drama.”
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Previously published on bryanreeves.com
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