Hello, Gareth--

Some of my long-time readers will attest that I'm awful at analogies, but in the effort to improve, I'm going to give you an analogy that may help clarify this a little better for you:

Suppose you spend 5 hours making a meat lasagna dish from scratch. And then you give it to the person you care about. I mean...the money for ingredients...the time...the effort. She should definitely appreciate that. But then it turns out, she doesn't like lasagna very much. I mean, she'll eat it, but...it's not something she's particularly excited about. (Or worse--she's a vegetarian!) I mean...sure she's thankful that you made that effort to feed her...but...now imagine every Sunday for years you make that lasagna and give her that lasagna. I mean...it's food...it's sustenance...she should just be happy you worked so hard to feed her. Right? Even if she doesn't particularly like or want lasagna? Now imagine if, before you make that lasagna, you learn what foods she likes, or, ideally, a food that both of you like. Now you spend that effort time and money to make that food. Pretty cool, right?

Of course, the hope is that she lets you know that she appreciates your effort, and specifically lets you know that she doesn't like lasagna or that she's a vegetarian, but that would be the focus of another article--what women need to do better. The focus here is helping men understand what may be accidentally harming their relationships, despite their efforts. I so hope this analogy helps you understand...

--Lee