So what’s she supposed to do? Well, while men have to work on expressing feelings, women have to work on encouraging and not criticizing. Wait for the moment that he does express his feelings and say to him — You know, I feel so good that you’re telling me how you feel. I really care about how you feel. — And when he sees, then — Hey, my wife thinks I’m great. My wife thinks that I have what to give. My wife is interested in this close relationship. — This will encourage him to do it more. Our sages tell us that the wisdom of women builds the home, because the woman, she knows how to wait for the right moment to say the right word. Her sense of intuition, her sense of understanding emotions is sharper than a man’s. And she has to be able to look at her husband when he comes home and realize — No, now’s not the time to tell him that the stove broke. — And she has to know when to encourage him and when to pick him up and give him that emotional support. Really she’s going to build him in a way that nobody else can, because she’s the only one who has that inner glimpse into his real world. Encouraging and not criticizing, showing respect for his accomplishments. Men crave to be admired by their wives. It may not look that way on the surface but it’s something that they want. They want their wives to put them on a pedestal and tell them how wonderful they are. Perhaps this is a weakness that men have that women don’t have. The women are looking for the emotional closeness and the men are looking for the respect from their wives. The wisdom of woman builds the home. She knows how to give him this respect and she knows how to encourage him to bring out the kind of behavior that she wants in him.

What you’re saying then is that happily ever after doesn’t follow automatically in the real world. There’s no easy street in creating a long lasting relationship. A successful marriage requires an ongoing investment of effort on both sides.

Stretching Your Personality

One of the things that a person has to realize when they get married is that they’re entering a relationship which is there to build them. When you go to the