David Murrow
By Ashley Andrews-700 Club Interactive
CBN.com –Wives all over the world have asked themselves this same question, "What is he thinking?" And more often than not, those women have heard the same answer - "Nothing." But now, for wives everywhere, author David Murrow has another answer.
WHAT YOUR HUSBAND ISN'T TELLING YOU
It's like this. Men stand in the middle of a river surrounded by a current that constantly flows with feelings of joy, compulsions, temptations, frustrations and pressures. Not every man can handle the current. In fact, David believes that very few men know how to navigate through life's ups and downs. As he describes, "Most men have no idea where these feelings are coming from. Many try not to feel anything at all. Some are so skilled at denying their emotions they aren't aware that they have any." What's more, he asserts that, "the majority of men resort to survival strategies in order to stand against the current." Rather than being honest or open, men learn to be destructive and manipulative. Often they give into game-playing, pointless bickering and displays of anger. "Many, he shares, "simple check out - becoming passive and unavailable to their loved ones..." And it is not because they don't care. It's simply because "they have nothing left to give." And David Murrow believes that this happens to every man, every husband and even every Christian male.
THE BASICS
After the fall, Adam (wanting to be like God) took on two roles: "provider and protector." And these roles have continued throughout the centuries. "Men derive great joy from providing food, clothing, and shelter to their loved ones...But even deeper," David shares, "is a man's need to protect. Men instinctively protect their families, their property, their honor, and themselves." If a man fails at either of these roles, "he feels a deep sense of failure." Now some men learn to function healthily in both of these roles. But, as David suggests, most men are either overdeveloped or undeveloped when it comes to being a provider and protector. They are either controlling workaholics or passive slackers.
David goes onto to say, "And this is the gigantic secret your husband's not telling you - because he probably doesn't know himself. Your husband's need to protect and provide will at times overwhelm his soul. It will be the source of every triumph and folly in his life. It's creating the hidden pressure that causes him to clam up - or to explode. It's keeping him from connecting on an emotional level with others. And it may actually be turning him into someone else."
THE PROVIDER
"A man's very definition of himself comes from how he provides...In fact, men rank each other by their work." And this provider role drives men to "leave their mark on the world - to provide a legacy to mankind." But if those roles are underdeveloped, then you end up with a "slacker" - a man who lacks ambition and purpose. And it just so happens that studies show the number for "slackers" is growing. "Today, 18-to-34-year-old mean spend more time playing video games a day than 12-to-17-year-old boys. While women are graduating college and finding good jobs, too many men are not going to work, not getting married and not raising families."
So what is the problem? "Our world is full of men who dislike their jobs - but they trudge to work each day" because the role of provider tells them to. "A study by the Conference Board research group found that just 45 percent of Americans are happy in their jobs, a record low. A CBS News poll found that a third of U.S. men believe their generation has worse opportunities to succeed than their parents' generation (only a quarter of women felt this way)." And what is the root of it all? David has yet to pin point the cause. All that is evident today is that young men have learned to "drown out" the voice of the provider. From Japan to the US, "Their lack of ambition is hurting these men and the women who want to love them."
So what about men on the other end of the spectrum - men with an overdeveloped sense to provide? These guys are doomed to become workaholics. "Such men," David writes, "provide abundantly for their families' material needs, but neglect their relational and spiritual needs...An overdeveloped need to provide can produce man who are greedy, materialistic, and avaricious." The voice of the provider can become so overwhelming, that the men "drown out the voice of reason, the voice of wisdom, and the voice of God." Some of these men even become stingy. They "look to the future...so they hoard today in order to provide tomorrow...I'm speaking of men who deny their families the basic necessities of life in order to pile up treasure." They are the kind of men that fit this statistic - "Americans are the wealthiest people on the planet, yet they give on average, less than 2 percent of their annual income to charity."
Regardless of a man's development in this role, the pressure for a man to provide "is constant. His social standing and psychological well-being depend on it." Every man, David shared, wants to provide for his family. "But it takes a terrible toll on him. It's a constant struggle to know how much to work and how much to rest, what to spend and what to save, whether to quit his soul-killing job in order to follow his lifelong dream. Modern men," he continued, "live under a sword of fear that jobs will be eliminated, their skills will atrophy, or their contributions will be unwanted."
THE PROTECTOR
Men with an underdeveloped need to protect become men that are passive, weak, even cowardly. And "Society," David points out, "has always despised such men." As for those with an overdeveloped need to protect, they tend to be hyper-aggressive, misguided and competitive. For them, "It's not enough to win - they must crush their opponent." And it is here, David says, that we find the central secret behind a man's heart: "The person he protects most is himself."
"Your husband," David continues, "learned to protect himself when he was just a wee lad. Something bad happened to him...As your husband matured, more bad things happened to him. Some were normal hurts of growing up: A teasing bully. A girlfriend's rejections. Bad grades. Not being picked for the team. And some may have been horrific: Sexual abuse. Abandonment. Starvation. A raging, alcoholic parent. Every man is wounded as a boy. Whether these hurts are big or small isn't the issue." The protector role, as David describes, takes over. With every pain, the protector role takes a part of a man's heart and locks it away. But even locked away, the hurt is still there. So that's when survival strategies kick in.
"Boasting. Hiding. Humor. Drinking. Career. Addiction. Hobbies. Success. Sports. Sarcasm. Bigotry. Silence. Machismo. Revenge. Guilt. Wealth. Rage. Control." Men have several survival techniques. It just depends on when the hurt occurred. "If your husband was hurt often as a little boy, then there is part of his heart that's still three or four years old locked deep inside. If he was wounded as a teen, he may be emotionally frozen in adolescence. If he went off to war and witnessed its horrors, he may have come home a different man." And these hurts are often what lead to addictions for men. Drugs and alcohol put that protector role "to sleep...This is why men under the influence often act like children. Chemicals can sometimes release that part of their hearts that's frozen in childhood or adolescence." And sometimes that protector role is lifted when "his favorite team wins the game, if things go well at work, or after he's had a couple of drinks. Sometimes he shows up during sex, sports, or a movie." But it is important to realize that the problem isn't simply the addiction or the survival strategy. As David shares, "He's using these things in a vain attempt to release the boy from his cage."
For wives, David stresses that a man "...cannot begin to protect others until he stops protecting himself...you cannot free your husband from his cage. Only Christ can. And he usually accomplishes this work with the help of strong men. Men who know their way to the headwaters. Men who are not afraid to break open cages and set captives free."
THE GREATEST NEED
As far as David is concerned, a man's greatest need is the secret that will give women all that they need to know. "The greatest need of a man's soul is to be found competent. Your husband needs to be skilled at something. And his skill needs to be recognized by others...there is nothing more paralyzing to a man than the prospect of being found deficient, unskilled, or clumsy at a particular task." It's simply this: "If a man can't win, he doesn't want to play." He will naturally stick to what he is good at, while rejecting anything that makes him feel or appear foolish. What's more, "very few men have the courage to ask for help. It's considered unmanly. Most men would rather bumble their way through a challenge than ask for assistance." And this, David asserts, is directly linked to childhood experiences. As he described, "Boys learn that bullies pounce on any vulnerability or weakness. Being competent (and hiding your weaknesses) is a way to survive school...and men carry this survival strategy into adulthood."
And it is no wonder really why men carry this trait into adulthood. Just look at society, David argues. Men are expected to be strong, certain, and unwavering. Culture dictates that. In history, in politics, in medicine, in military, and even literature and entertainment, men never admit their weaknesses. For example, David shares that, "Captain Kirk would never turn to Spock and say 'The Klingons have beat us. We're toast.' Politicians are supposed to have all the answers - instantly. They can't even change their minds, or they're dismissed as flip floppers."
With that, David asks all wives to "build her husband's sense of competence. The more competent a man feels the more likely Protector is put down his sword and open the cage. If your husband knows you will never ridicule him if he fails, he's much more likely to stretch himself."
FINDING HONESTY
Another secret your husband isn't telling you: "You (the woman, the wife) hold tremendous power over him. No one else can take him to the pinnacle of ecstasy or the depths of despair the way you can. A few words from your mouth can catapult him or crush him. Your face is a mirror that tells him how he's performing as a man." Here, David also added that, "Most men do not tell their wives what they really feel because if they did, their wives would punish them for it. That's right. When men tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, their wives often become upset. Very upset." So men learn to lie, as it often works out better than the truth. For if women "penalize their man each time he tells his true feelings, they are sending their men this message; 'If you want your life to be hell, tell me the truth. If you want things to go smoothly, lie to me; tell me only those things that will keep me happy in my delusions.'"
In the end, David reaches out to all wives. "A lot of women bring their survival strategies into marriage as well...You were hurt as a little girl. You also practiced self-protection." From there, he points out that, whether women realize it or not, they see their husband through the lens of their father. They react to their husband as they would their father. And for women who had no father, they bring their abandonment issues into the marriage. Even women who had a good father bring their survival techniques into their relationship with their husband. So, the only way to combat these strategies is to be honest. As David suggests, "If you want a more open and honest relationship with your husband, both of you are going to have to learn to stop playing these kinds of games. You must learn to speak up and ask for what you want." And David ends on this thought: "If every married couple could get to this point, books like this one would become unneeded. There would be almost nothing your husband would be unwilling to tell you."