“If you’re an independent, strong, passionate woman, you are meant to have a great life and you know it. This book will give you permission to claim who you really are, and create a love relationship that celebrates your highest strength and offers you the highest happiness.”
—Tama Kieves, bestselling author of
This Time I Dance! Creating the Work You Love and also
Inspired & Unstoppable: Wildly Succeeding in your Life’s Work!
www.TamaKieves.com
Finally! A dating/relationship book for women like me. As a successful self-determined woman—a Mars Woman—I’m thrilled that Paulette Kouffman Sherman has shown that being who we are doesn’t require artifice to attract and sustain a relationship--and that with some slight, but authentic perspective shifting, we can be in alignment with the men who are right for us. Bravo for Paulette! She gives the Law of Attraction and Manifesting a Partner a real boost in relationship resonance for us Mars Women!
—Jackie Lapin, author of the award-winning, bestseller
Practical Conscious Creation: Daily Tips to Manifest Your Desires
www.jackielapin.com
“Finally, a dating book for the self-actualized person! In When Mars Women Date, Dr. Paulette Sherman gives readers the tools to fully honor their authentic selves and manifest the relationships they desire. Regardless of your planet of origin, you’ll find effective techniques here.”
—Deb Snyder, Ph.D Author of
Intuitive Parenting: Listening to the Wisdom on Your Heart
“In When Mars Women Date readers are treated to a private session with Dr. Sherman, not only about dating, but achieving a peaceful, well-balanced life. I found this book to be relevant to anyone seeking to find the right balance for themselves in love, marriage, and self awareness. I particularly enjoyed her own personal experiences in dating and marriage, as well as interviews with her clients. This “behind the scenes” view of women’s, and men’s, inner thoughts about relationships, sex, expected roles, and fears was insightful and surprising in some cases. I thoroughly enjoyed reading When Mars Women Date, and, for me, this line embodies the heart of Dr. Sherman’s book. “When she is loved for whom she is, she is eternally beautiful and the relationship can thrive.”
—Sally Royer-Derr
Lebanon Book Examiner
“ When Mars Women Date” is a book written for hard working, intelligent, successful career women who are seeking concrete dating advice with a spiritual twist. This book is very interactive. There are quizzes, exercises, statistics and stories from real people that will appeal to both women and men. You’ll learn new ways to relate with the opposite sex and discover why a non-traditional man may be perfect for you. I valued the advice given by the author and I think much of what I learned will work for me. I loved the stories by both men and women who are navigating the turbulent waters of love and relationships. It is comforting to know that I am not alone in my struggles. Dr. Paulette Kouffman Sherman is a “Mars Woman” and has used what she shares in the book to create her own successful relationship with her husband.
—Bonnie Jo Davis
Book-Worm Reviews
Parachute Jump Publishing
www.ParachuteJumpPublishing.com
Copyright 2012 by Dr. Paulette Kouffman Sherman
All rights reserved without written permission of
Parachute Jump Publishing.
Parachute Jump Publishing paperback edition, December 2012
Manufactured in the United States of America
Designed by Sara Blum
Edited by Julie Clayton
Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication (Provided by Quality Books, Inc.)
Sherman, Paulette Kouffman.
When Mars women date : how career women can love themselves into the relationship of their dreams / Paulette Kouffman Sherman ; foreword by Anodea Judith.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references. LCCN 2012912492
ISBN 978-0-98524-690-7 (paperback) ISBN 978-0-98524-691-4 (ebook)
1. Dating (Social customs) 2. Mate selection.
3. Man-woman relationships. I. Title.
HQ801.S54 2012 |
646.7'7 |
QBI12-600151
The mission of Parachute Jump Publishing:
Books that Inspire You to Love More
I dedicate this book to:
My mother Miriam,
who taught me how to be a powerful woman
To my daughter Sera—
may I teach you how to love from a powerful place
And to my husband Ian for encouraging me to be a force in the
world while still having a family to love.
Foreword
Introduction
Section I: Who Is the Mars Woman?
Chapter 1. Defining a “Woman from Mars”
Chapter 2. Ways that Mars Women Don’t Fit Traditional Dating Advice
MY DATING TIPS, INSTEAD
Chapter 3. Dating Etiquette that May No Longer Apply
DATING ETIQUETTE TIPS
Chapter 4. Know Thyself: Self-Acceptance
SELF-LOVE TIPS
Chapter 5. Balance and Wholeness, First
WHOLENESS & INTEGRATION TIPS
Chapter 6. Dating is Inner and Outer Work
7 “DATING IS WORK” PRINCIPLES
Section II: She Said
Chapter 7. What Happens When a Mars Woman Dates a Mars Man?
TIPS FOR THE MARS MAN & MARS WOMAN
Chapter 8. What Happens When a Mars Woman Dates a Venus Man?
TIPS FOR THE MARS WOMAN & VENUS MAN COUPLE
Chapter 9. Money and Romantic Relationships
MONEY TIPS FOR RELATIONSHIPS
Chapter 10. Work and Romantic Relationships
TIPS ON BALANCING WORK & RELATIONSHIPS
Chapter 11. Domestic Roles in Romantic Relationships
TIPS ON DOMESTIC RESPONSIBILITIES
DATING TIPS FOR MARS WOMEN
Section III: He Said
Chapter 12. What About Sex, Baby?
TIPS ON SEX AND DATING
Chapter 13. Feeling Appreciated by New Definitions and Acts of Love
TIPS ON APPRECIATION & NEW DEFINITIONS OF LOVE
Chapter 14. Shared Parenting
TIPS FOR SHARED PARENTING
Section IV: “They Do”
Chapter 15. The Importance of Communication
Chapter 16. Alternative Relationships and Third Party Solutions
Afterword
Resources
References
Relevant Research Studies
Acknowledgments
About the Author
The dance of masculine and feminine lies deep in our psyches—nearly as old as darkness and light or emptiness and form. A basic polarity in the universe, yin and yang fuel the agony and ecstasy of our external longings and internal dynamics. Some say they make the world go ‘round.
As figures in complementary costumes, masculine and feminine archetypes have twirled across history’s dance floor as predominant influences ruling major stages and epochs. This dance has brought us through the twists and turns of humanity’s childhood to where we are now—a time of adolescent initiation, where the song of evolution is calling us into a new dance of adult partnership—as interdependent pieces in the new puzzle that we are all trying to solve together.
On the way to the dance hall, we spend time in men’s groups or women’s groups with the express purpose of moving deeper into the polarity of male and female mysteries. This is important. It seems the reflection of our own gender helps us to see ourselves better. More solid in ourselves, we can better hold our shape in the challenge of relationship. Without knowing who we are intrinsically, through a deep intimacy with our own interior, we cannot hope to have true intimacy with another. And without the intimacy of understanding of another’s interior, we cannot combine these differences in service of something larger.
Only by playing with a full deck—with a valued input from both genders—can we create wholeness in our world. The next step is re-integrating masculine and feminine to see how we can meet the challenges of our time.
Evolutionary partnership calls for a new level of synthesis. Our challenge is to integrate masculine and feminine while still maintaining their distinct integrity. Even so, these archetypes and all they represent are evolving as well. Whether this plays out in our personal relationships (of any persuasion, gay, bi, or straight), in the workplace, or in politics, our old roles and definitions no longer suffice. New ones are evolving through us, discovered more by internal exploration than external norms.
The Sacred Marriage of masculine and feminine is not just about romantic relationship, however, but about balancing the intrinsic values that (for better or worse) we have assigned to them: mind and body, light and dark, heaven and earth, spirit and soul, individuality and community, rational and mythic, to name but a few. Representing a higher synthesis, the Sacred Marriage can only be found through elements that have found both their difference and their commonality. Without maintaining our distinctions, we become an undifferentiated mush. Without finding our commonalities, we remain forever competitive, isolated and alienated.
Carl Jung said maturity is the ability to hold the tension of opposites. This is the essence of Tantric teaching, to reach new heights of differentiation and weave these polarities into a higher synthesis. Such heights bring us to the feet of the Divine—a revelation that beckons us into a deeper mystery—one that we are discovering and inventing together.
We scarcely know what it means to truly meet and see each other as Divine. Given the history of our long, checkered past, this is understandable. We have been growing up through stages of childhood ignorance to enter our adolescent initiation into a taste of divine consciousness. Like the baby of the king and queen who gets sent down the river to be raised away from knowledge of its true heritage, our evolution is the long pathway back to realization of our identity as young Gods and Goddesses. Our power in the world is reaching the scale of gods: the power to change the climate, alter the gene pool, or blow ourselves to bits. But do we have the maturity of divine consciousness to balance this level of power?
The challenge to being witnessed as Divine is to truly access the Divine within ourselves. But the Divine is not a static concept—but something that is evolving along with us, and even more through us.
In the past, humans have seen themselves as children of God, with the Divine as some kind of parent. In our earliest beliefs, (as far as we can tell), humans worshipped an archetypal Mother. We were birthed from her primal womb of nature as infants in her abundant garden, eventually learning to cultivate our own food, soon to crawl across the land in our teeming toddlerhood. This was the era of the Static Feminine—nurturing and supportive, but so stable there was little change or evolution. We were but infants after all. We knew so little about the world, didn’t have much influence over our destiny and lived short lives with relatively little change. The only animals with fire, we could barely make it warm when it was cold or bring light when it was dark.
As the archetypal Mother had babies—both boys and girls—we began to see the Divine as Mother and Father. Riane Eisler has postulated this as a partnership society, but it was more like our parents were the partners, and we were still children to the Divine. We were naive and powerless, living in supplication, centered around the magic of our prayers as petition for their bounty. This was still the era of the Static Feminine, for we were centered around the fixed cycles of nature.
In the violent overthrow of the mother goddess cultures that began roughly 5000 years ago, we entered the phase of the Dynamic Masculine. The tables were turned and all values turned to their opposite. Over the millennia, women were reduced to the status of submissive daughters and the masculine raised to the archetype of Father.
He was a stern parent who could forge a burgeoning humanity into some semblance of cooperation, first through violence and force, then evolving to the Static Masculine through law, order, and reason. We learned to read and write, developed rational thinking and scientific knowledge. We developed industry and woke up to our individuality. We rejected our past infusion with nature, saw our mythical beliefs as fairy tales of a younger time, and continued to grow up through the middle years of childhood—gaining knowledge and power and opening to an ever wider world.
We’ve now gone through the dynamics of the Great Mother and her son, and the Great Father and his dutiful daughters—all stages of our collective childhood. But we have been growing up all this time, finding ourselves and our purpose, learning about the world, evolving. It is time now, as Steve Baerhman has said, for us to stop being children of God and start becoming adults of God.
Like adolescents taking our first forays into romantic relationships, we have largely played in our separate realms until now. And like adolescents, we still barely know who we are, let alone how to retain the best of our differences as we come together in partnership. But relating as mature archetypes—not as child to parent, but as co-creative equals is the new challenge of our time. Part of that maturity is men learning to dance with women in their power.
Of course we have a long way to go to achieve this parity. Women are still hugely oppressed in the world, in some places struggling for the simple right to drive a car or get the most basic education. In first world countries, women have only been able to vote for less than a hundred years. The political and financial worlds are still highly male dominant and it shows.
But we are making headway, learning from each other, and evolving. The final stage in this archetypal foursome is the Dynamic Feminine—typified by women actively taking their power and transforming the linear Static Masculine to an all inclusive evolutionary spiral once again. This does not imply domination by women, but the inclusion of everyone, whole system thinking, non-linear dynamics, with creativity welling up from the deepest parts of our soul.
The balance between static and dynamic, masculine and feminine, takes the best of all possibilities and completes the quaternity of wholeness. We can and must create a vision of where we are going. But it is only through reclaiming wholeness and balance that we will have any hope of actually getting there.
This book addresses the new dynamics of masculine and feminine, allowing more freedom, creative expression, and authenticity for all concerned. In a world where feminine dynamism is sorely needed, how do we form a new kind of relationship that supports what the world needs most? Through dynamic women who know who they are and how to make a difference.
If you’re one of those women, or one of the lucky men that gets to love one of those women, this book will help you navigate the new terrain of a healthy relationship. As we enter our global rite of passage from the love of power to the power of love, our relationships will be the bedrock upon which the next age is built. This book is a travel guide to the new territory that’s possible when both men and women are fully actualized in their power and creativity.
Anodea Judith, Ph.D.
Author of Wheels of Life; Eastern Body,
Western Mind: Creating on Purpose; Waking the Global Heart
www.SacredCenters.com
Finding our own authentic version of “happily ever after” can be a challenge. We’re surrounded with stereotypical myths and messages about how men and women date, relate, and marry but most aren’t current or productive. Women are told that they can’t have a successful career, love and family but it’s long been accepted that men can. So, the very act of dating and mating tacitly dictates that a woman give up her masculine energy in order to attract love, marriage and children. Many people no longer fit this traditional paradigm. And when a person doesn’t fit, they often tell themselves that they’ll never be attractive to the opposite sex.
We need a dating book that captures our changing times and allows us to grow as a society. In this book, I’ll focus upon single, successful, career women who are looking to find a great mate, and the men who’d love to date them.
I will be calling this single, successful, career gal the “Mars woman.” She is assertive, authentic, daring, intelligent, and independent. She knows what she wants in life and in a relationship. She plays by her own rules.
In the old dating paradigm, women were considered passive parties who waited around for a man to ask them out. Then they’d play hard to get, trump up the Feminine behaviors, and patiently expect him to chase and claim them.
Women were expected to have predominantly Feminine energy in order to be attractive to men, their Masculine energy counterpart. Feminine energy was considered the passive, receptive, emotional, nonverbal, magnetic force in the relationship.
In contrast, men were expected to embody predominantly Masculine energy, which was active, doing, work-oriented: the pursuer and giver.
This old dating paradigm is now outdated. Mars women today are pioneers in every area of their lives, including their relationships. They are able to take a more active role in dating and can express both their Masculine and Feminine energies, to assert the whole, dynamic women they are. They are able to assert their opinions, go after what they want, and they have a lot to offer a man. And this new embodiment of Masculine energy in women is no longer a turn off to most men. Men today are ready to be met with passion, honesty, and full acceptance in their relationships. Both men and women seem willing to balance the Feminine and Masculine roles and energies so they can create happy, healthy and whole partnerships.
Yet there are still so many romantic stereotypes about intelligent, successful, independent women scaring men away.
In my private practice as a psychologist and dating coach I work with many single career women who are trying to find love, and I’ve been there myself, before I actually found the love of my life. It became evident while working with my clients that a book exploring this new dating and relationship paradigm, one which encourages successful career women to embrace who they are, while attracting terrific men who support their goals, was sorely needed.
I remember what it was like to date. When my first love from high school returned from graduate school and we began dating again, he said that he wanted to marry me. The primary reason I chose not to marry him was that he wanted a traditional wife who would spend most of her time at home. He was a teacher who worked with children all day, and felt strongly that children ought to be with their mother most of the time. Also, he wasn’t thrilled with my expectation that he would be willing to be an equal partner in caring for the children we hoped to have, even as I pursued my writing and interests. When I ended the relationship, I remember saying to him that I might well end up being a single woman alone with her cats for the rest of my life. He was sure that I wouldn’t, but in that moment I really wondered if I would ever find a man who supported my career goals as much as his own, and who would help out equally with the household maintenance and child-raising. I knew it was possible in theory, but here I was walking away from my high school sweetheart, whom I loved and who had many terrific qualities, and I couldn’t help the doubts that crept in. Was I being too difficult or demanding?
On the other hand, I’d spent most of my adult life in school, getting my Masters and Doctorate degrees and training to be a healer. I knew that I wanted to help people on a large scale and that this would require my time, focus, energy, and possibly some travel. I was passionate about my work and wouldn’t give up that part of me in order to get married and have kids. Yet, I still did want a family and I knew that I’d be an involved, loving mom. I wanted to balance work, children, and a relationship, and have my partner do the same.
In spite of that momentary wobble in my resolve long ago, I was actually very clear about what I wanted in life. I was also able to articulate my desires to subsequent dates, and see if they embraced a similar vision for a partnership. Eventually I met and married a man who said he would always support my dreams and that he had no problem watching our kids both in the day-to-day, but also if my work took me away from home for brief periods of time. He’s remained true to his word and is an excellent, involved father. In fact, after doing the research for this book and discovering that some men generally are more inclined to be like my high school sweetheart, this writing became a sort-of love letter to my husband. He’s a great dad and husband, and he continues to encourage me to be the career woman I want to be while having a family. So, Ian Sherman I love you…but I digress.
Professionally, I’m a psychologist who specializes in dating, so I see many powerful, successful single clients both in coaching and psychotherapy. Many of them are wanting a life mate and to start a family. Many are females in their late 30’s, and are feeling an increased inner pressure to meet someone and have a child before it’s biologically “too late.” Some want to find a man who’s equally successful, fearing that a less successful man might feel insecure by comparison. They also do not want to give up or sacrifice important aspects of themselves, such as their career or independence, in order to attract a mate.
I’ve helped them become clear about what they most need and want in a partner and relationship. We’ve worked through many dating issues that arise from changing gender roles and financial disparity between men and women in modern society. I’ve helped them learn to trust their heart instead of conforming to what is presented as “the norm” in the media regarding romantic love.
This book offers examples of the dating quandaries that powerful women who date face, from both the male and female perspective. In it, I challenge popular dating advice and provide new tips about how we can create powerful, balanced, romantic unions, eliciting advice from “Mars women” who’ve already achieved this.
My title, When Mars Women Date, is a nod to John Grey for his international best-selling book, Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus. Grey’s book achieved great success in part because he illuminated the differences between men and women, relating them as metaphorically being worlds apart—as in, Mars and Venus. This book begins where Grey and other dating experts left off. My focus is less on the sexual divide and more on how a particular segment of the dating population—what I am calling the Mars Woman—can become global citizens of planet Earth in the new millennium, and can transcend stereotypical attitudes and paradigms to approach dating, making their relationships stronger, more intimate, more healthy, and more fun.
Gray suggests that men and women must respect gender role differences to have a successful relationship.
In contrast, my book says that Mars women can date while remaining Mars women, or having more traditionally Masculine energy. Gray’s model stresses the acceptance of stereotypical gender differences, and although this may work for some, it may not work for many modern couples that don’t relate to those dichotomies and roles. The singles I see in my work needed a dating book that helped their non-traditional relationships thrive!
As times change, many of the traditional gender roles and rules don’t and won’t apply. And dating (which is hard enough in itself) is even more confusing when these new and often hybrid roles aren’t explored and made explicit. In the following pages, single men and women openly discuss the blessings and challenges of sharing power, decision-making, and courtship. They also share how men and women can fall in love authentically and create healthy partnerships and families.
Most dating books focus on telling the reader how to catch an attractive mate within in a certain time frame, but this book will tell you how to expand your consciousness so that you can create authentic lasting love, for yourself and a mate. This book addresses momentous decisions such as who you want to be in the world, who you want to marry, and how your children will live their lives.
In the new millennium, we each have the opportunity to become more balanced: physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. To become more balanced we need to affect the right relationship within ourselves, and we start by metaphorically looking in the mirror and noticing how we perceive our reflection. The more you come to know, accept and love yourself in a healthy, authentic way, the more likely you will attract a similar, healthy partner. This will in turn affect your home environment and family dynamics, and as more couples enter into conscious, loving relationships, this more harmonious relational shift ripples around the world. Each individual, every family, and every community has a resounding effect upon the sum total of human consciousness.
I am a Mars woman myself. I can’t imagine living my life without following my soul’s passion. I am driven to fully express that passion and myself in the world, and in my relationships. I am definitely a “doer.”However, when I was recently diagnosed with breast cancer, I was forced to slow down and create a new balance within myself and consequently, in my family and lifestyle. My mantra became, “My mission is stronger than my cancer,” but I spent more time relaxing, trusting my intuition, connecting with my feelings and Spirit, in nature, surrendering to the moment, and caring for my body. This was a real gift for me, so I have incorporated some balancing exercises for you too, my Mars women readers. I have seen from working with many Mars women clients, and now firsthand, that in working so hard to succeed and make a difference in the outer world, both men and women often lose sight of the balancing value of integrating Feminine energy into our inner world—and outer lives. I’d love you to receive this gift without feeling like you have to lose sight of your own passion and what you can contribute in this world.
I know that as Mars women your mental capacities are extremely well developed, so I’ll speak to you in your language throughout this book, providing you with statistics, common sense arguments, and case examples of how Mars women successfully date.
We all know that when it comes to learning, we need different skills to achieve goals in various arenas. We use different parts of our brain for work and for love. The energy centers in our body are called the chakras, and love and work normally affects different energy centers. As career women we may need to recognize that we can access a different consciousness to succeed in love. To use an analogy, it is like trying to use a cellist to write a grant proposal for your microbiology research. So, I’ve provided meditations for your heart and Spirit to help you attract love throughout this book, so you can tap into those areas of consciousness as well.
I believe that we create everything on the inside first and then manifest it through our conscious awareness. My first book, Dating from the Inside Out, discussed how our limiting beliefs and past baggage in love are often the cause of repeated love patterns, and especially the unhealthy ones. This current book will help career women transition from success at work to success in their love lives.
We’re so saddled with different roles and responsibilities today that we can often feel like different people at different times. Yet through it all we can stay connected to our Higher Self. When we align with this level of consciousness we can make the best choices for ourselves in all areas. I will help you connect to your Higher Self throughout this book.
Sometimes we cut off seemingly unnecessary parts of ourselves, like our Spirit, or attending to our body or feelings, because we want to apply more energy to succeed, particularly in our work. We think our energy is limited, like our time. But really we are closing the valve on our life energy flows and getting stuck on just one channel. As a result, we lose sight of our full potential when we don’t honor our body, mind, emotions, and Spirit. There are many layers and levels of truth and consciousness, and when we can access them all, we’re far more powerful and can better manifest our dreams.
So for me, presenting the relevant dating facts to brilliant women isn’t enough. This book is also about helping men and women find balance in their Masculine and Feminine energies within themselves, as well as in a relationship. In order to be whole, you must take in information from all channels and deeply process this new awareness. To facilitate this process as you are going through this book, I’ve summarized the information from each chapter so that it can be integrated with your Spirit, mind, body, and heart. At the end of each chapter you’ll find an invocation to align your Spirit, an exercise to embody this information, an intention to focus your mind on what you’ve learned, and an affirmation to open your heart to it.
If you’re not used to calling upon a higher purpose or trusting your heart wisdom, this may feel strange at first, but try to remain open. I’ve written invocations about the Goddess archetypes after each chapter to help you identify with your Feminine energy and gain support from it. In the end, you may find that your heart grows even bigger than your mind and that your Higher Self infuses you with new clarity and focus.
This journey is about much more than dating. It’s about figuring out who you are, and loving yourself. It’s about attracting someone who gets you and fits you, and then possibly creating children from that synergy. But the implications stretch even further—because your children will have children, so by doing your own inner work and balancing, you’re affecting a new consciousness that has a multi-generational impact. And that’s huge, because it will create even more love on a global scale.
So, please join me in this conversation. You can email me at kpaulet@verizon.net or visit my website www.whenmarswomendate.com. Together we can reinforce an emerging new relationship paradigm, envisioning more romantic partnerships where people are fully expressed and supported in their personal and shared journey, and so are their children.
Yesterday I picked out a card from a deck called “Messages from Your Angels,” by Doreen Virtue. The card said: “It is safe for you to be powerful. You know how to be powerful in a loving way that benefits others as well as yourself.” I want to share this message with Mars women and the men who date them. My intention for this book is that we all reclaim our power within a context of global love.
My Best in Love,
Paulette
My definition of a “Mars woman” is a successful, professional woman who is often outspoken, incredibly competent, earns a good living, and is an intelligent leader. She identifies with some traditionally “Masculine” traits such as being assertive and action-oriented. She respects her own thinking abilities, and wants to leave her mark in the outside world. She likes to be appreciated and respected, and wants to share the decision-making within her relationships.
The planet Mars is associated with the third chakra or energy center in our body. For those of you who don’t know, chakras are wheellike energy centers in the subtle body and each chakra is associated with certain characteristics. The third chakra is associated with will, self-confidence, and action: the very qualities that epitomize the Mars woman. So, Mars women have a fiery energy associated with the color yellow, according to this chakra model.
Mars women also often have some commonalities in their upbringing. According to Dr. Sylvia Rimm in See Jane Win, many Mars women had parents who set high expectations for them. These young women invested time in study, were very involved in extracurricular activities, won competitions, received awards, traveled, played sports, were independent, and had a strong work ethic.
The traditional dichotomy of men who hail from Mars and women from Venus derives from John Gray’s classic book in which he identified specific gender differences in responses, communication, and relational roles, many of which were based on traditional paradigms. For example, Gray says that men talk to problem-solve and find solutions; women talk to express their feelings and be understood.
The Mars woman, however, is more Masculine than Gray’s Venus women. She may not have predominantly “Feminine” energy, she may communicate to problem-solve rather than express her feelings, she may be more of a leader in the outer world, and yet she can still be very attractive to men.
Historically, a woman’s role was to be mother, homemaker, and wife, so it was assumed that women were more oriented toward feelings, relationships, children, and domesticity; and men to action, career, finances, and conquering the outer world.
Today, many modern singles no longer relate to these limiting gender roles and research supports this. Astin did a study in 2005 and found that the number of young men and women who expect to have a relationship based on traditional gender roles has dropped significantly. There’s also evidence showing that gender differences in communication style are matters of degree rather than characteristics, and that biological differences affecting communication are minimal. The Bem Sex Role Inventory asserts that men and women develop attributes in both Masculine and Feminine gender domains.
In my personal work as a psychologist and dating coach, I’ve observed that traditional gender divisions are outdated and unrealistic now, especially when we understand the societal and psychological changes that have occurred in modern society.
So, in this first section of the book I’ll provide an overview of how dating has evolved, explain more about what I see happening in the dating scene with the single Mars woman, and describe a new “dating and mating” paradigm. You’ll also have a chance to take a quiz here to identify whether you’re a Mars woman, or whether you’re a man who is dating one.
Dating involves social activities between two people to decide suitability as a mate. Often we also call the time period before engagement, dating.
Historically, dating was a courtship process known as “calling,” according to Beth Bailey in her book Front Porch to Back Seat. When a girl became a certain age she was eligible to receive callers, and her mother or guardian would invite the young man over. Men would “call” on women and visit them on designated days at their home. Thus, initially in the courtship process it was women who took the initiative. But as society changed and more women began joining the workforce and getting a higher education, courtship rules changed. Rather than men visiting in the home by invitation, men and women would go out to the theater or to dinner on their own. This shift in courtship, from calling to dating, evolved into more of a male-initiated sphere. Men began doing the asking out, and paying, for dates.
The goals of marriage have also changed. Historically, families arranged marriages with the goal of economic, and in the case of the nobility, political partnership. But later, when dating in public became common, couples dated to increase intimacy. Dating became an opportunity for two people to see what they had in common and if there was enough chemistry to result in love and long-term partnership.
Today, dating has evolved from personally orchestrated public outings to an industry of Internet dating, singles events, fix-ups, speed dating, and matchmaking services. According to a 2005 Pew Research survey, three million Americans have long-term relationships or end up married after having met on a dating site. Birth control and legalized abortion have made sexual and romantic relationships before marriage (and while dating) common, and today many people even live together before marriage. Gasp! Times have certainly changed.
As we know, today more people marry for love than political or financial gain. Love implies a lasting heartfelt friendship that will withstand the emotional rigors of a lifetime. But although we say that our intention for marriage is to “find love,” dating is still often viewed as a game with rules geared toward manipulating attraction. Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist who writes a lot about gender differences, says dating is a game designed to “impress and capture,” which boosts dopamine levels in the brain. I’ve seen many women play “hard to get” and many men attempt “seduction strategies” that don’t reflect who they really are, all to attract the opposite sex. I will discuss later why, in my view, approaching dating as a game is not a great way to begin a relationship.
But to continue with the broader dating context, today people date with varying goals. Some date for sex, fun, companionship, long-term relationships or marriage. Singles attempt to date partners with similar dating goals, and the majority of singles over the age of twenty-five date as a forerunner to long-term relationships. The ultimate goal of a long-term relationship is particularly true of the self-referencing, education and career-minded Mars women I’m describing.
Of course, people of all ages date, which is also indicative of how times have changed. Women over the age of 30 are just in their prime, not undesirable “spinsters” as they once were called. People in their teens, twenty year-olds, middle-aged singles, divorcees, and seniors date.
And most relevantly, professional women date after having established their career, often with an eye towards marriage. This particular group is the Mars woman to which I’m referring. They can be anywhere from 25 to 60 years old, but generally the Mars women clients I work with range from mid-twenties to early fifties, are career-oriented, and often wanting to find a partner who will share and complement their life, dreams, and lifestyle.
In the courtship days, single women preferred men with “means,” and men were attracted to youthful, fertile women. But these days, men pay more attention to education and earning potential in women, and women look for men who are confident in expressing themselves. New studies show that other factors also influence what each gender is attracted to. In this book, we’ll explore in depth whether Mars Women today are paying more attention to men who are less financially successful, but who offer a range of other terrific qualities. But first, let’s continue exploring the qualities that define the “Mars woman.”
A Mars Woman is a successful career woman with some traditionally Masculine traits. She’s assertive, successful, and passionate about her career, in my experience. She’s ambitious, invested in her education and training, and values her intelligence and talents. She speaks her mind and expects to be heard in her relationships. She wants equality in romantic relationships, and contrary to traditional paradigms, this in no way suggests that she is un-Feminine. She can be beautiful, nurturing, maternal, and playful, but most of all she is confident and self-reliant.
I have met many Mars women through my psychology practice. They are highly successful in their careers, come from good families, and often have large social networks. Intelligent, motivated, hard-working, and great planners, they’ve put a lot of effort into their work and realize that the time has come for them to give equal energy to dating, marriage, and starting a family, before it’s “too late.” They don’t need a mate for financial support or sex, and don’t want a marriage of convenience. Most have the resources to have a baby alone, but they really want intimacy and to join forces with a partner they can love and respect—and to be equally loved and respected in return.
These women have already achieved many of their goals, so they bring many valuable qualities to the partnership table: intelligence, income, education, responsibility, organizational skills, leadership abilities, and reciprocity. They’re highly discerning and often want a partner who will enrich their lives, but they don’t want to sacrifice their career, independence, decision-making abilities, and natural leadership qualities. They understand that relationships require work, compromise, and negotiation, but they want a mate who’ll meet them halfway in the division of labor and income, or be willing to bring in outside resources to create life-balance for them both. These women want a partner who respects their opinions and ideas and who’s an intellectual, emotional, and physical teammate.
It can be confusing for these women to be competent leaders in the work world and then discover that they are expected to be passive “followers” when dating. To many women this feels disingenuous and demeaning. They’ve been told by various dating experts not to give their opinions on dates, not to ask a man out, never to call him, never to pay, not to speak about their accomplishments or to give men advice. This doesn’t feel natural, nor does it align with their values or personhood.
Dating is also challenging since these women are usually incredibly busy and already lead full lives. They may go to a gym multiple times a week and have various self-care regimens, including hair highlighting, manicure, massage, therapy or coaching, and acupuncture that already fill up their precious “spare” time. Dating has to be able to fit into their already demanding schedule. Many report that they’re already happy and fulfilled, and enjoy running their own lives and making their own choices. So, although they crave love and companionship, they aren’t needy and won’t easily settle or please men at the expense of their own needs and desires. When they date they’re usually looking for someone who’ll appreciate them as they are, and who’ll fit into or complement their existing lives.
Society has gone through many developmental changes in terms of romantic relationships between men and women. During the time of the caveman our survival was at stake. As a result, since men were stronger, they were the hunters and protectors, while women cooked the food and cared for the young. Survival as a species was key and their respective roles served this end.
Later, sexual attraction became a strong element in relationships and sexual differences became associated with differentiating social behaviors of Masculine and Feminine energies for men and women respectively. Thus, romantic love became defined by the maxim, “opposites attract.”
As society pushed forward, women began to feel left behind in their restrictive Feminine role, and wanted more participation and equal rights in the outside world. A power struggle ensued between the sexes as women fought for status and rights. Roles became less clearly defined, and men and women began to test each other in dating and relationships. Gradually, men and women began to redefine their identities, roles, and definitions of personal power.
This is where we’ve been as a society but now let’s look at where we are going. Men and women are starting to unite these Masculine and Feminine energies within themselves through self-love. This process (which will be discussed throughout this book) will allow men and women to share roles and to create more balanced, loving, and cooperative relationships with one another. And as humanity progresses, we’ll come to recognize our unity through love more than emphasizing our differences through fear. We’ll recognize that man or woman, black or white, Jewish or Protestant, gay or straight, we’re all ultimately from one family: humanity. Most people agree that even the Divine contains both Masculine and Feminine energies. The Divine embodies everything, and ultimately so do we. This is the path we are walking now and we probably never guessed that it could begin with a focus on our dating!
If we are on our way to unifying the Masculine and Feminine energies through love, then why is it that there are so many Mars women who have cultivated even more Masculine energy now?
From a developmental perspective, woman are still coming out of that power struggle period with men, where we had to battle with the Masculine paradigm and learn to compete on Masculine terms in order to assert our power and win in the outer world. The good news is that there are increasing numbers of women in the “new” arenas of work, politics, and commerce. Women have shown that they do indeed have their own identities, that they too can make some of the rules, and that they are independent. The not-so-good news is that for many women, being successful in the Masculine-dominated arena meant that they sacrificed, diminished, or rejected their Feminine energies in order to fit in and be on an equal footing with their Masculine energy counterparts. The pendulum had swung to the other extreme. Now the pendulum is swinging back to a balance point, where both men and women are enfolding and reintegrating Feminine energy, bringing themselves and each other into greater balance and wholeness.
Today, there are more Mars women due to many social and psychological forces, most significantly is that more women are in the work force today than at any period in history. Forty-seven percent of the labor force will be women in 2018 in the U.S., practically the same number as men. This is a statistical, concrete measure of women’s equal presence in the work world.
Women are also having children much later in life, which frees them to pursue an education, career, and other interests. One survey found that 67% of young women expected to hold an executive position at work and 88% expected to earn a high salary. So, women are envisioning themselves as successful in their careers, instead of picturing themselves as being rescued by a white knight and then staying home in the role of homemaker. There are also fewer stay-at-home moms now. Only 17.76% of women with children remained home with their husband as the sole financial provider, according to one 2007 study.
Women work because it makes them happy. Research also shows that women are happiest when they’re able to have both a career and family. It is perhaps not so surprising then that women tend to be most content when they work in part-time jobs, or can work part-time hours at a job so they have time for work, time with their children, and time for themselves. I suspect that many men, if given an opportunity, might also prefer the opportunity to work part-time hours outside the home and have more time at home with their families and for themselves.
Educational demographics have shifted considerably. Today more women earn bachelor degrees than men, and they’ve earned more than 59% of all postsecondary degrees in 2008 and 52.7% of all doctoral degrees in 2009. As women get more schooling, they create more educational and career opportunities for other women. As women teach, become politicians, and CEOs, society will address more issues that affect working women and working mothers, including childcare, sick leave, and telecommuter opportunities.