Everything looks like a nail when you're a hammer

Everything looks like a nail when you're a hammer is the reaction I had to  It's Not About The Nail 

making the rounds on social media. I notice that most of the people sharing appear to be males, as they find it perfectly expresses their frustration of wishing to solve an easily solvable problem when their female significant others prefer to talk in nebulous terms about the effects of the problem and turn aside any suggestions for a solution.

What the video doesn't get that in real life, most problems are not nails that can easily be removed with no problem. In fact, many difficulties have no simple solutions at all and require an approach to deal with that. And trying to reduce everything to a situation that will be solved as easily as removing a nail is not going to help when empathy will.Yes, I do get it. And I'm sure it appeals to the "Men are from Mars/ Women from Venus" fans who like everything put into simple terms of gender division. Seehttp://www.psychotherapy.net/article/gottman-and-gray#section- a-tale-of-two-relationship-gurus

Those who really want to discover what women want, read up on your Dr. John Gottman. You can start with Why Marriages Succeed or Fail by John Gottman, PhD with Nan Silver (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1994)

That brings us to the phenomenon that always astounds well-meaning men. When a husband offers a solution to a problem his wife complains about, why does she get upset with him? Dr. Gottman explains that the wives are seeking "validation" and so find their husbands’ "hyperrational" reaction to their feelings distancing. "Rather than acknowledge the emotional content of their wife’s words, they try to offer a practical solution to the problem being described." The fact is that they are not interested in "hearing advice" at this point; they only wish to be heard and have their feelings acknowledged. What the listener is supposed to do, in that case, is use his imagination to picture himself in his wife’s "emotional" situation. His response should convey that he comprehends her “feelings and consider them valid” (159). Responding with empathy is not humoring someone unreasonable just to avoid an argument but crossing beyond one’s own emotional boundaries to appreciate the experience of another.

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