Man's behavior that drives a woman crazy (5)
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‘Why do men hate shopping so much?’ [Allan & Barbara Pease, "Why Men Lie & Why Women Cry"]
It is very difficult for a man and a woman to shop together. This is because the man and the woman have different shopping mentality. For example, when the woman shops, she moves around in a zigzag fashion, look at a thing and lift it up and let it down (many times she is not even buying it). And she doesn’t know how much this stresses her husband. A British psychologist, Dr. David Lewis, says, ‘When a man is shopping during Christmas, his stress intensity is almost similar to the stress felt by a police officer who has to suppress the rioters (Pease). Why is the man so stressed out shopping with his wife?
One of the reasons why the man is stressed while shopping with his wife is because he has a "tunnel vision". So he is familiar with moving straight from A to B (Pease). That's why the man is stressed out when his wife is shopping in the zig-zag fashion with him. The woman with a wide angle of view is not so difficult to pass through crowded shopping center. But since the man has the tunnel vision, if he moves in the zigzag fashion in the crowded shopping center, he is stressed out because he has to make more conscious decisions (Pease). Knowing this, the woman must move in a straight line instead of moving in the zig-zag form if she wants to finish her shopping with her husband. By doing so, she will make her husband receive less stress. So I encouraged my church women to move in a rectangle way as much as possible when they go to shopping with their husbands. Walking from point A to point B, walking from point B to point C, and point C to point D, the women can minimize the angle change at least by walking in a zigzag fashion for their husbands. And it is better not to turn around. My wife knows that I don’t like to turn around. So when she leaves something at the church, she doesn’t call me and ask me to go back to the church and bring her the forgotten thing. Shopping is same. The woman should never go back to a shop that she has already passed for her husband. The reason is because when she goes back, her husband will be stressed out. Also, it is said that it is not good for his health.
Another reason why the man is stressed while shopping with his wife is because he thinks that his wife is just shopping inefficiently without a clear purpose, goal or time limit. The man's inclination has a clear target of what to buy according to his needs before going shopping. For example, when he shops for Christmas, he goes to the shopping center, already thinking about what to buy for his wife and children. And if he goes to the shopping center alone, he gets things he already thought about. However, even if his wife goes shopping with a note of what to buy, when she enters the shopping center, she does eye-shopping because she can see many things besides the targets she was looking for in her wide field of view. However, this behavior of the woman makes her husband feel limited in patience. He doesn’t understand at all why she does it. Especially if he is result-oriented, he gets stress when his wife moves around here and there without buying any things. And if his wife eventually goes home with empty hands, he thinks it is ineffective and a waste of time. Of course, from the woman's point of view, she will not think so. One interesting interpretation is that when a man goes out hunting in the old days, he chooses a target, takes a bow and a spear, kills and grabs the target, and returns home. However, a woman had habit of planting the things in the garden of her house, and it is interpreted that when she goes to the shopping center, she goes to this store and that stores and lifts stuffs up and put them down. Haha. This is the interesting interpretation. With this interpretation, I think it is understandable that the woman goes to the shopping center and goes this store and that store, lift these things up and putting them down and so on even though she is not going to buy all of them. The man has clear things to buy when he goes to shopping center, but there are things that the woman can buy or not to buy. She doesn’t have to have a clear target to buy. When we think about these differences between the man and the woman, in order for the couple to enjoy shopping or at least not to be distressed with shopping and come back home safely, the couple should make concessions to understand each other's point of view and yield to each other. For example, the woman should know why her husband hates shopping and try to avoid things that stress her husband out as much as she can. She has to learn from her husband's point of view how to shop more efficiently together. The man also has to learn how to shop with his wife. Sometimes he should try to shop in zigzag fashion with his wife, little by little. Haha. So he needs to train himself in changing the angle. And he should trust his wife and leave her alone when she touches stuffs, lifting them up and putting them down, even though he thinks that she doesn’t need to buy them. He should wait for her to finish shopping. I am sure there are many other things to talk about, if the couple make concessions and try to work out together, their shopping will gradually improve.
Longtime ago, I went to Target to shop alone. I went there to buy things for my three children for Children’s day (my wife was working). Before going to buy gifts that cost around $10, I asked the children what they wanted for the Children's day. My first son and first daughter said they didn’t know, while the youngest daughter told me that she wanted a Barbie doll. So I went to the shopping center Target, went around the first and the second floor, looking for the gifts for my three children. I intentionally walked a lot in zigzag form. Although I used to not go back to the place I already went, on that day I went back to the same places to look for the gifts for my children. I was not very stressed at the time. I bought the puzzle for my first son and two Tom & Jerry DVDs for $ 5 each for my first daughter. For my youngest daughter, I eventually went back to the Barbie doll section and bought the doll set at an affordable price. Like this, I go shopping alone sometimes. And I think that if I shop by myself, I am doing pretty good job. Haha. Of course, this is just my opinion. But there are things I cannot do well. And one of them is buying your wife's clothes. Once I went to Target to buy a gift for my wife. As I was walking around in Target, one woman cloth come into my eyes and caught my attention. So I bought it and brought it home and gave to my wife as a gift. But after few days, I saw that cloth in the corner of the closet. When I saw it, I thought that my wife didn’t like it that much. From that time on I didn’t buy any clothes for my wife. Haha.
If you are a woman, you should plan a way to shop with your husband. If you already gave up and are shopping alone, I think it is not too late. If you know the man's tendency, you will have fun shopping with your husband. For example, in order to make your husband to go to a shopping center, you might first want to find out what your husband wants to buy and go to buy it together. How about making a list, the things to buy for your husband and for yours and show to your husband? (Maybe you don’t need to write down all the things that you need to buy). If your husband knows the clear targets, he will to go to the shopping center with you and will buy what he wants to buy. During that time, you should buy what you need to buy. Like this, you can try to make your husband to shop slowly. But it would be better not to shop for too long. According to Allan & Barbara Pease, most men have only about 30 minutes to concentrate on shopping. So, I think it’s better for you to go shopping with your husband no more than an hour. And when you see the things your husband bought, why don’t you praise them. If you show your uneasy feeling to your husband for what he has bought, whether verbally or nonverbally, because they look expensive and obsolete to you, then your husband will not want to go shopping again with you because you hurt his pride. I think it would be better for you to shop according to the level of your husband’s shopping mental capacity and then slowly bringing it up to your shopping mental capacity even though he will never be able to fully reach your shopping mental capacity. Someday your husband may go to a 24 hours shopping place with you and shop until 3 o'clock in the morning. Haha.