What is a husband's role in marriage? Hi, my name is Paul
Friedman. I founded The Marriage Foundation
and I'd like to help you see marriage and I'd like to help you see more
of what it means to be the husband. And also I'd like you to understand more
about your wife's role, why not take a look at the whole thing?
Because if you have this sort of bird's eye view you'll be able
to implement more of the right things in your marriage than if I just say,
you need to be like this and you need to do that.
So understand that marriage is between a husband and wife in some cases, I
understand it's same sex but there's still these two
roles: the masculine and the feminine. This
is nature itself. It's kind of a cosmic thing
masculine and feminine. It exists throughout creation.
And in marriage if it's more than companionship
then you have these two elements and you're asking this question
so you want to know about the male role. And for that what we do is we go
into understanding male from a biological point of view
first because you can't ignore it for each of you, a man
and a woman. So I know there are a lot of Christian
values superimposed based on scripture
and there's nothing wrong with those but they're misunderstood
because they come across as dictates. I'd like you
to understand it from structurally. Why it is the
way it is? Let's take a look. Biologically,
the woman is equipped with the procreative tools
to carry and care for another human being. A new soul
who's coming into from their point of view
a new family to help them get started on planet earth. And
the wife therefore, the woman is equipped to do so
by kind of tricks that nature plays. Because if you think about it
caring a human being within you is asking a lot -- that's a huge
responsibility. It's a huge burden. It takes a lot of energy,
takes a lot of focus. You can't just have a baby and walk away. Go back to
work do whatever you want that baby will die.
It has to be cared for. So what nature has done with the woman
to make her good at taking bearing and taking care of this
child is nature has given
the woman, and not the man, given the woman a connection to her
heart that is incredible. That's why we look up to women
because they have this heart connection and everyone knows
what I'm talking about here is that heart is the soul.
So the woman has the connection to her true
being. Now nature doesn't want her to just become one with
God again, one with her soul, and I'm not doing a religious thing -- I'm explaining
this. It's scientific actually.
Just because western science hasn't acknowledged that it's still
real and it'll make perfect sense to you. And western psychologists who
don't want to acknowledge God and souls and all that call it
consciousness -- it doesn't even matter. It's the soul.
So the woman is tied to her soul and because nature doesn't want her
released into that soul because then she'd have
no desire to have sex which you have to have in order to
have children.
Nature confuses women with emotions because the emotions that a woman feels
is very similar to that feeling
of intuition. It's very similar. And so women routinely mistaken
their emotions for a soul connection. They trust their
emotions. In fact that's the latest thing in the psych
world is trust your emotions which is nonsense
because your emotions are actually -- I won't get into the whole thing
but they're just components in the mind. So here you have a woman who's really
connected to her heart. This is what's about your
wife and as a result,
her capacity for reasoning is typically not the same
as a man's. They don't even interact like men do. They interact with each
other almost without speaking, don't they?
And they're really good at that, at interacting.
They're really good at it. Women get along with other women
really well, usually. Now obviously, nothing is absolute in this
world including this but most women get along with other
women. It doesn't mean they're not catty behind
each other's backs but they interact well.
What do they need? If they're busy taking care of these children and
they're hyper-focused on it because this is the biological
role that they have no choice but to fulfill
if biology has its way and I'm telling you everything being
equal natural.
Then they look to men
for two things, primarily. One is they look to men
to become pregnant to give them the sperm they need to fertilize their
egg but we know how evolution works and even
if we're Christian we can't deny
evolution. They select the best
that they can have
and what are they looking for? They're looking for a man who's going to
stick around
and protect them and that is your role biologically,
but it's also your role socially within this context of your
marriage is to continue to reinforce
the fact to your wife that you are solid,
that you are not going to stray
what would that do, that you're not going to throw her under the bus
so you're going to be very supportive. So, what does it look like to her because
this is what we're really asking, isn't it? What is my role?
It looks like you're always loving, considerate, giving her the space
to be anything at the moment that she just
feels like being because you don't care because you love her.
And you love her unconditionally so you're not critical of her no matter
what she does, not critical. Now, where do most men blow
it? They blow it in thinking their role is
to be the head of the household. Yeah
meaning you should be the breadwinner. It doesn't mean you command her.
There's a principle that I teach that I think is missing
in virtually all marriage training that's out there.
And for me, it should not be missing it should be
really promoted and that element principle is the principle of free will.
She has it and you have it, and it's not a tug of war and it doesn't
mean compromise. It means understanding
that her free will is not to be messed with.
It's a gift given to her by God not by you. You don't get to go,
"Well, I'm going to allow you to have free will."
It's sort of like in the United States. The United States constitution talks
about those things that are endowed by our
creator. That the government doesn't give you
free speech. You have free speech and the government
is obligated to not be intrusive and take away your
free speech, and this is the same in your home. You're
obligated to recognize and honor her free will however, it
manifests. However, it manifests.
Now occasionally, someone will challenge me just being a wise guy. "Well, what if
her free will is to attack me with a knife and kill me?"
And you know what, my response to that is, "Come on."
You know what we're talking about here. You know what we're talking about.
What would probably be the best for you is to read one of my books.
It'll give you such an incredible grasp of what a good marriage looks like
because a marriage that is working is an amazing
institution because you got married to be happy, right?
You didn't get married to fulfill a role as a husband.
That's not why you got married. Now you want to but for the same reason
why you got married because you want to be happier and
your wife got married to be happier too. So you want
her to have that same benefit from marriage. You
both are supposed to benefit from marriage
in two distinct amazing ways. One -- you're supposed to experience and
learn how to love unconditionally so you can't even
stand it -- it's so beautiful. And the second
is to be happier every single day of your life
because you're married and you're experiencing this
joy of connectivity in this very unique
institution we call marriage.
It's a very deep topic but when you understand marriage better,
when you understand what men are, what women are
it becomes very natural for you. So take the time to learn,
you can subscribe to these videos. You'll get so
much information but of course it's better
to learn more formally. So in one of my books
it's where it's laid out so well. You could do that inexpensive, but if
your marriage is in trouble take the course for men. Now a lot of men,
a lot of men take the course for men anyway
because they have a pretty good marriage but they want to really get the best of
it, and they have figured out that I have
figured it out and so they want to come to us
and learn. The place where I start in the course for men
is with something that no one ever talks about
and it's critical, and that is learning how to control your mind.
We all know what people do when they have an anger problem, right?
They take anger management training and I go, baloney. You need to learn
how to eliminate anger and you can when you learn how to
control your mind and so that's where we begin with the
courses. You learn about the mind and then you
learn tools that you need to control it. When I have
taught therapists
I'll never forget the first group of therapists because I've been doing this
since 2000, and I thought, "Okay, I'm going to
show them how the mind works," and they're going to
go, "Yeah, we all know that." None of them knew it. It was amazing
and these people were not like new therapists.
Some were 30-year veterans. They were the best of the best in San Diego County
and they were like it was all new to them.
No one ever taught them how the mind works
and then they couldn't get it in the first session. I thought, why not
because we're not used to this stuff. It's deep stuff and it's cool stuff and
it's all for one purpose -- happiness.
We get married to be happy. You get married to experience
love. Need I say more and so, need I say more I'll end this
video. Blessings to you! Blessings to your wife!
Blessings to your family! Like, comment, follow
you know the drill. Thanks for spending your time with me! Take care!