G.E.A.R. to Humans (5)
Man, Woman and Reactions
This is the last part of this series. There is a chance that I would talk about these different topics later on here. It just happens to be the 30th day of my community’s writing challenge and I want to stop here to mark the end.
Thank you for reading my content for the past 30 days. I am sure it wasn’t always smooth but you understood me. If you are just getting here, please look out for parts 1–4 for context.
So, on Emotions and Reactions.
There is this tendency to always go with the stereotypical way of apportioning emotional behaviour. Even with science and psychology, the statistics show that the ‘emotional’ beings are more of women than men but they give their reasons for that.
In the psychology of emotions, there are two positions of thoughts: emotional processing and emotional reaction. The science behind the psychology of emotions shows that men and women feel the same kinds of emotions 95% of the time (with the exception of those that are slow to feeling things; both men and women). Emotional processing involves feeling emotions and interpreting them.
Where the difference comes to play is the emotional reaction. Many studies attribute emotional reactions to societal constructs and stereotypes because originally, those feelings should evoke similar reactions from both parties.
A study from Everyday Health describes this idea of stereotypical reactions as the reason for how boys and girls are raised in misconceptions.
Now, the goal of this article is not to say cry when you do not want to. I have only cried once since 2019 and I’m female, a lady. Not because there were no troubling times but because I saw someone’s strength and it gave me so much more respect for him. I cried out of respect and honour.
My goal here is to show you that you just might be stuck with stereotypes and misconceptions in your head about emotions and how to react to situations. Rather than join a bandwagon of people who just follow trends, tell yourself the honest truth and make research on those stereotypes.
Not all girls cry, not all boys want to cry, boys should cry when they have to, girls should stay strong when they have to. Girls can process their thoughts and not act out in anger, boys can process their thoughts and do things rationally.
We can all be good people without always attributing things to stereotypes. Well, it may look like I have brandished stereotypes as the bad guy here when, in fact, some people actually fit right into those stereotypes. This person writing to you still fixed a couple of people in a stereotype today.
But, I’m saying that when you meet people who don’t (many people do not), try to hide your shock. You can try to see them outside of the stereotype you have and converse with them from this point.
Adieu
It has been a fun ride, this 30-days writing challenge.
Thanks for riding along.
