“Pusechek, I’m home,” Marina said loudly, slamming the front door, “where are you?” “Musechka, you’ve come!” I am so glad to see you! Large three-room apartment, furnished with expensive furniture. A married couple lives there - Marina and Victor. Marina is thirty-five years old. She is a businesswoman and director of a company. Her husband, Victor, is forty-one years old. He hasn’t worked for over a year now and is running the household. “Musechka, I prepared an incredibly delicious dinner!” Let’s eat soon! “Now, my dear, I’ll change clothes and be happy to try everything you’ve prepared.” You are such a great guy! Everything is so clean, it really shines! How I love you! – And I love you, my Musechka! You are so strong to me. I admire you. And I’m so pleased that you like the way I cook and clean our house.” Smiling, Marina went into the bedroom, put on home clothes and returned to the kitchen, where a warm dinner was waiting for her. “Musechka, how do you like it?” All liked it? Tasty? Maybe I added extra spices? – Victor said while his wife was eating. “Everything is fine, Pusechek!” You cook very tasty food. I liked everything. What will we do next? At that moment the bell rang. Marina picked up the phone and began discussing work issues. The conversation dragged on. Sighing, she took the laptop, a folder with documents and went into the office to continue working - only this time at home. Victor sighed, removed the dishes from the table and washed them. Knocking on his wife’s door, he carefully opened the door and asked in a whisper: “Musechka, did something happen?” - Oh, eternal problems, Pusechek! - Marina answered, turning around in her chair, - today I’ll sit until late, so you go to bed, and I’ll come later, okay? Are you offended? - Yes, of course. Everything is fine. Victor thought about it. Is there something wrong. But what? Everything seems to suit him: he has money and opportunities, but at the same time it’s as if he’s out of place, out of place. The man involuntarily remembered the beginning of his relationship with Marina. Then things were going well for him, his business was actively developing, bringing in a stable income. But at some point everything turned upside down: from a successful businessman he became a housewife. The feeling that life was wrong suddenly began to torment and torment him. It seemed to Victor that somehow everything was not going to work out this way. He doesn’t work, cook, clean, and when the question arises of making an important decision, his opinion is rarely taken into account. This realization gave rise to self-loathing. How did this happen? Why did he allow himself to be called “Pusechka”, and his wife suddenly became “Musechka”? Why doesn't he act like a strong man? Why does the spouse completely manage the business? These questions made Victor feel uneasy. He decided to quickly distract himself: he went to the refrigerator and took out a bottle of beer. Having drunk it in one gulp, he grinned. “I’m fine: I’m well-fed, dressed, and there’s no need to work! My wife does everything for me. I can relax all day long, play on the computer, just lie there and do nothing! The main thing is to clean up and cook food. I’m quite happy with my life.” But something inside still squeezed my heart painfully. Self-deception could not drown out the inner voice. Victor understood that he was slipping, and his relationship with his wife had long lost its former beauty. After thinking, he decided that it would be worth changing everything and living differently - as is customary in proper families, where the man is fully responsible for himself and his wife, and the woman takes care of the home. And not vice versa. *** We are accustomed to the categories “strong man” and “weak woman”. It so happened that such a model of relationships is natural. However, in the modern world, many things have changed a lot. A new norm has emerged - a weak man and a strong woman. Despite the fact that such an alliance can function for quite a long time, the partners in it will face enormous difficulties and problems. In this chapter we will consider possible options for the development of such relationships. So, let's start with the fact that in families where the woman is strong and the man is weak, both people necessarily suffer. At first glance, everything seems calm andsmoothly, but if you dig deeper, it’s obvious that everyone is unhappy in their own way. So, does one person have to be strong, and the other – his shadow? There are strong women and there are strong men. And it is important that a strong woman be with a strong man, and not with a weak one. Then it will be a harmonious union, and the relationship will develop. Everything can go wrong when someone starts to “play” a different role that is not at all natural to him. For example, a man becomes weak. Surprisingly, sometimes women can deliberately make a strong man weak out of fear of losing him. They worry that they will be actively interested in him because he is successful and confident. And he will eventually leave for someone else. Such fears lead to the fact that women begin to see any manifestation of strength in a man as something wrong and try to nip it in the bud. After some time, the man agrees with his wife’s reproaches and gradually turns from a successful person into a housewife. What is this connected with? Only what was put into us gets into us. Accordingly, the man described above once had similar negative beliefs. He knew that you couldn’t show character, you had to pretend to be weak, then they wouldn’t touch you. “You have to hide somehow so as not to think for yourself,” such men think. Some even avoid responsibility altogether, and therefore do nothing. They expect action from a woman in order to give her full power. This is where businesswomen, or rather “businessmen,” come from. The roles have changed, the emphasis of the relationship has shifted. The woman begins to do men’s things, and the man – women’s. And the concept that a man is, first of all, strength, character and perseverance, and a woman is tenderness, care, love, has been forgotten forever. At the beginning of family life, the question arises: “Who is the boss of the house”? Young people often cannot calmly resolve this: they reproach each other, shout, break dishes and even manipulate for their own benefit. All this takes a lot of vitality, which could be spent on self-development and achieving goals. When you adequately realize how high your potential is, it becomes much easier to share responsibilities. Let’s say if the husband is better at planning the family budget, let him do it; If a woman thinks through vacations and travel better, let her do it. At such moments, it is especially important to support each other’s efforts. We want to emphasize that women never truly love weak men, even if they themselves do not admit it. They do not respect them, try to humiliate them or emphasize their worthlessness. What can I say, a weak man doesn’t respect himself. He understands that he cannot do anything on his own: neither answer, nor fight back, nor make an important decision. What does a weak woman look like then? What with her? This is not a self-confident creature who will find it difficult to give birth and raise a child. She does not want to cope with difficulties, but prefers to go with the flow. Thus, a weak-willed person in a stressful situation is absolutely useless because he cannot act logically and rationally. Fear paralyzes such people. A strong person is one who makes a conscious decision in any situation and always sees different ways out of a problem situation. Why is it that there are few families headed by a strong man and a strong woman? The union of a strong woman and a weak man is more common. This is a universal problem. However, now there is an opportunity to change this by realizing the ineffectiveness of such a model of relationships. When a strong woman realizes that she is carrying everything on herself, and the man next to her is doing nothing, she begins to hate her strength. She wants to feel a strong man's shoulder, so that her partner will finally take responsibility. She feels like a man in a woman's body - of course, her emotional health begins to collapse. The question arises: what happens to the man? He finds himself in the position of a child or even a slave; begins to obey the woman and.