Dear Daughters,
Men are like Waffles, Women are like Spaghetti was the title of a book I came upon the other day. Thinking it was a rather odd comparison, I read on….
When you look at a waffle, you see a collection of little boxes each separated by walls. Every box is detached from the other and they all make convenient holding places. Apparently this is typically how a man processes life. Their thinking is divided up into boxes that have enough room for one issue, but only one issue. The first issue of life goes into the first box, the second goes in the second box, and on and on.
A typical man, says Bill Farrell, lives in one box at a time and only one box. When a guy is at work he is at work. When he is in the garage puttering around, he is puttering around. When he is watching TV….well you know the rest of that sentence. That’s why he looks as if he’s in a trance and ignores all else that goes around him. Psychologists call this compartmentalizing – that is putting each part of life into a different compartment.
Because of the waffle structure of their brains, men are problem solvers by nature. They enter a box, look at the problem and formulate a solution. A man strategically organizes his life to spend most of his life in the boxes that he can succeed in. If possible, he will ignore the boxes that confuse him or make him feel like a failure. For example, if a man feels like his career brings him success he spends most of his time at work, at the expense of other priorities. If being home and communicating with his family is difficult he will spend more time in front of the TV. It’s a safe and comfortable box.
When it comes to communicating, men will often talk only if they believe they can reach a desirable outcome. But if they see no point to the conversation quickly, they get frustrated and clam up.
Many men find it easy to develop hobbies that consume their time. If a man finds something that he is good at and makes him feel good about his life, he will pursue it relentlessly. He may get emotionally attached to fixing, building, and maintaining projects. If he is good at gaming, research, computers, or fishing, that will become his focus. He knows what he gets back from these activities is predictable and safe, which can be much more certain than the outcome of a conversation with his wife.
So, basically men spend most of their time doing what they do best while they attempt to ignore the activities which may cause them to feel deficient. It is rather challenging for them to jump from one box to another quickly; they like to stay in a box until that subject is finished, then move on to another box.
The same day I read this interesting phenomenon about men’s brains, I decided to try it out for myself. Dad and I were working on making a Vistaprint family calendar for you girls. We have done this in the past and often ended up frustrated with each other because pictures conjure up all kinds of memories for me, but Dad is focused with the job of choosing the pictures and staying away from that inevitable walk down memory lane.
That night we needed to go through hundreds of pictures, narrowing down to 12 of our favorites. Ordinarily, I would comment on many pictures, talking about the memories that came up. I would say something like, Oh……that picture reminds me of the incredibly strong storm that came up on the lake and it was so fierce that we were out of power for 18 hours and the next day was my birthday so we went out to breakfast and later walked along Lake Michigan and…… This time, however, I decided to stay on the task at hand with no small talk. It was quite amazing how much more smoothly the process went when I let Dad stay in one box and not hop from one to another. The process was smooth and we got the job finished in record time. It was only a little difficult to refrain from bird walking.
In stark contrast to the waffle model of men, women process life more like a plate of spaghetti. Looking at a plate of pasta you notice that there are lots of individual noodles that all touch one another. If you tried to follow one noodle around the plate, you would intersect with many other noodles and who knows, you might even switch to another noodle without knowing it. That’s how women face life. Every thought and issue is connected to every other thought and issue even though it may be only in some remote way. Life is much more of a process for women than it is for men.
This is why women are so much better at multitasking than men. We can cook dinner, nurse the baby, instruct older children to quit fighting and get the table set while planning the next days’ activities. Because all our thoughts, emotions and convictions are connected we can move almost seamlessly from one piece of information to another and keep track of more activities than our husbands.
We consistently love to talk things through as we solve problems, and as we do we connect the logical, relational, emotional and spiritual aspects of the issue. Men, however, prefer to stay in one box at a time. Trying to jump boxes is tiring and confusing for them. Pam Farrel gives the following illustration of how women tend to sum up their day:
Joan gets home and says, “Honey, how was your day? I had a good day today. We just committed to a new educational wing at the university, and I have been asked to oversee the budget. I am so excited that they didn’t rule me out because I am a woman. You know women have been fighting for a place in society for decades, and it is good to see so much progress being made. I think it is neat that you treat the women who work for you with so much respect. Our daughter is so lucky to have you for a dad. Did you remember that Susie has a soccer game tonight? I think it is important we are there because the Johnsons are going to be there and I really want you to meet them. Susie and Bethany are getting to be good friends, and I think we should get to know her parents as well.”
As Joan is talking on and on her husband is getting lost, frantically trying to jump from one box to another in his waffle way of thinking. He simply cannot understand what the budget at the university has to do with Susie’s soccer game and their need to have a new friendship with the Johnsons. 
God certainly has a sense of humor when we look at men and women in the light of waffles and spaghetti. Of course He created us this way on purpose so we could complement one another. Life would be quite boring if we were the same, even though at times it sounds like a good idea. But I think He must occasionally be chuckling as He watches us learn about each other and strive to communicate. Frustrations mount and sometimes anger erupts when we just don’t understand our men and they don’t get us, but that’s why we have a lifetime to learn.
So… now that I have read the first chapter of this book, I will have to ponder better how to communicate with my husband. I can see already why it is so important to have women friends and daughters to talk with, then our noodles can overlap in conversation and it’s all good. So thankful you are my friends as well as daughters.
Love, Mom
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