My Favorite things about Rob Becker's show
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Rob Becker's Tour DEFENDING THE CAVEMAN
Plant some trees
This is the "Caveman Theory"........ Rob Becker thoguth of this, these are mostly his words, and I can't wait until he writes and publishes his book, because you should get his book. ==================================================================================================================================================================== ==================================================================================================================================================================== The cave man ==================================================================================================================================================================== These are notes from a great show by rob Becker. When he comes out with his book, I’ll remove this page. Until then, please enjoy these observations and try to go to hear his show. You can find it at www.angelfire.com/fl4/cavemanwoman and look for the link to his tour website. \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ ==================================================================================================================================================================== In the cave days, there were hunters and there were gatherers. Think of hunter like this. Someone who can focus on its prey, to the exclusion of everything else, until it’s dead. Men are great at this. It has its drawbacks. Like, men have to turn down the radio when they get lost. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 1. Think of men and women as different cultures. ==================================================================================================================================================================== One culture is based on negotiations and the other on cooperation. Imagine six people sitting around a bowl of chips, watching TV. The bowl is empty. What do the women do? The first one who notices it says, “I’ll go get some chips.” The second one says, Oh, I’ll get some more wine.” The third woman gets up and offers to clear some dishes. Soon everyone is partying in the kitchen, working together to get the next round of snacks. That’s cooperation (and a better way of life, don’t you think?) ==================================================================================================================================================================== Now imagine a bunch of guys sitting around a bowl of chips. The bowl is empty. The first guy who notices it says, “Hey, the bowl is empty. Whose turn is it to get some more?” The second guy says, “Well, I got the chips, so somebody else can go get them.” “It’s my bowl,” says the third guy. The last guy tries to describe how he helped with this party, but his excuse has the lowest value: “It’s my house.” He loses, the whole group continues to watch the TV and the guy who lost the negotiations goes to get more chips from the kitchen. That’s a negotiation that focuses on win-lose. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 2. Compliments Guys, learn about this one. Watch what happens when girls meet. “You look great. Is that a new dress?” “Gee, thanks. Yes. I just got ==================================================================================================================================================================== it and you look cute, too. OK let’s go.” What happens when two guys meet? “Hi, butthead.” “How’re you doing, you old SOB? Wanna brewski?” It somehow doesn’t work if a guys tells a woman that she’s a butthead. And if you don’t start a date (within the first thirty seconds) with a compliment about her clothes, you are in big trouble. You have a special problem if she asks, “How do I look?” You might as well go home right now. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 3. FIGHTING guys fight differently than women. When two guys fight, they cream each other (they hit each other until they are liquid, like cream), call each other names and then forget about it. “Let’s go watch TV.” When women fight, they talk about their feelings. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 4. WATCHING TV Guys can’t do a lot of things at once. This hunter attitude affects everything we do. When we watch TV, we become the TV. We merge with the TV. I’m aware of a buzzing sound in the background, and it’s not coming from the TV. It gets louder and louder and suddenly I realize that my wife is standing right next to me, shouting, “Haven’t you been listening to me? I’ve been asking you to come help me with washing the dishes.” Now compare the cave woman with the cave man. She used to walk out in groups. You can’t get locked into one thing when you are gathering fruits and nuts. You have to look to see if the fruit is ready. You talk with your neighbor, you look behind you, you notice your children, you have to look at everything around you, colors, sizes, movement, everything -- and that’s shopping! ==================================================================================================================================================================== 5. CLOTHES A hunter uses a shirt until it wears out, until it is dead. A gatherer stores things, even when the old things haven’t worn out. So a gatherer needs more storage area than a hunter. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 6. OPINION ON A HOUSE A guys opinion of a house, a painting or address depend son “Can I buy this?” “Is it too expensive for me?” He wants to know if he can kill it. If he can’t kill it, he ignores it. He hunts for something he can kill. His wife asks, “What do you think about this house? Can you imagine us living there?” No, I can’t afford it. I don’t have enough money, so I can’t imagine it. If you are a good advertising person, you can get inside the mind of a woman, who does much of the shopping. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 7. WORDS a woman uses on average 7000 words in a day. A man uses 2000. At the end of the day, I don’t say very much, so my wife thinks I’m in a bad mood, …. But really I’m out of words. Guys prefer action. We want to talk a little and then go do something. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 8. ON THE TELEPHONE My friend is sad (he lost his girlfriend or his car was stolen). “Yeah, I hear you. Yeah, Yeah. Well, just forget about her. Yeah. I’ll see you tomorrow, Bye.” A woman will spend houses on the phone asking about how her friend is feeling and then listening to each word. A guy can’t do this. (not unless he’s been trained). ==================================================================================================================================================================== 9. in a restaurant. Watch how two couples sit down. The guys will face each other and sit at least 3 feet away, not too close. The women will lean in to each other, trying to get their heads close, as close as possible. That way, the words won’t have to take as long to travel. The information has to be transferred quickly. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 10. When a couple visits another couple, the women immediately get down to the information exchange. The guys stand around and don’t really know where to begin and what to say. Guy 1: “What have you been doing?” “Work” Guy 1: “oh.” “How are things with you?” Guy 1: “Fine” “Let me show you something in the garage.” Guy 1: “Okay,.” Finally, something in common. Talk turns to action for a guy. Guys gotta move around. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 11. In the car on the way home, my wife asks me, “So, what did you guys talk about?” I have to say, “Nothing special. Well, I saw his new drill and he has a great set of screwdrivers.” My wife has found out that the couple is having marital problems, they are in counseling, and their roof is leaking. Women love details, and I have no details to give my wife. What use am I? ==================================================================================================================================================================== Women bond through the exchange of details. (HINT to GUYS: Guys, you can help a woman feel happier by actually taking time to notice things, to share details about your life, to get into her world and ask her about her details, and to tell her some details about your life.) ==================================================================================================================================================================== 12. SHOWING SUPPORT – the genders have different ways to show support for a friend. Guys show support by making a joke. When I appeared on a funny talk show (David Letterman’s show), my friend said to me, “They’ll let anybody on that show.” This means that he’s happy for me and he hopes that I will do well. When he says something negotiate, I know that he loves me. Of course, I have to compete with him, so I tell him, “Screw you, you bastard,” which means, “Thanks for your support, you’re a great friend.” That’s how guys show that they love and support each other. You will not hear women say these things to each other. Women show support by listening, by asking details, by getting excited and really wild about the news. “Oooooooo!” ==================================================================================================================================================================== 13. HINT TO WOMEN when you want your man to talk with you, make sure that he is in the room. His body might be there, but he might be focused somewhere else. He can’t be in two places at once. He is not multi-tasking. He can’t jump back from his thoughts quickly, so you need to let him know you are there. You could start by touching him. Guys like physical contact and this will make sure that he focuses on you. Wait for him to notice you. This might take as long as six seconds. Then you can start to talk with him. Remember, he can focus on only one thing at a time. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 14. CARS Cars are the extension of a man’s territory. If a car cuts me off and my family is in the car, I will chase that other driver. My wife asks me, “What will you do when you catch him?” I tell her that I don’t know. Haven’t thought that far ahead. I just want to scare him to stop him from bothering my family. “Don’t come back to this cave,” is the ancient message. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 15. How to put a man in pain. Clean the house and ask him, “Do you notice anything different?” they guy might say, “Uh, is this a test? Uh, you moved the TV guide? Uh, is that a new carpet?” He just doesn’t keep track or notice the details. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 16. HOUSEWORK here’s another area where there is a clash between the culture of NEGOTIATION (guys) and COOPERATION (women). A woman stands up and starts dusting. She assumes that everyone else in the house will do the same and do something to help finish the work. The guy is thinking, “Wow, and I didn’t have to negotiate that one. Great! It’s something that she wants to do and she’s doing it.” He continues to read the newspaper. Bad idea. The smart guy will just go ahead and cooperate with his wife until the cleaning urge is finished. Any attempt to negotiate an end to the dusting activity is going to be dangerous, unless you have cooperated for at least fifteen minutes. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 17. FISHING If you ask a guy to sit by the lake for hours and just talk, he would go nuts. But ask him to do something, like fishing, and he wants to do it. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 18. What were the hit movies of the 1950s? John Wayne movies. The man was strong as a rock, silent and on a horse. In the 1960s, the man was on a motorcycle, silent and he was stoned. In the 1970s, Woody Allen movies were popular (talkative, unsure of himself and sensitive) 1980s,. the guy was Don Johnson. So it was cool to wear pastel and sensitive colors. IN the 1990s, the cool guy is like GHOST (with Patrick Swayze). He still is with you, but he’s dead, so he doesn’t leave hair in the sink or the bathroom. This is the wife’s fantasy. ==================================================================================================================================================================== 19. How do we get beyond these difficulties? We need to participate in each other’s ways of thinking and doing things without judgment. Sometimes we can sit but not talk. Like when guys sit and watch a football game (on TV or in real life) or next to a lake or in a boat when they fish. ==================================================================================================================================================================== A woman might say, “If we’re not going to talk, I might as well be in another room.” Guys, try to listen and be in her world without judgment. You can wander, explore, suspend logic, imagine, and dive into your feelings. Remember wheat the Caveman did. He protected the cave and made it safe for the Cave woman to create her magic. Magic doesn’t follow logic, but magic is special and we need it to make the world an interesting place. ==================================================================================================================================================================== ==================================================================================================================================================================== You have to see the tour! http://www.cavemania.com/tour/index.html == Robe Becker is fantastic. ==================================================================================================================================================================== Thank you for visiting my page at Angelfire. Please come back and visit again! ============================================================================================================================================================================== One of steve's friends wrote a Steve: I took a look at your caveman stuff. While I find it very funny, I do not agree with a lot of it. My wife considers me a "girly man" because I would rather watch an Audrey Hepburn movie than a James Bond flick (Nancy prefers Bond). Ever since I heard the expression on "Sex in the City", I have referred to myself as a "gay straight man". However, I do not think that I am that atypical, and there is the rub. It is all so populer to portray men and male values as brutish and insensative. Yet I do not consider myself, or my friends (such as you) to be brutish. We do not bang drums and hunt. We do talk about relationships and such things. To be sure, men and women are different. However, it has been my experience that men are more cooperative than women. The history of civalizations seems to bear this out, for how could we have accomplished what we have without cooperating? It has also been my experience that when a woman "wants to talk", what she really wants is for the man to shut up and listen. She is generally not the least bit interested in what the man has to say. Next time you are out and about, listen to the conversations that men are having with each other around you. Yes, you will hear lots of shop talk, but you will also hear lots of 'girly talk' as well. Men talk to each other about feelings plenty. The reason I have jumped on a soap box here is because I resent the fact that everyone assumes that men are loud, beer guzzling, insenstive jerks. If a man isn't, then he must be gay. I like to be loud and guzzle beer, but I also abhor organized sports, discuss my emotions with other guys, express myself through art, theater and writing, and I like interior decorating. What does that make me? what about you? I am man, hear me emote... ================================================================================================================================================================================ What needs to be corrected in this letter from my friend? The answer is below.... =========================================================================================================================================================================== Steve: I took a look at your caveman stuff. While I find it very funny, I do not agree with a lot of it. My wife considers me a "girly man" because I would rather watch an Audrey Hepburn movie than a James Bond flick (Nancy prefers Bond). Ever since I heard the expression on "Sex in the City", I have referred to myself as a "gay straight man". However, I do not think that I am that atypical, and there is the rub. It is all so populAr to portray men and male values as brutish and insensItive. Yet I do not consider myself, or my friends (such as you) to be brutish. We do not bang drums and hunt. We do talk about relationships and such things. To be sure, men and women are different. However, it has been my experience that men are more cooperative than women. The history of civIlizations seems to bear this out, for how could we have accomplished what we have without cooperating? It has also been my experience that when a woman "wants to talk", what she really wants is for the man to shut up and listen. She is generally not the least bit interested in what the man has to say. Next time you are out and about, listen to the conversations that men are having with each other around you. Yes, you will hear lots of shop talk, but you will also hear lots of 'girly talk' as well. Men talk to each other about feelings plenty. The reason I have jumped on a soap box here is because I resent the fact that everyone assumes that men are loud, beer guzzling, insensItive jerks. If a man isn't, then he must be gay. I like to be loud and guzzle beer, but I also abhor organized sports, discuss my emotions with other guys, express myself through art, theater and writing, and I like interior decorating. What does that make me? what about you? I am man, hear me emote... \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ Steve's reply: The connection between the "Feeling" side of the brain and the "VERBAL" side of the brain is stronger with many women. They can instantly access their feelings and put them into words. I can't do that. I know that my connection is limited and I prefer to think that biology has pre-selected me to have a thin connection. I'm sure there are men with a stronger or bigger connection between feelings and words. They aren't gay, they are just better at putting their feelings into words. I have to train myself to be civilized (to watch theater and movies with Audrey Hepburn). The child in me wants to see an action movie and my general tendency, usually, is toward the focused near-term goal. I'm not good at planning many things at the same time, especially if the things are mundane and not exciting. In short, I'm a sensitive caveman who needs to work to be more multi-tasking. Steve
