10 Things Guys Love That You Didn’t Expect

We men are simple creatures but are generally misunderstood. There is more to men than just good look. Men appreciate what’s inside a woman too.

Here are the things that guys love:

1. We love it when you shoot us the first text of the day

James Michael Sama over at Huffington Post said it best.^[1]

“There is a lot of pressure for guys to always initiate conversation.”

That’s very true and starts out when we first meet you. We’re the ones who walk up to you in the bar. We’re the ones who have to call back after the third day or some such thing. When it comes to talking, we usually go first. Every now and then, it’s nice to wake up and see that good morning text from you.

2. We love it when you laugh

Laughter is always the best medicine and men love giving you your daily dose of it. We will literally act intentionally stupid to generate a laugh. We’ll overact when we hurt ourselves and act sassy and sarcastic to get a smile. We thrive on your laughter even if it comes at our expenses. Do us a favor and snicker a bit when we do something goofy because we’re doing it for you.

3. We love your nurturing side

Generally speaking, we love to take care of you. It’s just what (most of us) are born to do. However, every now and then it’s nice to be taken care of. It never has to be anything absurd or grandeur. A back rub after a long day, a little soup when we’re sick, or a hug when we’re down is all we need. Few men will admit this, but we love it when we say to ourselves that we have a partner who takes care of us. It also makes us want to work harder to take care of you!

4. We love to cuddle

Now when I say we love to cuddle, I don’t mean that we love to cuddle form 11AM til 2AM the following morning. We’re men, we’re busy, and we have stuff to do. But if you want to cuddle on the couch while watching a movie or for a little while before bed, we’re totally down for that. The closeness makes us feel good and we like to make you feel safe. Chances are it’ll also put us to sleep but that’s the risk you run.

5. We love to talk about feelings

Just, you know, not our feelings. At least not all the time. We like hearing about your day and your triumphs and troubles. Your life is interesting to us (that’s why you’re in our life to begin with). Now, there is at least one rule to this. We love listening to you talk about your feelings but we mentally can’t handle doing it for like four hours at a time. That’s just ridiculous. Not one of the Lord of the Rings movies is that long. Just because we can’t listen all day long doesn’t mean we don’t care or we don’t want to. We’re men, we have short attention spans. Work with our weaknesses, please!

6. We love it when you talk about us on Facebook

Not all the time. Okay, not even some of the time. Really all we’re asking for here is a cursory mention every now and then. When we go through the trouble of surprising you with something totally awesome, we love it when you want to tell your friends about it. Posting that you love your man 45 times a day is creepy and even your man thinks so. That said, if he happens to buy you that special thing you wanted for Christmas or makes a superb dinner, do him a favor, take a picture, post it on Facebook, and show some pride in your man.

7. We love it when you listen

I mean really listen. You know as well as I do that men don’t typically open up about our feelings, fears, frustrations, etc. When we do, it is because the topic is something important to us. We love when we finally decide to open up and you care enough to hear us out. I couldn’t tell you how many times I kept something bottled up and finally opened my mouth about it and my girlfriend sat there and listened to me. The weight comes off the chest and life is all good again. It’s a great feeling that we just can’t get from our guy friends.

8. We love it when you text us when you’re out with your friends

Any guy who says he is 100% jealousy free is a 100% liar. Even the most stable relationships in the world have that 1-2% that creeps into the brain and wonders how you’re doing. We’re not asking for you to give us a play-by-play recap of your night. Chances are when you’re out with your friends, we’re watching sports listening to a guy on TV give us a play-by-play of the game. We can only take one play-by-play at a time. All we want is like a “hello” or something every so often to let us know that you’re thinking about us. It makes us feel good and keeps that bit of jealousy all men have at bay.

9. We love it when we’re needed

We may moan and groan when your car breaks down, that pickle jar won’t open, or that thing on the shelf is too high for you to reach and you ask us to help. It’s all an act. Secretly, we love helping you with these things. It makes us feel useful and that’s a feeling that’s important for a man. As with these other things, you shouldn’t go overboard with it. We like it when we’re needed but we also don’t want to spend the whole day following you around doing things for you. That’s not a relationship, that’s a job. We love being needed the most when you need help the most. It’ll take you four hours to get us to do the dishes but if you’re trapped under a bookcase and the house is burning down, you best believe we’re on that!

10. We love it when you appreciate us

Every now and then we love hearing that what we do is appreciated. Too many men on this planet go to work 40-60 hours a week, pay for the house, the food, and the bills without so much as a thank you. We know deep down you do appreciate it (at least we hope you do) but sometimes it feels really good to hear it out loud. Just something like “I know you worked hard to do this for me and I appreciate it” is good enough. It doesn’t have to be serious stuff like work and the mortgage. Dropping a “thank you my strong man” when we open the pickle jar is a really good way to get us to walk away smiling. The enticing part was my idea. You don’t have to use that if you don’t want to but secretly we love that too.

Thanks to the media, expectations, and other outside things, men have become a bigger mystery to women than women are to men. The fact is that the same thing that makes a man happy now is the same thing that made men happy 300 years ago. The times have changed and we have all changed with them for the most part. The one thing that has never changed is what makes us happy and generally, that’s you.

Featured photo credit: Unsplash via unsplash.com