In Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus (one of the highest selling books of the 90's) John Gray posited that men and women relate to the world and each other in fundamentally different ways.

In my experience growing up in the Western world, boys and men are discouraged from showing vulnerability, emotion, or feelings as a rule, with the exception of anger, from a very early age (big boys don't cry) therefore the suppressed yet expressive language of emotion is kinda lost on many of us dudes - much to the consternation of our (female) partners and visa versa!

And no, hunger is not considered a "feeling" in this sense - we are talking about emotions - fear, sadness, joy, anger, excitement, grief - get the picture?

So here's my challenge if you dare - and this takes some balls if you are a man, and no less if you are a woman!

So if you are willing, tell us firstly if you are m/f, or any other chosen gender assignment, and then I'll give you multiple choice pairs to make it easier - answer any combo you like ;)

1. A) Which emotion do you feel most threatened by, or which do you have most trouble expressing?
   B) What is your dominant emotion?

2. A) On a scale of 1-10, how masculine do you consider yourself (1 being feminine, 10 being masculine)
   B) And on a scale of 1-10, how heterosexual do you consider yourself (1 being gay, 5 being bi, 10 being hetero)

3. Do you have any opinion, anecdote, joke, concern, question you would like to express regarding gender or the language of emotion?

Thanks for playing! Here are my answers:

1. a) anger (scares the crap outa me) and sadness (unable to cry in front of another person)
   b) mmm. difficult one! I was gonna say being a miserable bastard, but in truth I think it's fear.

2. I'd say a 7 and a 7 (yes, I am a SNAG)

3. My new Naturopathic doctor said "Dude, (okay, she didn't say 'dude') your Testosterone, T3 and Dhea levels are way lo-ow - ya need ta eat more meat boy" and then she spat a splooge of tobacco juice into a can by her desk with a pth-twang and eyed me all, like, this is America boy...
   So I'm on hormone drugs now and (to all my sensitive English / vegetarian friends) I think it only fare to warn you I may be leaving the ranks of the SNAG (Sensitive New Age Guy) you thought you knew, and becoming a testosterone pumped, red blooded, hootenannyin' carnivore. No more the shrinking omnivorous quasi vegetarian. Arrrr!!!

Pay It Forward!

This article is a part of the Pay It Forward initiative by @dragosroua.
I received this assignment in turn via @ervin-lemark 's post here!

The best comment - in my opinion, irreverent or sensitive - will receive the award according to the protocol in the root post here!.

The time limit is 24 hours after the publishing of this article which is 23:15 GMT on Jan-11-2017.

... Right then, 24hrs are up so it's time to pay it forward

A learning experience for me on this platform, and an interesting little discussion between a smattering of sporting players (I think I might have made responding a little more complicated than necessary, but there ya go

And so the winner is....

well... @trevor.george - thanks for sharing your thoughts and feelings.