I've told the story that led to the question I posed the other day. Is submissiveness appropriate in male/female relations? I was having a conversation with a young, well-educated woman. The discussion of marriage prompted the topic of culture and submissiveness. I shared with this particular woman my own experiences and I really wish I could have gone into greater depth with her to maybe allow her to see POSSIBILITY rather than limitations.

I believe that a certain amount of submissiveness is essential to successful relationships, including male-female one's. As children, we are all subject to whomever is responsible for our care. If this isn't learned in this first essential relationship, then future relationships will be more difficult to endure. Both men and women, especially in the marital bond, are required to exercise a degree of submissiveness. One cannot be more dominant than another. Looking at successful parent-child relationships, the same temperate submission must be fostered. If it were a dictatorship, the relationship would not be a productive one. We see this type of stuff in government as well.

I think every relationship, whether at the macro level or micro, would be more productive and foster happiness if everyone exercised more humility and less self-righteousness. More compassion and less judgment. Love flows more freely when those positive qualities are nourished.