Whether there are any significant differences between the male brain and the female brain has been debated for centuries.
Generally speaking, we barely understand how our brains work, let alone identify significant differences in function and form between the sexes.
As Alan Watts said, “you can’t look directly into your own eyes without using a mirror, you can’t bite your own teeth, you can’t taste your own tongue.”
Ultimately, can a brain truly understand a brain?
Without getting off track, there is some real and tangible knowledge about the brain that we can be sure of. For example, there’s generally a difference in size and weight between the male brain and the female brain.
But within the context of what I want to talk about in this article is the difference that seems to be seen over and over again in how we optimise our performance based on our sex.
What I mean is that from my experience, there is a significant difference in how we process information and complete tasks.
For men, you are probably best to try and stick with the model that has worked for us for thousands of centuries – the hunter-gatherer.
The hunter-gatherer awoke in the morning and had a singular task – to hunt food and thus feed the tribe.
During the hunt, the hunter-gatherer had to have full and undivided concentration on the dangers that existed in his environment and be focused on achieving a kill.
Get eaten, no food for the tribe. Don’t get a kill, no food for the tribe.
But achieving that goal, the hunter-gatherer not only gets the high from the adrenaline of the hunt, but also the dopamine from achieving the goal.
He also gets a dopamine hit the next morning when he recalls yesterday’s triumph and knows that he has the skills and tenacity to likely do it again.
If the hunter-gatherer was thinking about forty different things while on the hunt, he would be distracted, thus danger increases, along with the chances of missing that key moment that decides whether the hunt was a success or a failure.
Just imagine how the hunter-gatherer would feel walking into the camp without dinner!
Be fully focused, achieve the goal, and move on to the next challenge.
Within the same context of the hunter-gatherer and the tribe scenario, let’s imagine what it was like for the female members of the tribe who are tasked with maintaining the camp while the hunt is on.
They would need to be mindful of so many different things. Firstly, watch the perimeter for threats. Take care of the children and ensure they are safe. Work in collaboration with the other females, prepare food, and build fires, etc.
So, using this scenario, the female brain is capable of processing a number of different things at any one time. A successful day for the female tribe member was ensuring that the camp was safe, everyone was taken care of, and that the social cohesion of the tribe was maintained.
How does this play out today?
Transpose this across modern-day living, and the chances are that the stressed-out person, no matter which sex, is not working optimally.
The stressed man is trying to be here, there, and everywhere all at the same time. In the process, not properly dotting ‘i’s and crossing ‘t’s and feeling less than a success.
Not scoring those dopamine hits, not building self-esteem.
The stressed woman is trying to compute one hundred things at a time, well beyond her capacity. Each child, finances, work, family, friends, self-image, self-care, health, etc., is another tab open on an already overworked computer.
And from a relationship perspective, one issue that takes up a lot of the female’s processing each day can be the worry about how her partner isn’t happy within himself.
You might say that great male partners help close female tabs, and conversely, female partners keep males methodically achieving goals.
Sometimes men who have had strong female role models while growing up can be more susceptible to this phenomenon of trying to operate in a way that we were never designed.
Either way, there is a great chance here to think about changing the way that we operate, and to play more to our strengths both as individuals and in our team!
Wests Tigers Podcast - Talking everything Wests Tigers since 2018!
Definitely substance to this @joel ! Fishing (active fishing with lures and moving about, basically hunting) gives me these hits and satisfies this deep-seated hunter/gatherer within me. It's a common feeling that drives most fisher-folk.
Together with the open spaces and enjoying the environment, it calms and cleans the body. The sharp single focus of successfully catching clears the mind and gives me a re-set that cleanses me of work stress, and energises me for when I go back to work.
Quite rightly there is a big focus on fishing and mental health these days!
